What Is Dyslexia?
Dyslexia is an inherited learning disorder that affects people's ability to process information while reading, writing and comprehension. Dyslexia is a frustrating problem, especially for children, and those trying to help them overcome the difficulties that it causes.
Other People Are Reading
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Sufferers
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Dyslexia affects all ages. The advantage to early detection is that children are more easily taught how to deal with it by using alternate techniques.
Writing
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Dyslexia is not necessarily occurring when someone writes letters or numbers backwards; this is a normal part of handwriting development. It is when this practice continues into 2nd grade and beyond or when someone continues to see combinations of letters and numbers backwards consistently.
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Reading
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Reading is a problem for dyslexics because they have poor phonological skills. They have a hard time processing the concept that letters represent sounds, sounds become words and words become sentences.
Comprehension
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Because words are read slowly and with great effort, the ability to comprehend is compromised. The meaning of text is lost because the process of decoding words is more important than what the words are saying.
Speech
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Stuttering can be a telling sign, but is not used alone for a diagnosis. Usually there are other articulation difficulties that can be detected by a speech therapist.
Diagnosis/Testing
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There is no single test to diagnose dyslexia. A diagnosis is made only after a series of reading and speech tests reveal telling symptoms and confirm what has been already been observed by parents, teachers and others (speech therapist, doctors).
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