A Dyslexia Story

Once upon a time in Education Land there was a wise king named Success. He wanted above all else to have his subjects succeed in life and be happy. After much thought about how to gain this goal, he came upon the idea that having a good educational system for his subjects would be a good place to start. Gathering all of his advisers together a plan was developed to build the best educational system possible. The future looked bright for Education Land.

Word went out to find the best teachers , the best builders and the best book makers and soon the books were printed and the schools were built and teachers made their lesson plans. All of the kingdom's children were required to attend because the king wanted all to succeed.

Time passed by and it was many years before the King went to inspect the schools and see how well his plan was working. At first he was very pleased because the teachers brought out the best students to show him what they had learned. He soon noticed that some students were not included in the demonstrations and asked the teachers why.

The teachers explained that some students kept falling behind because they wouldn't learn to read. Those students are slow or lazy and have refused to put out the effort to learn to read the teachers said. With their poor reading skills they can't learn their other subjects. It is not our fault if they won't learn.

The king wanted to believe the teachers. He had never heard of children who had trouble learning to read but he also wanted all the children to succeed so he took all those children back to the castle to talk to them.

After talking to the children he found that they didn't seem to be slow or lazy and they were really trying hard to learn to read. The King didn't know what to do so he called in all his advisers and asked for suggestions.

Maybe all children can't learn to read the same way said one. Maybe if we ask them what makes reading difficult for them they can tell us said another. Maybe if we can determine how they are different from the children that read well that might help said still another. All good suggestions said the King . I want you to start an investigation immediately.

The advisers called the condition dyslexia . The investigation is still going on.

Flawed Joint Statement about learning Disabilities And Vision.

Here we go again. A new Joint statement from pediatricians and eye doctors who admit they can't diagnose any learning disabilities want to make a blanket statement that learning disabilities and vision aren't related. Here is the PDF file link.

http://www.dys-add.com/VisionTherapy2009.pdf

After reading the statement , my thought is that that they are throwing out the baby with the bath water. It is easy to understand their position and why they felt the statement was needed. It would also be easy to correct their statement with the addition of a few facts. Fact # 1 , there are a minority of dyslexics , properly called visual dyslexics , whose reading problems are caused by visual problems .
Fact #2 , the minority of visual dyslexics is about 10% of the dyslexic population or about 1-1.5% of the general population.

I designed and sell See Right Dyslexia Glasses which act as a universal visual dyslexia filter to remove the visual problems associated with visual dyslexia. I make no claims that the glasses help learning disabilities in general. They do not help dyslexics in general. The small minority of dyslexics with visual dyslexia that can describe visual problems that make reading difficult will have the visual problems removed with the See Right Dyslexia Glasses.

Visual dyslexics are known to have a higher rate of poor depth perception than the general population. Eye doctors that would like to see evidence of the affect of See Right Dyslexia Glasses might consider the fact that they will correct poor depth perception instantly and the poor depth perception will return when the glasses are removed. I mention that because I do not believe that eye doctors have anyway of correcting poor depth perception of visual dyslexics.

The idea presented in the statement that missing letters and moving words leading to reading problems are the result of anything other than visual problems is FALSE. It is really a stretch to say that it is a proven fact. I would suggest that the failure to being able to identify dyslexic individuals is partly because of a poor understanding that some dyslexic problems are visual.

Products that associate learning disabilities in general with visual interventions are likely to fail the majority of people with learning disabilities and at best help a small minority. The Irlen method has had some real success but does a poor job of identification of who will be helped leading to many failures. I have yet found any indication that vision therapy is an effective therapy for learning disabilities. I would describe vision therapy as bait and switch. People want educational help and vision therapy promises to help all with learning disabilities. The eye training provided has never been shown to help anyone.

Reading the joint statement about dyslexia and vision by every type of doctor that can NOT diagnose dyslexia was interesting. In many ways I do agree with their results for the mentioned vision therapies and how they have not been proven as beneficial for learning disabilities and so shouldn't recommended.

I believe that their basic agenda is a result of feeling that promoters of the mentioned vision therapies in the statement do not take a professional approach to the business of selling their products. It is actually hard to argue with the position that the mentioned promoters are not acting professionally.

All doctors are expected to act in a professional and ethical manner.Whether or not those promoters are being ethical depends on if they are knowingly over promoting the products or just incompetent or unaware.One requirement of being a professional doctor is to prescribe treatment to those that need treatment and to not prescribe treatment to those that do not need to be treated. The majority of years of education a doctors receives are slanted towards being able to diagnose who is to be treated for what and how.

