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How to Give Your Dyslexic Child Roots and Wings

At the beginning of my parenting journey, I came across this quote, “There are only two lasting bequests we can hope to give our children. One of these…is roots, the other, wings.”

According to Quote Investigator, the earliest evidence of this saying comes from a book by a prominent 1953 newspaper editor, Hodding Carter, in which he said a “wise woman” said those words to him.

One day, I would like to meet Ms. Anonymous. Many profound statements have been made by her.

When I first learned that my daughter was dyslexic, I was crushed. The plans I had; the dreams I’d cherished disappeared the moment I read the dyslexia specialist’s evaluation report.

As in any other loss, I went through the grieving process.

Denial

First, I thought she had made a mistake. Perhaps my daughter had just misunderstood some of her questions and directions. My brilliant child could not have the D word.

Anger

“Why me?” I asked God. After all, I am the academic in my family. “Why would you do this to embarrass me?” My friends expected my daughter to be a genius. Now, instead I would be humiliated. I didn’t even know anyone with a dyslexic child.

Bargaining

If only I had spent more time teaching her the basics… If only I had homeschooled her… If only… If only… If only…

“Okay, God, I’ll do better. Can you make this go away?”

Depression

“I’m an introvert, so I’ll just keep to myself and tell no one,” I thought.

Acceptance

Finally, I arrived at a place of acceptance. This is the hand I was dealt, so God must have a good reason. After all, He said that all things work together for good to those who love Him. The time had come to buckle down, do some research, and tackle this monster. When all is said and done, I am more than a conqueror.

This was the point when I sat down, reflected, prayed, and made a plan. I am resilient – my mother taught me how. I am a winner – my father instilled that in me.

I picked up myself, dusted off my mental dross, and stepped out to vanquish dyslexia. I resolved to give my daughter roots and wings.

Roots so deep that no one could shake her belief in herself… her gifts and abilities.

Wings so wide that nothing would keep her from reaching her highest goal in life.

How to give your child roots and wings:

Most importantly, come to a place of acceptance quickly.

Make memories in elementary school:

Highlight her strengths and use them to build her weaknesses.

Counterbalance the negatives teachers and other authority figures pour into her.

Read about that in my first letter to her here.

Make memories during the middle school years:

Find and implement programs available to strengthen the weak skills. Not just the popular ones, but also try those that may only have anecdotal evidence. If they worked for someone else, they may work for you.

Travel. Let her see social studies in action in real life. Take her to various countries. Let her explore the real world.

Check out my letter recounting my daughter’s middle school experience.

Make memories while she is in high school:

Teach her self-advocacy. Help her discover how she learns and provide the support and encouragement for her to travel on her own. Let her build confidence in her ability to surmount the most challenging difficulties.

Discuss every topic she’s interested in. Be prepared for your knowledge and imagination to be stretched.

Give her space to grow into her personality. Look at her graduation letter here.

Be a safety net for her during her young adulthood:

When my daughter went away for college, I visited regularly, and we chatted on the phone frequently.

Her friends got acquainted with me and I became a mentor to some and a surrogate mom to others.

Throughout the years, at different intersections of life, my daughter thanked me for the way I raised her and the consistent support I gave.

She still has some challenges, but she has learned how to roll with them.

On the other hand, she has excelled in the areas of her gifting, and receives ongoing accolades.

Many years ago, I come across some books and tapes by Dr. Denis Waitley. This poem of his resonated with me, and I hope it does with you, too.

A poem to parents…from their teenage child

If I had two wishes, I know what they would be
I'd wish for Roots to cling to, and Wings to set me free;
Roots of inner values, like rings within a tree,
And Wings of independence to seek my destiny.

Roots to hold forever to keep me safe and strong,
To let me know you love me, when I've done something wrong;
To show me by example, and help me learn to choose,
To take those actions every day to win instead of lose.

Just be there when I need you, to tell me it's all right,
To face my fear of falling when I test my wings in flight;
Don't make my life too easy, it's better if I try,
And fail and get back up myself, so I can learn to fly.

