October 7-13, 2019 was National Dyslexia Awareness Week in Canada and the United Kingdom.
October 1 to November 1 was Dyslexia Month in Australia.
These events are always the perfect time to take a look at initiatives that focus on empowering people with dyslexia.
After all, more than one in ten of us are dyslexic.
Students with dyslexia have been identified as having Math Difficulties because of
their developmental differences. Find out the Dyslexia Basics here.
Dyslexia “has a genetic base” that affects individuals neurologically, which means that these students
require specific and extensive instruction.
Unfortunately, dyslexic students are typically characterized
as having a learning deficit.
This is not true.
In fact, these students are not lacking in skills: they simply learn differently than other
students and tend to actually be gifted and productive students.
Gavin Reid puts it best in his book Dyslexia by indicating that individuals must
“view dyslexia as a difference rather than a deficit . . ., a difference in how the
child processes information”. Dyslexic students can have trouble processing
information at any or all of the three levels of processing.
Difficulty at any of these levels affects all aspects of learning, not just
language-based courses. Although students with dyslexia can be successful at
math, they are likely to have difficulties with numeracy. For example, students with dyslexia habitually take
instructions literally, which is a difficulty with input that can affect cognition and output.
Although dyslexia is seen to be a language-based problem, it can greatly
affect math because of the variety of symbols used—namely words,
numerals, and operational symbols. Not only do dyslexics have to make
sense of words, they must also decipher two other forms of symbols and make
sense of all three within the same problem! For this reason, dyslexics regularly
require more time to complete assignments. Students with dyslexia take, on
average, 50 percent more time than their peers to complete the same problems.
Although not a Math Learning Disability, dyslexia can have a significant impact on
an individual’s achievement in math.
Marilyn Wardrop is a gifted trainer & mentor who helps educators replace or surpass their current math teaching strategies for struggling math students or those children learning math for the first time. Marilyn’s OG Academic Math training programs have been called the secret weapon of frustrated math instructors. Thousands of educators use OG Math every single day.