News and Articles

Dyslexia: Learning disorder or gift? By Jennifer Moreau, Burnaby Now Published: March 27, 2010

Imagine you're struggling to read the words on this page, and the letters get flipped backwards, spun upside down and turned into an incomprehensible mess. That's a bit what it's like to have dyslexia. But is it a learning disorder or a special gift?

For eight-year-old Freya Enright, dyslexia used to mean struggle. She would get so frustrated from school, she would come and throw screaming fits, and up until a few weeks ago, she couldn't spell her last name.

Making it fun: Eight-year-old Freya Enright and mom Hayley work on Freya's reading skills. The Grade 3 student received tutoring in a unique method designed to tackle the challenges of dyslexia, and had great results.

Larry Wright/BURNABY NOW

"It was very difficult in school. I was having a lot of trouble, it was very stressful and (I couldn't) really spell and I couldn't get my math right," said the Grade 3 St. Michael's student.
Freya took a course with Sue Hall, a North Vancouver woman trained in a special technique, developed by author Ron Davis, to help people with dyslexia.

Hall got Freya to make clay figures for "trigger words" - words like do, get or why - that aren't easily associated with an image.

The two then look up the meaning in a special dictionary. For the word fetch, Freya made three clay hearts and a star.

"It's a picture that I can see, and it helps me to remember the word," she said. "It's a different way to learn, it's easier for me, it's also fun at the same time."

For Freya, having dyslexia is something special. "I have this special gift that not many people have," she says.

Dyslexia is often characterized as difficulty with reading, writing and sometimes math, but it's not a reflection of lesser intelligence. It affects an estimated 5 million Canadians -roughly 15 per cent of the population.

According to Hall, dyslexics have brains that process information differently, which doesn't mean they are disabled. When they read, the processing signals go to the visual part of the brain rather than the auditory part, she said.

"There's nothing wrong with that. It's just different," Hall said.

Part of the problem is the education system teaches kids to read through sounds, while dyslexics think in pictures and see two-dimensional words in 3-D. Hall tries to train people with dyslexia to control their perception so they can recognize the words in two dimensions.

"Dyslexia is a wonderful way of thinking. The only reason they struggle is because the school system doesn't understand them," Hall said. "They don't have a learning disability at all, they just don't learn the way they are taught."

Freya started working with Hall last November. She's now on par with her Grade 3 peers in reading and she can spell her last name on her own. The specialized tutoring cost $3,000, but her mother Hayley said it was worth it.

"I would have sold everything for it," Hayley said. "For us, it was just a Godsend."

Hall is bringing her positive spin on dyslexia to Burnaby's McGill library branch on Monday. Her talk is from 7 to 8:30 p.m., at 4595 Albert St. Hall will cover methods to help correct learning challenges for dyslexics. For more information or to register, e-mail info@dyslexiacanada.com.

Unique Program Helps Dyslexics Fulfill Potential By Fiona Hughes, Vancouver Courier Published: Friday, August 07, 2009

Teaching method adopted from American author of The Gift of Dyslexia

"All the other methods out there come from the sound-based world, even if they have multi-sensory facets, they are still based in sound [phonics]," she says.

He'll be working with Sue Hall, a Davis Dyslexia Correction Facilitator who uses the Davis method, based on the experience and work of Ronald Davis,...

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Sue's Personal Hero - Jamie Oliver, Putting America's Diet on a Diet By ALEX WITCHEL – Published in The New York Times October 2009

On his first day in Huntington, W. Va., Jamie Oliver spent the afternoon at Hillbilly Hot Dogs, pitching in to cook its signature 15-pound burger. That's 10 pounds of meat, 5 pounds of custom-made bun, American cheese, tomatoes, onions, pickles, ketchup, mustard and mayo. Then he learned how to perfect the Home Wrecker, the eatery's famous 15-inch, one-pound hot dog (boil first, then grill in butter). For the Home Wrecker Challenge, the dog gets 11 toppings, including chili sauce, jalapeños, liquid nacho cheese and coleslaw. Finish it in 12 minutes or less and you get a T-shirt.

So much for local color. Earlier that day, Oliver met with a pediatrician, James Bailes, and a pastor, Steve Willis. Bailes told him about an 8-year-old patient who was 80 pounds overweight and had developed Type 2 diabetes. If the child's diet didn't change, the doctor said, he wouldn't live to see 30. Willis told Oliver that he visits patients in local hospitals several days a week and sees the effects of long-term obesity firsthand. Since he can't write a prescription for their resulting illnesses, he said, all he can do is pray with them.

Last year, an Associated Press article designated the Huntington-Ashland metropolitan area as the unhealthiest in America, based on its analysis of data collected in 2006 by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Nearly half the adults in these five counties (two in West Virginia, two in Kentucky and one in Ohio) were obese, and the area led the nation in the incidence of heart disease and diabetes. The poverty rate was 19 percent, much higher than the national average. It also had the highest percentage of people 65 and older who had lost their teeth — nearly 50 percent.