If I had two wishes, and two were all I had,
And they could just be granted, by my Mom and Dad;
I wouldn't ask for money or any store-bought things.
The greatest gifts I'd ask for are simply Roots and Wings.

By Denis Waitley

As you ponder the future, what is your major goal for your child?

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What If You Read Through A Dyslexic Child’s Eyes?

The one constant about dyslexia is its inconsistency. Each child’s encounter is unique. Even when two children have difficulty in the same area, reading for example, their struggle has different nuances.

Listen to dyslexic 2nd-grader, Maya, talk about her reading challenges.

Now, Jade gives a heartbreaking account of her 8th-grade dyslexic reading experience. Look through her eyes here.

Yesterday, you walked through one day at school with Henry.

Today, it’s your turn to experience what a dyslexic child sees when she reads. Here’s a fun way to understand and appreciate why learning and thinking differences can be so frustrating.

Go ahead and try a dyslexia reading simulation. Click the link below.

https://u.org/31RqeeY

How did you feel while trying to complete the reading task in the allotted time?

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I’m Dyslexic – I Can’t Read!

The most common struggle dyslexics experience is an inability to read. They have extreme difficulty identifying letters, converting those letters into sounds and putting them together to make words.

During the times of the apprenticeship era, there was not the great need to read as there is today. People learned by observing and doing. Kinesthetic learning was the norm.

With the dawn of the industrial revolution, however, there arose the need to educate the masses to work in the resulting businesses.

The invention of the printing press merged perfectly with this need for mass education. This made it possible to put knowledge into a system that could be spread out on a national level. Hence, the proliferation of textbooks. Only then did those with dyslexic minds begin to have problems.

According to Dean Bragonier, founder and executive dyslexic of NoticeAbility, the dyslexic mind is able to “look at a situation, identify seemingly disparate pieces of information and blend those into a narrative or tapestry that makes sense” to them. Most people are unable to perceive the situation in the same way.

This ability translates into levels of exceptional success needed in some vocational paths, for example, entrepreneurship, engineering, architecture and the arts.

In spite of that, they are at a great disadvantage during their years in school.

There are three ways of accessing information: eye reading (print books), ear reading (recorded or audiobooks), and finger reading (braille). While information is commonly made available in braille for blind children, dyslexic children are mandated to eye read print books, and when they have trouble doing so, are labeled as lazy, stupid or unmotivated to learn.

Ear reading is not new. As early as 1931, the American Foundation for the Blind and the Library of Congress Book for the Blind Project established the Talking Book Program. Here is an abridged history of audiobooks:

1934: The first recordings are made for the Talking Book Program and include parts of The Bible, The Declaration of Independence, and Shakespeare’s plays.

1948: The Recording for the Blind program is founded (in 1995 renamed Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic, and in 2011 renamed Learning Ally).

1952: Caedmon Records is formed in New York and is a pioneer in the audiobook industry.

1955: Listening Library is founded and is the first to distribute audiobooks to libraries and schools.

1970s: Libraries start carrying audiobooks.

1985: Publishers Weekly identifies 21 audiobook publishers including Caedmon, Recorded Books, Books on Tape, Harper and Row, and Random House.

1980s: Bookstores start to display audiobooks on bookshelves instead of in separate displays.

1986: The Audio Publishers Association is created.

1997: Audible debuts the first digital audio player.

2011: Audiobook self-publishing becomes possible with the Audiobook Creation Exchange (ACX).

2012: Audiobook annual publication increases 125% from 7,200 to 16,309.

(Source: The Audio Publishers Association)

Dyslexic clinical psychologist, Dr Michael Ryan, gives some recommendations when using audiobooks:

  • Use the listening application from the same company where you get your book. This makes downloading and organizing easier, and offers the listener the ability to increase the speed of listening.
  • Whenever possible, listen to an audiobook while eye-reading a print book. This multisensory approach will help increase focusing on and understanding of the material. In addition, practice brings improvement – the more one eye-reads the better he becomes at doing it.
  • Learn to speed-listen. Beginning at the normal speed, increase the speed of listening by 20% to 30% every few days. This can be done until the speed is too fast for you to understand. Research is showing that this increases content comprehension, reading speed and fluency.

