Does Your Child Have Educational Dyslexia?

Preamble

Barack Obama is a highly intelligent, well schooled President-Elect of the Usa. But he has stated that One person whose life/works he studies intimately to ensue in his chosen work is Abraham Lincoln - who paradoxically, boasted few months of schooling, and spent over 30 years of his life failing Before becoming president of The Usa.

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A check reveals that Lincoln - among other things - was self-taught, and reportedly walked miles to and from the library Daily to borrow books to read. That is what Obama and Lincoln have in base - great proficiency in learning by reading. In my Free book and One Hour talk on this subject, I share anecdotes about Thomas Edison, Daley Thompson, Mary Lou Retton and others to help you understand why your child may Not be the dullard you (or his/her teachers make you) think s/he is.

And if your child is said to - or seems to - be doing well, what I share in this write-up may help you peruse early adequate why That may not mean s/he is for real being taught How To Learn effectively, in a way that will enable him/her ensue later on in life!

Are you a parent to a school age child? Have the teachers in your child's school been complaining to you about his/her performance? Does the child seem to frequently struggle to learn thing that other children in the same class seem to have no problems with? Does s/he for instance have problems recognizing letter of the alphabet, tend to read/write them in reverse (or mixes up some that appear similar e.g. B and d)? Does the child have a tendency to "forget' what s/he learns after sometime even though the instructor has gone through numerous repetitions?

If any of the above or similar problems are what you find with your child, then you will do well to read this report right to the end.

Rote learning Is Bad - And Makes citizen Dislike Studying

Our original teaching methods destroy our children's potential to learn. By original methods, I refer specifically to the base custom in most of our schools where teachers emphasise learning by rote instead of teaching children to understand meanings in learning. A descriptive example of the negative impact of this method on our children is what happens at Schools Debates. The fixed stares in the children's eyes as they recap their consider "arguments" is only broken when the child misses a "line" in the recitation.

Leaning by Rote discourages Thinking. Reasoning requires the use of the brain and the mind. The brain is just like any other muscle in the body. The more it is exercised, the more it develops.

Therefore teaching whatever to understand meaning will ensue in production the person one who seeks to understand by thinking. Subsequently, s/he will learn to apply that Reasoning potential to other uses - and at last become creative. The Oxford industrialized Learners' Dictionary defined "rote" as the process of learning by repeated study rather than by comprehension the meaning.

That is how many of us Nigerian adults we taught to learn. And that's also why many of us today are not exactly keen on Reasoning and reading. The truth is that rote learning is difficult, unpleasant and for children, can be especially painful, particularly if the child happens to be one of those who lack the aptitude to cope with that method of learning.

So in our case, as adults since that's how we were taught to learn, most of our memories of school are unpleasant. And that explains why the mean adult Nigerian typically announces s/he has done "learning" upon graduation. Try and get that person to do any focused learning and you'll meet stiff resistance.

The only other time s/he returns to learning is for a higher qualification, and evidence abounds to show that very often, s/he looks for the easiest and quickest way to get it over with - sometimes via "shortcuts". If learning had been made pleasurable for Nigerian adults, they would not seek to avoid it so much.

Some children a naturally gifted at rote learning, and so tend to excel in it. But there are some who do not have the natural routine towards learning by rote i.e. Children who have been described as Visual, Spatial, Right Brained, 3D etc Learners. They belong to an elite minority group of citizen who have the unusual potential to learn by finding things from a multi-dimensional rather than linear perspective.

For them rote learning is torture - and when forced on them makes them hate learning/school, plus they may become withdrawn or introverted or in obvious cases, they could rebel and become difficult to control in class. Teachers in industrialized societies described many children who reacted like these as having disorders like Add, Dyslexia, etc. It is children like these that I refer to when I talk about "Educational Dyslexia".

Your child may be one of them - and if you stay insensitive to what I say here, s/he may suffer needlessly in the course of learning!

But What Is Dyslexia?

For most parents who are not necessarily customary with healing terminology, the Oxford industrialized Learner's dictionary offers an easy to understand definition: "a limited disorder of the brain that causes strangeness in reading and spelling". There are numerous Internet resources dedicated to providing sustain for children with Dyslexia. Some are maintained by explore organizations, government bodies, incommunicable institutions and even individuals.

What is ironic is that many children who failed or refused to learn in these original ways often ended up becoming highly successfully later on in life - sometimes in fields that wish formal schooling or literacy, and in obvious enthralling instances, without even having continued with formal schooling.

An example is Albert Einstein, whose teachers described as "dull-witted" and "would never amount to anything". But we all know Einstein etched his name in history as one of the greatest scientific minds the world has ever seen.

Thomas Edison's teachers had done he was "addled". Think this Oxford industrialized Learners' dictionary application of this adjective(used derogatively to mean "confused"): His brain was addled from years of drug abuse. That means the teachers believed Edison's brain was not functioning normally. But thankfully his mom refused to accept what they told her. If she had, we probably would not have his 1091 inventions - including the light bulb and electricity.

