Teach-Primary-18.3

www.teachwire.net | 57 Laughton King practiced as an educational, child and family psychologist for thirty years. His latest book, Inside the Dyslexic Mind , is out now. no ability to understand the meaning of those words, as none of them (prepare, Wednesday, test) link to a specific picture. The child may well be able to repeat words like these aloud, but will be unlikely to attach meaning to them. (I acknowledge that this can be very difficult for a language-thinker to grasp.) Consequently, the child is unlikely to prepare for the ‘assessment’ and will predictably perform poorly. In such a case, rather than the child having a ‘learning problem’, we should really say the child has a ‘thinking/ learning difference’. The teacher is trained in one system (language), but the child operates in another (pictorial images). We could go as far as to say that the thinking-fuel the teacher is offering in good faith in the classroom is not appropriate to the thinking-style of this child. Our teachers are doing what they have been taught to do, and are doing it well, but are unaware of the different style of the child. Frustration, anxiety, anger and depression (for both teacher and child) will predictably follow. Ron Davis, in his book The Gift of Dyslexia (2010), identified approximately 220 words in the English language that do not have a pictorial component. He states that they make up 75 per cent of the most commonly used words in the English language, and include: is, and, a, the, too, to, two, was, went, who, what, where, why, how. These may be referred to as ‘sight words’ and ‘heart words’. Different fuels and diesel learners A parallel with petrol and diesel fuels thus becomes apparent. If we put petrol in the tank of our diesel car by mistake, it won’t run well – but we don’t blame the car for this. If we put petrol (language-based teaching) into the diesel (pictorial) child, they won’t be able to perform well either, but often end up taking the blame. Unfortunately, because most teachers and parents don’t understand this, we inadvertently create an apparent learning difficulty. Many children of dyslexic style have a strongly practical, hands-on nature, and will be familiar with the ruggedness, strength and usefulness of diesel-powered machinery - bulldozers, tractors, diggers and trucks. They quickly grasp and understand the implications of the ‘petrol into the diesel tank’ analogy, and many readily embrace the positive associations with ‘diesel-power’ and take on the appeal of being a ‘diesel’ learner in a proud and assertive manner. Although there are a number of characteristics of diesel engines that make this analogy appealing to many, it is not likely that every child will choose to see themselves as a ‘diesel’, and for their own reasons they may be more comfortable with the traditional labels. But it is important that they have a choice. Why not encourage them to come up with their own variations on this analogy? TP The real essence of dyslexia is that these children are brain-wired for pictorial and image-based thinking, whereas most people are brain-wired for language- thinking. Pictorial-based thinkers tend to decipher language by matching words they hear with pictorial images. They hear ‘tennis racket’ and they get a distinct related visual image. However, many of our words have no pictorial equivalent. Let’s use an older child as an example. If their teacher advises them to prepare for a test on Wednesday, the pictorial thinker may have little or Labels and stigma Years of working with children in schools taught me that the label ‘dyslexic’ is not a user-friendly term. Watching children who are experiencing both learning and social difficulties noticeably shrink when they hear that they are dyslexic quickly taught me to avoid this term. The technical meaning and spelling of the word is beside the point; to be given a label that is so similar to ‘disgust’, ‘disgrace’, ‘disturbed’... It doesn’t sit easily with these children. So it seems to me that we need to offer them an alternative way of describing how they learn. S END S P E C I A L “Years of working with children in schools taught me that the label ‘dyslexic’ is not a user-friendly term”