With this longstanding history, I wonder why aren’t schools more accepting of ear reading as a method for testing the knowledge of those children who are dyslexic, and audiobooks for textbooks?

What has been your experience with audiobooks?

Have you used recorded textbooks for your children?

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Dyslexia and Following Directions

Today, I continue to put a megaphone to my voice to help children with dyslexia get the support they need to succeed – from parents, teachers, and everyone with whom they come into contact.

Most dyslexic people have strong visual/spatial abilities and weak auditory skills. How does that translate to real-life and living?

One important area that has significant consequence in childhood is following directions. This requires accessing of linguistic information presented in different forms.

Because this learning and thinking difference occurs on a spectrum, the level of difficulty following directions will vary from one dyslexic to another.

Some children have poor sight-word recognition but they are able to process language adequately. They understand phonics and apply it to reading, but have memory problems that translate to, among other things, following verbal or written directions.

Others have trouble processing language but are able to recognize sight words, so they rely on sight words when they see unknown words but are unable to sound them out. These children take mental pictures of word patterns and are able to read. These are the children who say “the” for any word that has that letter combination in it, like, their, there, them, they, etc.

Then there are those children with a mixture of the two. Their difficulty is a combination of the two experiences above.

In a very short video clip, Nessy illustrates how a child may appear to be lazy when, in fact, he has forgotten a direction given. Check it out here.

Instead of slapping labels on children who have difficulty following your directions, or punishing them for “deliberately” disregarding your instructions, seek ways of making the direction as easy as possible to visualize.

How have you felt when you could not remember all the instructions given to you or were distracted by something, then forgot directions you were following?

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Determination: The Third Letter to My Dyslexic Daughter

A child’s high school experience can be pivotal. For a dyslexic, it’s an even greater achievement, considering that 35% of dyslexics drop out of high school.

My dearest K,

I can’t believe this time has come. You never thought you would achieve this much. But our God has been faithful! You are at the end of High School, and it’s your graduation day. Well done, my child!

Some Things Remain

Testing seemed to have been the first order of high school. Those pre- and post- IOWA tests seemed to be written in a different language and the New York State Regents examinations loomed ahead and you didn’t know what to expect. Now, the bulk of schoolwork had to be done at home, since school hours were spent in discussions and experiments.

You still struggled for hours, every night, to complete your homework assignments; and your late nights made it difficult to wake up early for school, the next day. But you pushed on. It was a blessing you had the Learning Ally audio textbooks to accompany your print books.

You still weren’t very motivated to go to school, but you went, without complaining.

Do you remember how, in addition to your school, you had to work through those brain exercises and the Learning Ears program? It seemed like intervention programs would never end, but I kept pushing and encouraging you.

A New Experience

High school was different from elementary and middle school. For you, it was a good change. Here students were expected to be responsible and you were no longer dependent on teachers.

The many intervention programs began to pay off. You’re reading better and not afraid to be called to read in class. You learned tips and tricks of blending with the crowd and appearing “normal,”

You were involved in more student interaction and collaborations and were accepted into the groups without question.

Teachers

Your teachers here were empowering and less punitive.

Your 9th grade homeroom teacher set the tone and spiritual foundation for your high school experience. She was kind, supportive, friendly, yet demonstrated excellent classroom control.

Your 12th grade homeroom teacher and Digital Media teacher (whom we found out later is also dyslexic) were great cheerleaders.

You history teacher taught you much about the philosophy of living, and kept you curious about life and the world.

I don’t know what you told him, since you determined not to let anyone in your school know you were dyslexic, but it was admirable of your Bible teacher to allow you to take his scripture memorization tests verbally, rather than written.

Your science teacher, Ms. A., took the crown. She was focused on your success. She was the reason you scored so high on the Biology Regents. She taught you how to explain yourself verbally and on a written test. She moved around the class and met you and your classmates on your level. The atmosphere she created in her classroom made it easy to ask any question, and not feel ridiculed. Along with that, she seemed to put extra effort into getting you to the point of clarity, then remembered to celebrate your successes and cheer you on to the next level. All in all, she made learning fun, and your high school experience enjoyable.