I suspect that the joint statement was prepared because The Irlen Method and Vision Therapy are seen as overselling their respective products as being the necessary treatment for learning disabilities. Their sin is at least that learning disabilities is too broad a subject ( or condition) to only have a single treatment and to suggest either as a general treatment.

The joint statement basically says that Vision Therapy has never shown any educational benefit and that Irlen tinted lenses studies have shown mixed results at best. It implies that you can conclude results from flawed studies. By any reasonable standard you can't conclude results from flawed studies.

There is no reason that visual problems should be related to learning disabilities in general. If there is a visual aspect to some learning disabilities it would be a subset of reading problems or dyslexia. This has never been tested in a proper manner and so has not been shown to exist. It is no surprise that something that has never been shown to exist does not have a recommended treatment.

Visual dyslexia is not likely to be proven any time soon by a scientific study.

Dyslexia testing is prohibitively expensive and best case today is what is called dyslexia risk identification followed by some intervention for kindergarten children.This is often called dyslexia testing but has low standards.

By its very nature a generalized dyslexia testing program is going to test all children in an area. The people to give the tests and record results must have some generalized skills with testing and children ( think money ) and testing all the children will take time ( think money). Identification of children at risk ( the bottom half) and intervention ( more money). After intervention you find that 70% have come up to standard and that 30% didn't. They are the children most likely to be dyslexic and can now be tested for dyslexia.

It is also very likely that because of the assumptions on language abilities tested to determine dyslexia risks that visual dyslexics will not be included in the final group as their language skills are often very good.

To conclude , I suggest that See Right Dyslexia Glasses that claim to remove described visual problems , have a money back guarantee , and are easily evaluated in a matter of minutes to at most hours indicate that at least some people with learning disabilities have visual problems where removal of those problems leads to faster more accurate reading with better comprehension.

More information about See Right Dyslexia Glasses and visual dyslexia can be found at The Visual Dyslexia Solution web site

Adult Dyslexia as a money making machine

I might just be having a bad week but everywhere I look I see products and services out to rip off adult dyslexics. If you are an adult with reading difficulties and suspect you are dyslexic , let me save you some money by giving you the results of any on line dyslexia test. The results will show you are dyslexic. The reason I say that is by the definition of not being a dyslexic , having normal or expected reading skills, the person who is not dyslexic is not going to be taking the dyslexia test.

It doesn't even matter if you are dyslexic or not and dyslexia is not the only reason for poor reading skills. Having English as a second language 20 or more years ago or missing a lot of school because you were ill come to mind as common reasons the educational system might have failed for an individual. Simplistic adult dyslexia tests are just going to identify poor readers as being dyslexic.

All these dyslexia tests for adults suggest once you know you are confirmed dyslexic it is easy to find a program to help your dyslexia, easy to complete the program and then blue skies forever. I hate to be the bearer of bad news but it is just not so. There may be the rare adult program available maybe even free but generally free programs if available are for children.

This is where I should be putting the answer to all your dyslexia problems for $29.99, get it today, limited offer and all the other hype for a product that isn't going to help anybody. I don't have such a product.

That hasn't stopped others from claiming to have the answer. To be fair I haven't reviewed this book but when the normal selling price is over $1 a page I think that it is going to be over priced. Here is the reason for my rant today. This is not new information !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Notice that almost every topic is covered in 1 page. Some pages cover 2 topics. I know that being concise and to the point is a virtue in writing but you can't cover much in a 2-3 page chapter. Chapters 4, 5,6,7,11,12 ,13,15 are all of 1 page long.

Look at their P.S. P.P.S. and P.P.P.S . and what they claim you will get from this book. I don't believe it!
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P.S. Remember when I told you about those tips above? You could be enjoying the freedom from worry right now! Act Today!

P.P.S You could be enjoying the freedom and happiness that comes with controlling your dyslexia symptoms....Don't wait another minute! Join the hundreds of others that are completely impressed with the product!

P.P.P.S. After this special pre-launch offer, I will be raising the price tag back up to the original $34.00 price. Advertising online can get very expensive, and I'm not even sure if I can keep this offer up much longer!

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I assembled these useful links as a resource for dyslexics without visual dyslexia.

These links were chosen because they either offer free services or information about dyslexia that is presented in an objective manner.

useful links

If you are the type of person that thinks something only has value if it costs money you can send me the $29.99 LOL .

