Dyslexia - myth or highly specific learning difficulty?
Graham Stringer MP’s view (14.1.09) that dyslexia is a myth supported by a dyslexia industry, illustrates the confusion that surrounds poor literacy achievement in the UK and the inaccurate use of diagnostic labels for specific learning difficulties.
It is certainly true that a percentage of children fail to read and write as a result of poor or inappropriate teaching methods, and that the teaching of phonics is an esential part of teaching children to read.
However, there are a number of other reasons why an otherwise intelligent child might fail to achieve reading, writing and spelling levels commensurate with chronological age.
In a series of small scale independent studies carried out across the UK between 2001 and 2005, it was found that the balance and coordination abilities of 38% of 7 - 8 year olds and 45% of 4 - 5 year olds were immature. Problems with balance, posture and coordination can affect the development of the eye movements necessary for reading and writing (Child Care in Practice. Vol 11/4 pp 415-432, 2005). Not all of these children have dyslexia, but the lack of oculo-motor control can interfere with the acquisition of literacy skills. These studies found a corellation between immature physical abilities and lower educational performance.
Children diagnosed with dyslexia can have a mixture of phonological deficit with or without additional visual processing and motor-perceptual problems. These children, need a combination of therapy aimed at improving the underlying deficit and specialist teaching to support the weaker skills. It is unlikely that a single method of teaching as suggested by Graham Stringer would eliminate the clinically identifiable features of true dyslexia.
May 8th, 2009 at 5:02 pm
Interesting article.
It seems to me that comments by Graham Stringer and Julian Elliott have exposed a narrowness of deffinition with regards to dyslexia. Whilst educationalists would clearly be happy once dyslexics such as myself achieve our 5 grade C or above GCSEs, and progress on out of their area of concern, we as dyslexics have the same brain architecture through the rest of our lives.
Dyslexia confers many advantages as well as disadvantages. The problem for most dyslexics is not the way our brains function, but the fact the world had been built and organised by and for the non-dyslexic majority.
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