Your teachers didn’t seem bent on embarrassing you, but allowed you to take responsibility for your decisions and actions.

Friends

It was easier to relate to your classmates and you acquired female friends. Even when you misspelled or verbally mixed up words and phrases, your friends just laughed, corrected you and moved on. When you didn’t understand some concepts, they chuckled and explained it. It just wasn’t a big deal!

What relief I felt that you maintained a pleasant demeanor and displayed no more evidence of daily anxiety. The communal atmosphere certainly added to what I was doing to build your self-esteem. You took your inclusion in activities and the respect shown to you as evidence of your friends’ trust.

To top it off, your peers considered you to be smart.

Successes 

Your work ethic began to pay off – you are reading better.

More importantly, you now understand the implications of your different thinking style and have discovered how to teach yourself to learn, and developed a personal manifesto:

  • Passing or failing is a decision.
  • If you wanted to pass, you needed to prepare, and it was up to you to adequately prepare for upcoming examinations.
  • It was okay for your preparation to look different from your peers.
  • You should not rely on your teachers or even me.
  • You must be deliberate and intentional when asking questions.
  • You will remain after school and ask your teachers additional questions to further your understanding of the concepts taught that day.

Finally getting a grasp of how you learned helped you prepare for and pass you exams.

Your high school experiences helped you see that, although you may learn and see the world differently from others, the foundation for success is the same.

You made a conscious decision to pass and be a success in life.

Do you remember the knot-board you created for your club assignment? It was so creatively organized – so exceptional – the club director kept it as a sample to show future members.

Your decision to be intentional about your success permeated every area of your life.

You are admired by young people and adults alike.

Today, you graduate Valedictorian of your class. Yes! VALEDICTORIAN!!!

You deserve every moment of your celebration!

Look out College. Here she comes!

Love,

Mom

How has your child overcome personal challenges to achieve success in some area of life?

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Unlocking the Dyslexic Potential

When you consider the vast advancements that have been made in science and technology, and the multiple methods for accessing information, it is fair to say that schools and institutes of learning insist on using, as Dean Bragonier puts it, “the most archaic form of educational media.”

If dyslexia is considered a different way of thinking rather than a disadvantage; if the different patterns of strengths and challenges are kept in mind; if as much importance is placed on those strengths as their difficulties; then early intervention and continued support would be made a priority.

Imagine a world where the thinking skills that dyslexics excel at are used to prepare them to contribute to their communities and the world. What would be the possibilities?

You may be wondering what those skills are. Here are they:

  • Visualizing
    • 75% of dyslexics are above average.
  • Imagining
    • 84% are above average.
  • Communicating
    • 71% are above average.
  • Reasoning
    • 84% are above average.
  • Connecting
    • 80% are above average.
  • Exploring
    • 84% are above average.

After many years of struggle, usually, with very little significant support, many dyslexics gravitate to career paths that cater to their preferred way of thinking.

In my previous article, I cited some data from Dr. Gershen Kaufman. Here’s some more:

  • 35% of all entrepreneurs are dyslexic.
  • 40% of self-made millionaires are dyslexic.
  • Over 50% of NASA engineers are dyslexic.

In his autobiography, Nicholas Negroponte, founder of the MIT Media Lab and the One Laptop per Child Association, called dyslexia the MIT disease because of how common it is among students on the campus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

If you’re not already familiar with the world of dyslexia, it’s time to educate yourself about it and encourage every teacher and educator to do the same. After all, if one in five children are dyslexic, there is at least one child in every class who can be identified with dyslexia.

What are you willing to do to support the movement to reshape the teaching industry in the area of dyslexia?

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Learning Denied – The Dyslexia Dilemma

Dyslexia and similar learning differences often show up in a child who appears bright, highly intelligent, and quite articulate for his age. Unexpectedly, this same child has difficulty reading, writing, and spelling at grade level.

Sadly, many of these children will go through life labelled as lazy, careless, dumb, displaying immature or inappropriate behavior, or “not living up to his or her potential.”

Why do they get these labels?

They usually score average or high on IQ tests and aren’t lagging behind their peers badly enough to qualify for specialized intervention. If you ask them questions about what they heard from you, they’ll, most likely, answer adequately, yet their written tests are atrocious.