Multiple Deficit Theory of Dyslexia

Try as I might I haven't been able to make popular the idea of dyslexia as a syndrome. Syndrome being a term that has major essential aspects which all people must have to be considered having the dyslexia syndrome after proper reading instruction. Poor reading skills ,lack of fluency,slow inaccurate reading and poor comprehension seem to be common to all dyslexics and could be considered major essential parts. A dyslexia syndrome also has minor aspects that may or may not affect the individual and usually make up a laundry list of symptoms.

reading below grade level
trouble rhyming words
oral word confusion
short term memory problems
poor spelling
Bothered by glare on print
see text in motion
left and right confusion
auditory problems
poor phonemic understanding
reversing letters in words
writing letters backward after third grade
slow naming of pictures
delayed speech

and many more minor essentials would usually be included in the list. Most of you reading this have seen similar lists. If anyone wants to comment and have other minor essentials added to the list I will, but that is not the point of this post.

Failing to make the dyslexia syndrome popular as a way of understanding why dyslexics are different from each other and need interventions based on their individual problems, like a thief in the night, I am going to steal new terminology, modify it, and hopefully come up with terminology that the public can use to discuss the subject of dyslexia in a more comprehensive way .

My opinion is the the issue of dyslexia needs a paradigm shift , A paradigm is a system of belief
based on an individuals personal knowledge and assumptions. It is a way of looking at situations. Your personal paradigm about particular issues actually colors your opinions and behaviors.

I am sure I need to have an example of a paradigm shift to show how changing a paradigm can be powerful. Many people have the paradigm that the homeless are lazy,dirty ,thieving,drug addicted alcoholics that wouldn't work even if they had the chance and so helping them is futile .

A different paradigm might include different facts such as a large % of the homeless are veterans who suffered post traumatic stress syndrome from being exposed to horrors in war defending or country, others are hard working family people who have lost their jobs through layoffs, and some are single mother families with children who are on the street because of financial hardships that they had no control over. We can also expect a large increase in homeless from people that we actually know due to the financial depression we are having in our country. Many people are only a paycheck or medical problem away from being homeless. The conclusion from this paradigm is that many homeless are not that different from us and so are deserving of help and that with help they may indeed recover and leave the homeless population.

The second paradigm does not exclude that the first paradigm is partly true. There are indeed some homeless that will always be homeless for different reasons. The second paradigm does try to expand our thoughts and can change people's behavior to some degree. Perhaps they might consider voting for rather than against some homeless laws to protect the homeless. If nothing else, having more information is likely to help people make better informed decision about the homeless.

Back to dyslexia. I have posted before about how people tend to report about dyslexia as if it has a single cause. I propose that we now call that the Single Deficit Theory. The SDT (single deficit theory ) has been pretty common to describe dyslexia and some ore used to base SDT interventions.

The Dore Method SDT dyslexia is based on brain structure problems that can be helped by exercise programs .

Ron Davis Method SDT dyslexia is based on the fact that dyslexics think in pictures.

Irlen method SDT dyslexia reading problems are based by their sensitivity to a single color

Timing problems in the brain SDT dyslexia problems are caused by slow processing in the brain

Phonoogicial problems SDT dyslexics have problems associating sounds with letters

Auditory processing problems SDT problems differentiating individual sounds

Language processing problems SDT problems in the word formation part of the brain

Executive processing problems SDT problems sequencing thoughts

Short Term Memory Problems SDT problems with short time memory as the cause of dyslexia

MRI areas of the brain SDT every area of the brain associated with reading visual,auditory,phonemic,language processing,word formation etc has each has its day as the SDT of dyslexia

See Right Dyslexia Glasses SDT for the 10% of dyslexics that can describe specific visual problems that make reading difficult.

There are many more SDT's about dyslexia. The obvious lack in all is they have is that none account for all the different problems that dyslexics express as why individuals with dyslexia have problems reading fluently with good comprehension.

I read a post the other day about the concept of the Double Deficit Theory of dyslexia. The position was that while the author used to believe in the SDT of phonological problems she saw dyslexics that had no phonological problems still having reading difficulties She thought by adding delayed time processing problems and calling that the DDT she could now describe all dyslexics as having phonological and or delayed processing problems.

I see the DDT as still lacking as a final description of what problems all individual dyslexics have.

My first thought was that be DDT lacked any acknowledgement that some dyslexics have visual problems that make reading difficult and there needed to be at least a Triple Deficit Theory or TDT. My second thought, seconds later, was that it was unlikely that even a TDT was going to be able to accurately describe dyslexia.

