Dyslexia Symptoms and Explanation

Defining Dyslexia

Dyslexia is an "unexpected difficulty with reading."   It is a simple description of a learning difficulty. Dyslexia does not mean that a child is below grade level with their reading.  It means rather that there is a discrepancy between performance in other academic areas and reading, a discrepancy that can persist.

According to Sally Shaywitz, author of Overcoming Dyslexia, up to 40% of children do not take to reading easily.  This is not surprising -- reading is a relatively new human invention and so there it no reading region in the brain.  This is why development of reading skills is so unpredictable.

Dyslexia Symptoms

Gemm Learning provides dyslexia help using Fast ForWord and BrainWare Safari software.   But first, it is helpful to know if your child does indeed exhibit signs of dyslexia so that you know whether action is merited or not.

Here's a short list of dyslexia symptoms and signs:

• a family history of learning difficulties
  
• difficulties with spelling
  
• confusion over left and right
  
• difficulty with sequencing letters, words and facts
  
• language difficulties
  
• difficulty following 2- or 3-step instructions.
  

For reading and spelling symptoms in detail, see our list below.

Early Signs

If a young child cannot hear "cat" as containing three sounds -- "c-a-t" --sounding out words is not going to be easy, and decoding will require much more effort than it should.  Children switch d's and b's not because they see them the same, but because they hear them the same.
Looking for Early Clues

Slow auditory processing also impacts working memory and a number of other language skills that impact reading. The fact that language processing is the most common cause of dyslexia is not surprising. Processing language is not easy. It is lightning fast -- "one, one thousand" is one second, but there are 12+ separate sounds in there to be processed, heard and understood.
Auditory Processing and Reading

Later Diagnosis

Many children get to 4th grade or even later before dyslexia or reading issues are discovered. These children have been able to get by with memorization and/or an ability to multi-task (concentrate on decoding and comprehension) as long as the text is relatively simple. But as the reading comprehension gets challenging their reading problems "suddenly" surface. or high level reading, decoding has to be automatic.

Middle and High School Reading Comprehension

Symptoms In Details

Children with dyslexia do not make random reading errors. They make specific errors, reflected also in their spelling. Watch for these errors:

Reading

Can read a word on a page, sometimes with prompting, but won't recognize it on the next page.

Knows phonics, but cannot sound out unknown words.

They may insert of leave out letters or mix letters up, such as form-from, or star-stair.

When reading aloud, reads in a slow, choppy cadence (not using prosody or natural emphasis) and often ignores punctuation

Becomes visibly tired after reading for only a short time

Reading comprehension may be low due to spending so much energy trying to decode. Listening comprehension is often significantly better than listening comprehension.

Substitutes a word that means the same thing but doesn't look at all similar, e.g., fast for speed.

Misreads, omits or even adds small function words such as an, were.

Spelling

Their spelling is worse than their reading. They sometimes flunk inventive spelling. They have extreme difficulty with vowel sounds, and often leave them out.

With enormous effort, they may be able to "memorize" Monday's spelling list long enough to pass Friday's spelling test, but they can't spell those very same words two hours later when writing those words in sentences.

Continually misspells high frequency sight words (non phonetic but very common words) such as they, what, where, does and because—despite extensive practice.

Misspells even when copying something from the board or from a book.

Written work shows signs of spelling uncertainty--numerous erasures, cross outs, etc.

A Reading Difficulty or Dyslexia?

Many parents know their child is struggling with reading, but worry that their child has dyslexia or needs help with dyslexia. This is a misplaced concern.   Dyslexia simply describes an unexpected difficulty with reading.

The good news is that most children can not only learn to read, they can learn to enjoy reading. Thel main causes of reading difficulty fall into three main areas:
-- Language processing issues
-- ADD/focus issues
-- Sensory issues, which often present as attention issues

Our reading program uses Fast ForWord reading software to help children and adults in the first category, by far the largest source of reading problems.   We use BrainWare Safari to help students either alone or in conjunction with Fast ForWord in the other two categories.

While we are able to help a large number of the students who need help with dyslexia we will refer out to others also.