Your Questions And Answers

Here are the most frequent questions that we get:

What does Easyread Cost?

If you click to the information page on each course, you will see a link to the pricing at the bottom of the page.

It all sounds great, but why have I not heard of you before?

Easyread has been in development since early 2000 and thousands of children have been through our courses. However, to date we have avoided pushing for publicity because we wanted to be sure to two things first:

1 Our systems were as good as they could get

2 We could handle high numbers of children coming through the system as a result of mainstream media publicity

We are pretty much there on both scores. In the meantime you can benefit from Easyread "before the rush", while we are still in direct control of the number of people using the system.

I can put you in touch with one of the thousands of parents and schools that have used Easyread. They can tell you what they have seen with their own eyes.

How do I know you are bona fide?

There are some scams out there and it is reasonable to be concerned on the Internet! All I can suggest is that I put you in touch with a parent or teacher in your area and you can discuss with them what they have experienced with Easyread.

In addition, you actually have quite considerable protection through your credit card supplier. There is a process called "chargeback" which allows you to process a refund on any debit that appears on your credit card statement. It is then up to the supplier to provide proof of purchase and delivery.

It is a hassle for the credit card companies so that do not promote this chargeback facility much. But I have actually used it (against an Italian car hire company...!) and it really works well. Of course you will never need to think of it with us because we offer an unconditional guarantee anyhow.

I have wasted money before. How do I know this will be different?

It is certainly possible to waste a lot of money in this area. A tutor will cost hundreds of pounds quite quickly, some of our competitors charge thousands of pounds and a school for dyslexics will cost tens of thousands of pounds. Nobody I know of offers the sort of guarantee we do. And a council statement for support is about as common as hens' teeth nowadays.

So it is a fair concern.

We want you to be able to try Easyread without having to worry about wasting money. That is why we give you our unconditional guarantee. If for some reason we cannot help, that will be very disappointing for everyone, but at least it won't have wasted any of your money. We will refund you every penny.

We can only do that because the course generally goes very well. We do have around one in twenty children stop after around 3-4 weeks for a variety of reasons. And around 0.5% stop later in the course because they do not feel it is achieving the aim.

So, with those drop out rates so low, we can afford to take the risk away from you.

Who is David Morgan?

That is described in detail in the book manuscript that you will find here.

Is Easyread a Charity or Business?

Oxford Learning Solutions is run as a social enterprise. All profits have been ploughed back into developing new systems for making all learning easier for every child. We are currently working on a foundation reading course, an adult reading course, language learning systems and a dyscalcula aid.

As a social enterprise we retain the facility to pay a moderate dividend (around 3 to 5% of turnover) to those who have helped finance the development of the organisation.

I am in the USA/Africa/Australia/NZ... Can I sign up?

Yes, we can deliver Easyread anywhere in the world without a problem. We currently price Easyread in Pounds Sterling, American Dollars, Australian Dollars and New Zealand Dollars.

How Long Does It Take?

We recommend a daily lesson where possible and most people average 4-5 per week. On that basis, with normal breaks for holidays, we usually expect to see the following progress:

Of course the exact timings of progress do vary from child to child. These are just an average benchmark that we work from.

What happens when we are away for holidays or cannot log on?

The system just waits for you to return. That is no problem.

What if I want to stop the lessons?

The courses come with an unconditional guarantee. So, if you don't think that it is suitable for your child, or we are not achieving the aim then you can stop at any stage and ask for a full refund.

If you want to stop because we have achieved the aim, then that is fine of course, but we do expect to be paid the full cost of the course. Most of our costs come very early in the course and so our spread payment option is there to help your cash flow, not to reflect the "cost per month".

We can only do 2-3 lessons per week. Is it worth it?

As you know, we prefer a daily routine with the lessons. But if you have to choose between something that isn't ideal and nothing at all, then something is definitely better than nothing. After all, tutors normally only do one lesson per week.

And we can extend your account as necessary so that you can finish the course.

How do I get the second child discount?

Once you have created your account, with one child subscribed, you will be able to access the sign-up process for the second child from within the Administration Zone of your account.

My child is 9. Would Easyread still be suitable for her?

Yes. We have a lot of children come through in the 7-9 range, because that is where you start to see a child drop behind. We also have teenagers work through the course successfully. As each year goes by the bad habits get more ingrained. So progress can be easier for a 7-year-old than a 9-year-old. But we get there in the end.

My child is pre-school. Is it too soon to start?

We have a steady flow of younger children do the course. You can repeat the lessons as much as you want, so we recommend going through the foundation course quite slowly. But the good news is that your child will be going in the right direction. And there is no hurry. You can take a break and come back to it if necessary.

My child is 14. Is that too old for Easyread?

This will depend on your child. Easyread is formatted to be fun and easy for 6-9 year-old children. If your child is happy to work with the format we use, then it can get the same results with a teenager that it does with a younger child.

Really you want to get a solution now, which means using Accelerator or Spellmagic. But you can wait for Maximizer (our new youth/adult version) if you prefer, or your child is unhappy about doing the other versions.

How do we access the lessons?

You create an account on our website and then log on for each lesson using the link at the top left corner of our home page. All the lessons are delivered over the Internet and so you can access them from anywhere. And each lesson will wait until your child logs on the next time.

How long is each lesson?

We keep the lessons very short. The absolute maximum time we suggest that you ever spend on a lesson is 15 minutes. Many are 5-10 minutes.

People sometimes comment "I have seen amazing progress, but I can't believe it is coming from your very short lessons". Yes, I can get a little irritable about it, when the child has gone nowhere in 3 years and is now progressing well after just 2-3 months!

We keep the lessons very short for a whole rack of neural and psychological reasons. The short lessons get much better results than longer lessons. With a very demanding brain activity like learning to read, doing more than 15 minutes can become a waste of time or actively detrimental to progress.

How long is the course?

There are 223 lessons in the Accelerator course and 189 in the Spellmagic course. They are both divided into 4 levels and there are around 25,000 words in the course materials.

However, we also have a roll-on fifth level if you want to do more lessons and continue the stories presented in the later parts of the main course. Effectively we have sufficient material to work on until your child has achieved the aim.

How far does Easyread go?

The text through the second half of the course is long and complex. It is certainly well above the average level of text read by most elementary school pupils.

However our main aim is what we call "reading takeoff". This is the moment when you walk into your sitting room and find your child lying on the sofa reading something by choice, without having been prompted by you. At that point, it is your child's own enthusiasm and interest in the reading materials available that will deliver a lot of the progress.

My child is dyslexic. Will Easyread help?

There are several causes of dyslexia and we focus on those. We find there is usually a solution once you know why someone is struggling to read. So yes, Easyread will usually help.

My child has learning difficulties. Would Easyread be suitable?

We have many children with learning difficulties do Easyread and get good progress. It does take longer and they may still be quite slow readers. But it almost always does get good progress for them, particularly for visual children with aspergers syndrome or mild autism.

Do I need to sit with my child?

Over the early weeks your input will be critical. We need you to monitor and assist your child.

Once the foundation is built, we like you to keep in touch with the lessons, but some children can do them unassisted.

Will it conflict with what my child is learning at school?

Most children doing Easyread are also learning to read at school and we have never had any instance where a problem has arisen from confusion over two parallel courses.

The truth is that Easyread gets results about 4 or 5 times faster than most conventional teaching systems. So what's happening at school becomes fairly irrelevant and the children seem quite capable of dealing with two approaches at once. In fact, I think it is usually a help.

Got a Question We Haven't Answered?

Then contact us by email or telephone

Use Easyread for Reading Help and Spelling Help