This is why I am proposing the paradigm shift to the Multiple Deficit Theory of dyslexia or MDT. The value of the paradigm shift to include MDT rather than DDT or SDT is this. If you are looking for dyslexia help and the person you see believes in a SDT , say phonological problems,
then your are tested for phonological problems and any positive results for phonological problems are defined as being your dyslexia problems and any intervention is based on helping you overcome those phonological problems only. No other dyslexia problerms are looked for ,evaluated or have interventions available at that location.

On the other hand if someone believes in the MDT of dyslexia then while phonological problems will probably be evaluated and intervention recommended that will not be the end of the process. Perhaps auditory processing will be evaluated next and intervention recommended if needed. Perhaps executive decision making and short term memory evaluations would follow with recommendations that interventions would or would not be needed in those areas. To be complete I would recommend visual testing for visual dyslexia and if problems are found that See Right Dyslexia Glasses are considered if necessary.

If you are out in the woods and want to have a fire and only consider that fires are made from big logs, when you return with only big logs you are going to have trouble making that fire. Call that Single Object Fire. Double Object Fire might include matches also. A Multiple Object Fire might also include an ax, dry grass, fire pit, rocks for fire pit, pine cones, bucket of water, cell phone, small dry branches, chairs, cooler with drinks,book to read, snacks, friends, music, permit or other objects as well. Few people will need all the Multiple Objects to make their fire just as most dyslexics only need help with a few different problems but only by considering that their problems need to be identified from an all inclusive list rather than than an SDT or DDT to start their reading fire.

When Should Dyslexics Try Visual Intervention

Visual dyslexia only affects about 10% of dyslexics as the primary cause of their reading problems and so it is seldom the first thought about what intervention is needed. While that is as it should be , I don't think that it should only be considered after spending much time and money on interventions and concluding that the final results fall below what could be reasonably expected from those interventions.

To muddle things up more, there are perhaps another 20% of dyslexics who co-mingle visual and more prevalent language and auditory processing problems. As these dyslexics show the typical early speech and communication problems so common to dyslexia they are likely to be enrolled in whatever the local community has deemed the answer to dyslexia without visual problems ever being considered.

People tend to believe their own senses and assume whatever they experience is normal. This is particularly true in children. Depending on the age of the child, visual problems can sometimes be determined by discussions about their vision. Being extremely near sighted all my life my Ah-ha moment came when I went to school with my first pair of glasses. I found that my teacher was not doing her usual arm waving dance up front while explaining things by the black board but was actually writing on the black board. I had no idea . It occurred to me later that if someone had asked how well I could read the blackboard I would have answered " read what?". I also remember my first eye exam and the first question . What direction is the E pointing? my answer " what E ?". My mother almost screamed THAT E ON THE WALL , "what E? I said.

My point being that , at least for me , as a child I thought my vision was normal . My fuzzy little world where only things closer than my outstretched arm were clear was normal. Later in life I realized that any discussion about my vision would have revealed its flaws.

My criteria for whether the See Right Dyslexia Glasses will help visual dyslexics is: can the visual dyslexic describe specific visual problems that make reading difficult. That works well for adults. Children can often answer questions about how they see the page that indicate problems that to them seems normal. Are all the words clear ,sharp , in focus , stable or in motion, and look uniform?

I am going to add another indication of visual dyslexia for children that parents can check. It is not universal but often can be used as an indication of visual dyslexia. If by changing font size on the computer the child's fluency improves with increasing size then a visual problem may be indicated.

As some visual dyslexics experience problems even with the large print in first grade books it may be impossible to both increase the size and have enough words to read for a fair test for all.
It is a better test for those visual dyslexics that only started to have their problems about third grade when print size in their school books gets smaller. It might also be helpful to stop near a billboard with very large print and ask if the print looks the same as that in their books.

A careful observer can often listen to a child's speech and determine if any language or auditory processing problems are likely to lead to reading problems and need to be addressed. In an ideal world discussions about vision and how a child see the written word would also be included. As visual dyslexia is unlikely to produce any noticeable problems before school age it is important to at least have a discussion about their vision if reading problems occur.

Visual intervention should be tried when there is an indication that visual problems with seeing the printed page are present. As See Right Dyslexia Glasses have a money back guarantee they are a low financial risk and are very effective in removing visual dyslexia associated visual problems.