A child reads a sentence. By the time they reach the end, they've forgotten the beginning. They go back to the start. The same thing happens. They think they're 'bad at reading,' but what's actually breaking is their working memory, the small, temporary workspace where the brain holds sounds and meanings while it processes text.
the bottleneck
Decoding a word takes more effort for a dyslexic reader. By the time they've sounded out 'frightened,' their working memory is already crowded. The next word arrives before the first one has been tucked into long-term storage. Sentences don't cohere into meaning because the workspace keeps emptying. It's not attention span; it's a memory bandwidth problem.
what helps
- Shorter sentences, more full stops. Teachers can break long compound sentences into two. The meaning arrives in digestible packets.
- Audio alongside text. Hearing the words frees the working memory from decoding, so the meaning has room to land.
- Re-reading the same short passage. Familiar text uses less working memory because decoding is already partly done. The child can focus on meaning.
- Visual anchors: finger-tracking, reading rulers, line markers. These reduce the cognitive load of 'where am I?' so more memory is available for 'what does it say?'
how wobble eases the load
Wobble reads aloud the line under your finger. The child doesn't have to hold the decoded words in memory; the voice holds them instead. This lets the child follow the meaning across the sentence without the workspace emptying at every third word. Over time, as decoding becomes more automatic, the working memory frees up, and the child can read silently for longer stretches. The audio isn't a crutch; it's a scaffold.
If a sentence disappears as soon as you've read it, the problem isn't your eyes. It's that your brain is working so hard to decode that there's no room left to remember. Give it some room, and the reading will come.