Added to that, they often zone out, daydream, and lose track of time. It appears that they have difficulty sustaining attention to anything they’re not personally interested in.

There are also those children who are confused with right and left. Not just in terms of the direction, but also with their handedness. They may write with the right hand, but do other activities with the left. Some mispronounce words, by switching letters or transposing words, for example, saying “mower lawn” for “lawn mower.”

One sign of dyslexia that’s commonly overlooked is word-finding difficulties. This leads to trouble expressing oneself and can have a social impact on the dyslexic. They often suffer from low self-esteem, thinking that there’s something wrong with them, because they’re not like the “normal” children.

What happens to dyslexics?

As students, they are ridiculed by classmatea and teachers alike, causing them to be isolated and, by middle and high school, seek the company of peers engaged in risky behaviors like drugs and alcohol.

Everyday experiences of failure, ridicule and not measuring up to expectations, sow seeds of shame, which grow in the minds, emotions, and souls of young children who are just beginning to discover their potential and form their identities.

Dr. Gershen Kaufman discovered in his study on shame culture that people who cannot read feel the same level of shame as people who have engaged in incest.

Where do these feelings lead?

Shame and rage seem to love to keep each other’s company. For the dyslexic, school becomes a place where there’s a struggle to survive instead of a place where joy is experienced in learning.

In Dr. Kaufman’s research, he found that:

  • 35% of dyslexics drop out of high school.
  • 50% of all adolescents involved in drugs and alcohol rehabilitation are dyslexic.
  • 70% of juvenile delinquents are dyslexic.

Dean Bragonier, the founder of NoticeAbility – a nonprofit dedicated to changing the world for students with dyslexia – summarizes the statistics this way, “Some of the most creative and innovative minds are wasting away behind bars.”

It is obvious from these statistics that early identification of dyslexia is crucial. Not only is initial identification essential, timely remediation of learning disabilities associated with it is also necessary.

What is one way you can contribute to eradicating this dyslexia dilemma?

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The Skinny On Hearing… Listening… And Dyslexia – Part 1

When asked what does our ears do, many people will say that they hear.

Did you know that hearing is not the ear’s only function?

Most of the sensory energy transferred to the brain goes through the ears. They:

  • Regulate balance
  • Direct movement and coordination
  • Permit language
  • Cause us to speak eloquently
  • Make us sing in tune
  • Adjust our eyes when we read
  • Control our arm, hand, and finger movements when we write
  • Protect us from sounds we do not want to hear, e.g. sounds of our own body

In addition to all of that good stuff, the ears are interconnected with several levels of the brain and act as a double antenna through which it receives messages from the body and the environment.

So, you can see, your ears are your link to your inner world and the outside world.

What is listening?

Merriam-Webster defines it as paying attention; hearing something with thoughtful attention.

This definition denotes that listening is an active process through which we make sense of, evaluate and respond to what we hear.

On the other hand, hearing is passive – once the hearing mechanism is physically intact, sound enters the ears and travels along the auditory pathway to the brain, where the sound waves are changed to electrical signals and given meaning.

Listening, therefore, brings harmony within us, as well as in our relationships with others. When listening does not develop in a satisfactory manner, the harmony is broken and good communication is sabotaged.

Although some generate good results with sustained effort on the part of the child, many of the programs promoted as interventions for the reading difficulties experienced by dyslexics are minimally effective.

While there is efficacy in practice, considering Herman Ebbinghaus’ work on memory (without context, about 50% of what is heard is forgotten within 1 hour), most remediation programs include multiple repetitions of instruction with lots of drill and practice, without any work to eliminate underlying issues with foundational skills, like listening.

I have not read any scientific or academic research studies, which looked at improving listening as an avenue for alleviating reading difficulties, but I have my own anecdotal experience. As mentioned in my previous post, when my dyslexic daughter completed The Listening Program, her singing voice improved (the voice can only produce what the ear can hear). In addition to that, she demonstrated better attending skills. This led to increased success in learning and communication.

Have you or any of your children experienced any form of auditory stimulation?