Here's an citation from an online biography about Edision: "Edison was a poor student. When a schoolmaster called Edison "addled," his furious mom took him out of the school and proceeded to teach him at home. Edison said many years later, "My mom was the production of me. She was so true, so sure of me, and I felt I had some one to live for, some one I must not disappoint." - citation from "The Life of Thomas Edison" (Online Biography)

Tony Buzan in his Speed Reading Book described some base Reading Problems which he said in 90% of cases were due to wrong methods citizen were taught to read rather than the "illnesses" they were attributed to. It was also the parents of both Daley Thompson (World/Olympic No.1 Decathlete for 10 years - chattering all old world record) and Mary Lou Retton(Los Angeles Olympics Gold Medallist) who refused to accept what teachers said about their children's difficulties with learning to read/write in school.

In the case of these two individuals, teachers had complained of their inattentiveness and hyperactivity, and recommended use of tranquilizing drugs to get them to be more subdued like other children. Instead the parents asked the schools to find ways to help the children put their extra vigor to productive use. This led to each child being introduced to sports. The rest is history.

Now in all the cases described above, the Parents played a crucial and decisive role by influencing the manner in which their children were given formal schooling. They did not leave their children at the mercy of teachers who already felt overburdened with the responsibility of attending to many children. Teachers who as a ensue of their workload, among other things would not spare the time to try and understand the child and peruse why s/he was acting different.

Why You Are Your Child's Best Teacher

It is instructive to note that very often, these children who struggle with learning like this for real come over in all other areas as salutary and highly intelligent. That makes it even more difficult - for the teacher/others - to understand why they find it difficult to learn the way their peers do. These children only stand a opening when person who truly cares takes out time to help them.

That's why the parents have a crucial role to play. They are often their child's only hope. But sadly, many Nigerian parents think their most prominent role is to pay for the school and leave the teachers to do the rest. When the child starts getting battered with negative comments about his/her doing or ability, the child is unable to muster the courage to tell the overworked, over-busy and absent-mi9nded parent what s/he is going through(that is if s/he is not too young).

When the parent learns of the child's poor performance, the fear of 'embarrassment" of friends and relatives learning that the child is doing badly in school makes them put pressure on the child, threaten etc. Very rarely does that help. Most times, the child struggles through that phase, but emerges with a badly battered self-image, which in adulthood reflects in a weak, introverted personality, and with few exceptions, poor academic performance.

You Need to stop being scared of how your child's supposedly poor doing makes You look and focus on Helping him/her overcome any obstacles s/he faces in learning effectively.

Children Are Not Poultry Broiler Chicks or Catfish Babies

Broilers are hybrid poultry birds that are fed with market rations by farmers to get them to grow together - swiftly - from day-old chicks to 2kg market/table bird size in 4-6 weeks. Catfish babies(or fries) are also fed formulated rations with a similar objective of accelerating their increase to physical maturity faster than would usually have occurred if nature were allowed to take its course.

Unfortunately, our children have distinct rates of learning, and distinct "strengths" which tend very often to resolve how fast they improve in distinct endeavours. That's why Dr. Bruno Bethlehem's explore findings (mentioned in Robert Kiyosaki's book titled "If You Want To Be Rich & Happy, Don't Go To School?") that some children may not be Ready to read until they are twelve (12) years old are quite instructive and worthy of note - for the wise parent. Stop trying to force your child(ren) to move at the same rate/pace of learning in the same areas as others. Help him/her/them find their natural learning style, pace, and interest, and Build on it in a way that ensures success in adulthood.

How Do Nigerian Schools Teach Reading/Writing? Holistically Or Phonetically?

The teaching methods/techniques employed by schools and/or teachers resolve to a great extent how well children learn - especially children that are visual-spatial, wholistic or 3D learners.

Most Nigerian schools have followed the look-say method of associating words with images or pictures. Samuel L. Blumenfeld is the author of six books on education, including How to Tutor and Alpha-Phonics, widely used by American home schoolers in teaching their children to read phonetically. He also authored a book on the reading problem, The New Illiterates, in which he revealed the true origin of the look-say as Rev. Thomas H. Gallaudet's method of teaching the deaf to read.

It was in Blumenfelds' report that I first encountered the "educational dyslexia," that is, dyslexia, or reading disability, caused by the teaching method. And that was when it struck me that some children who struggled to learn the way schools teach could be doing poorly more because the teaching method conflicted with their preferred learning style than because they were less enthralling or academically capable than their peers.

Don't Let Your Child's School Turn Him/Her Into A Sight Reader

It has been said that phonetic readers become good, independent readers because they have industrialized a phonetic reflex which makes them read/write effortlessly. A holistic, sight reader, on the other hand, must rely on memorization of individual word forms and use all sorts of contextual strategies to get the word right.

I end this by request you to spend plenty of time in helping your child(ren) manufacture a strong phonetic reflex that will make them more productive learners inside and surface the classroom.

Does Your Child Have Educational Dyslexia?