Dyslexia

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Dyslexia

• Level 3 Literacy Subject Support
• M Daybell

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AIMS

• To raise awareness of dyslexia, its problems and
  indicators
• To provide experience of what it is like to be
  dyslexic
• To explore ways of helping learners with dyslexia
  

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OUTCOMES

• You will be able to
• Recognise and explain some common problems and
  indicators associated with dyslexia
• Identify some available facilities for learners
  and staff
• Suggest some appropriate reaching and learning
  strategies

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Key principles for Curriculum delivery

• In twos or threes take the four principles
  assigned to you and suggest examples from your
  practice of how you deliver there key principles.
• Record your suggestion son the paper provided and
  be prepared to feedback to the group.

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Dyslexia

• Dyslexia is one of the most common difficulties
  experienced by learners in most courses in
  post-16 education

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What is Dyslexia?

• a specific set of learning difficulties most
  commonly a difficulty with processing written
  language
• Greek dys lexia
• a veritable syndrome of language impairments
  (Critchley)

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What does it affect ?

• Reading
• Spelling
• Problems with written expression
• Difficulties with order and organisation
• ACTIVITY Try the Am I dyslexic? Checklist from
  Demystifying Dyslexia by Marysia Krupska
  Cynthia Klein, with a partner

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What are the causes of dyslexia?

• No clear agreement
• Useful perspectives are educational, cognitive,
  neurological and developmental
• Social and emotional consequences and the
  importance of diagnosis

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Incidence

• affects between 4 per cent and 10 per cent of the
  population
• the incidence in FE, the prison population is
  higher
• early identification and appropriate support is
  paramount

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A definition?

• A (specific) difficulty with automatic language
  processing affecting reading, writing and
  spelling
• A difference in cognitive style affecting
  learning, organisation and memory

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Dyslexia

• One facet of a cluster of difficulties i.e. it
  can coexist and overlap with other difficulties

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Language processing

• Visual
• Auditory
• Motor

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Experiencing dyslexia

• Nasrudin
• Read the hand out you have been given silently
• Answer the questions you will be given on the
  text
• Reflect on your ability to answer

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The dyslexic learning style-implications for
learning

• Holistic or right brain
• Problems with order, sequence , connections,
  parts - but good at seeing simultaneous
  connections and patterns
• Difficulties with linguistic coding when
  dealing with the written word
• A difference which can offer alternative routes
  to success

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This means

• Limited strategies for storing and retrieving
  language based tasks
• A reliance on meaning
• A need to take a more roundabout route
• Poor short term memory

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This also means

• An emphasis on long term memory
• Easily overloaded
• Lack of flexibility in linguistic tasks
• Learning from lots of specific examples rather
  than rules e.g. spelling
• Problems with structure rather than content and
  ideas

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All this implies.

• A highly personalised approach to learning
• A need to have the learning process and
  conventions made explicit
• a need to understand how and why-metacognition

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Finding out
The earthquake of diagnosis
I felt relieved
I also felt angry
I felt cheated
I wanted to talk to somebody
My husband is still very sceptical
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Help in the classroom

• Samples of Student Writing AB Sheet 10
• Use the selection as the basis for a group
• discussion.
• Refer to Access for All and
• The Ten Top Tips Handout for Supporting
• Adults with Dyslexia and/or
• related specific learning difficulties
• Report your findings to the group

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Who else can help?

• All learners are entitled to an initial
  assessment of their difficulties under the DDA
  and to appropriate support
• This can mean additional specialist support,
  examination provision , access to equipment,
  access to funding for HE.

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What happens at your place of work ?

• Have staff received awareness training in
  identifying and supporting learners with possible
  dyslexia?
• Are learners who disclose dyslexia on enrolment,
  or who are later thought to have dyslexic
  difficulties, referred to a specialist or
  Co-ordinator?
• Do they receive an assessment interview?
• Do they receive group or one to one support as
  required?
• Is a full assessment by a specialist trained
  tutor or a psychologist available if necessary?
• Is there access to specialist software etc.?

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What you should do?

• Refer to Access for All for teaching strategies
  and resource information. Cross refer from
  sections on other difficulties to see how
  strategies can overlap
• Find out what the procedure for assessing and
  supporting dyslexic learners is in your
  organisation
• Aim for success with dyslexic learners

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Finally, name .

• One effect of late diagnosis (i.e. post 16)
• One indicator of possible dyslexia
• One facility available to you to support
  dyslexic learners
• One appropriate teaching strategy for a dyslexic
  learner who gets anxious in groups

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Further reading

• A Framework for Understanding Dyslexia
• http//excellence.qia.org.uk/page.aspx?o124856
• This is a comprehensive overview which you can
• dip into selectively
• Access for All
• http//www.dcsf.gov.uk/curriculum_literacy/access/
  dyslexia/
• For background and practical teaching approaches-
  a
• companion to your curriculum documents