Dyslexia's Puzzle

How a learning difference can lead to public humiliation in childhood?

Seminar paper from the year 2008 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Linguistics, grade: A-, Hawai'i Pacific University, language: English, abstract: Learning is a life-long process and everybody knows that it is often very painful and difficult. Teachers are supposed to meet the individual needs of the students, to help him/her to gain insight into the academic world and to succeed in school. It is often difficult for teachers to fulfill these tasks but it can become even more difficult if there are other factors that play a significant role in the learning process such as a learning disability called dyslexia. Nowadays there are a lot of children, who get the diagnosis dyslexia, and they are still treated the same way as children without a learning disability. It is often difficult for parents to accept the fact that their child might be dyslexic because they know how problematic the life of the whole family can become. These children have almost no chance to have a positive experience related to reading in school as a lot of teachers are still unfamiliar with teaching techniques that are appropriate for dyslexic children. Jackie Stewart, a Scottish race driver, who won 27 Grand Prix titles and has dyslexia, said once: 'You will never understand what it feels like to be dyslexic. No matter how long you have worked in this area, no matter if your own children are dyslexic, you will never understand what it feels like to be humiliated your entire childhood and taught every day to believe that you will never succeed at anything.' (Wolf, 2008, p. 166) Society has to accept that idea that there are dyslexic children, whose needs are different from the ones of normal children. Teachers should use teaching techniques for dyslexic children in school such as multisensory instruction, phonemic awareness, and promote the idea of home schooling, as they would not influence normal students in a negative way. Consequently, dyslexic children as well as normal children would have a good chance to be successful.