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I NS I DE TH I S SECT I ON 56 | www.teachwire.net Studying with dyslexia is a bit like trying to run a diesel engine on petrol, says Laughton King Fuel for THOUGHT C ontrary to popular belief, dyslexia is not a learning difficulty as such. It is more a teaching difficulty, in that it’s the style of our teaching system that creates the dyslexic condition. Dyslexia as a social phenomenon is the product of the absence of language as a useful thinking tool in an individual person. Consider that our current (western) education system is a recent historical development, evolving through the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries from the egalitarian intention of ‘an education for all’. Implicit to this education system, but not always acknowledged, is the fact that it is orientated to academic excellence rather than overt practicality. It has a specific reliance on language: as a prime teaching tool, as an information recording and processing tool, and as an exclusive assessment tool. So, we see that reading and writing, talking and listening, thinking and problem-solving in words, are the backbone of this education system that we insist every child has to endure. Education has thus become available to all. But there is a catch: in general it has to be accessed via language as a processing tool. This is a pathway that suits some more than others. Thus any child whose brain functions on a language-based processing style carries an inherent advantage in this system. Meanwhile those who have a more practical, hands-on and pictorial thinking style are actively disadvantaged by this pro-language orientation. A practical example of how to create effective nurture spaces around your school... Why we have to let children ask questions about their neurodiverse peers... p66 p69 A few small adjustments to their environment could make all the difference to an autistic child... p63 Don’t miss the Health & Wellbeing special in our next issue! Available from 10 May. SEND SPECIAL How one school’s neurodiversity champions built a culture of inclusion through disco and cake... p60