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Author Ron Davis on Dyslexia Good Day Atlanta – June 2009

ATLANTA - An interview with Ron Davis author of "The Gift of Dyslexia"

He answers parents questions - what dyslexia is, what it isn't, its causes and how to correct it.

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Teacher Brenda Baird helps dyslexic children, adults read By Fran Metcalf - Published in Courier Mail – May 2009

ELOISE Lestone is a different child from a year ago.

The 10-year-old girl from Charters Towers, north Queensland, has become calm, happy and self-confident after being sad and frustrated for most of her schooling life.

The turning point came about 18 months ago when her mum, Kylie Lestone, attended a seminar on dyslexia in Townsville.

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It's not always as easy as 1-2-3 By Tralee Pearce - Published in Globe and Mail – September 2008

Kids with dyscalculia have trouble deciphering numbers, in the same way dyslexics have trouble with letters, researchers say.

It may look like arts and crafts, but when Nicolas Lafreniere plays with balls of clay, he's actually learning the basics of math.

As the Vancouver child moves a clay rope up and down a grid of balls under the watchful eye of his tutor, he's adding sets of the same number in order to understand multiplication tables. It's a remedial method that is working for a number of children like Nicolas, 9, who have trouble reading numbers.

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Unraveling 'math dyslexia' Published in Globe and Mail – September 2008

Although school has been back for less than a month, it is likely that many children are already experiencing frustration and confusion in math class. Research at The University of Western Ontario in London, Canada could change the way we view math difficulties and how we assist children who face those problems.

Daniel Ansari is an assistant professor and Canada Research Chair in Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience in the Department of Psychology at Western. He is using brain imaging to understand how children develop math skills, and what kind of brain development is associated with those skills.

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Shift In Perception By Justin Beddall, North Shore Outlook – November 01, 2007

Sue Hall always knew her son, George, was a bright kid.

She began reading to him as a baby. He was creative and had a good vocabulary.

But when he went off to primary school in southern England he was suddenly miserable. He got along OK in math but reading was difficult. Very difficult.

By Grade 2, Hall came to the stark realization that her son wasn't keeping up with the rest of the class.

She asked the teacher: "Do you think he might be dyslexic?"

Visit the Whole Dyslexic Society

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Getting to the Root of Dyslexia A medication-free program is helping people overcome learning disability: By Mike King, The Gazette – January 27, 2006

Clinton Pazdzierski used to have terrible handwriting and tended to consult his colleagues a little too often about documents when he was a personal finance officer.

"I knew I had difficulties with work, and it was becoming an issue," Pazdzierski, 33, recalled yesterday. "I had a lot of issues with handwriting and comprehension of documents."

It was something he had to struggle with since he was a child and had developed ways to cope.

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Reported by René Engelbrecht, Master of Arts in Research Psychology By René Engelbrecht; Thesis written April 2005 available at www.rene-engelbrecht.co.za

South African educator René Engelbrecht worked with a group of 20 Afrikaans-speaking pupils in grade 5-7 from a school for learners with special needs. These children had all previously been diagnosed with a reading disorder and had an average to above-average intelligence quotient. These children were randomly assigned to a control group (10) and an experimental group (10).

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Full Funding Ordered for Learning Disabled Public schools required by law to provide proper education: tribunal By Janet Steffenhagen, Vancouver Sun – December 2005

The B.C. Education Ministry discriminates against learning-disabled students when it fails to give them proper support in the public school system, the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal ruled Wednesday.

In a decision arising from the troubles of a young boy in the mid-1990s, the tribunal ordered the ministry to provide full funding for the education of severely learning-disabled students and to monitor districts to ensure they deliver the necessary service.

The decision is a victory for Rick Moore, a North Vancouver father who filed the complaint years ago after watching his dyslexic son, Jeff, struggle for four years in a public school.

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An Interview With Ron Davis, Creator of the Davis Dyslexia Correction Method By Jennifer Brady published in GuidanceChannel.com – November 2005

GuidanceChannel.com: While most people perceive dyslexia to be a curse, you view it as a gift. Why?

Mr. Davis: The very thing that the person is doing that causes a learning problem early on will actually be of great benefit to the individual later on in life. If we look at what dyslexia is composed of, we will understand why it is both a negative and a positive. Dyslexia is a result of a way that the individual is thinking – in pictures rather than words.

There are two basic ways that a human being can think — through either verbal or non-verbal conceptualization. Verbal conceptualization is what most people consider thinking to be — talking to yourself with words, inside of your head and without your mouth moving. Non-verbal conceptualization, is composed of images rather than words. People with dyslexia think with pictures rather than words. Non-verbal conceptualization is actually extraordinarily fast, as images occur in one's mind 32 frames in a second, while the speed of speech is only between four and five words a second.

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Gene May Be Linked To Dyslexia By Miranda Hitti; Reviewed by Louise Chang, MD; Published in WebMD – October 2005

Researchers have found a gene that may be linked to dyslexia, a reading disability that affects millions of children and adults.

The gene is called "DCDC2." Scientists have found a gap in that gene in about 17 percent to 20 percent of people with dyslexia who were studied.

"The message is really crystal clear," researcher Jeffrey Gruen, MD, tells WebMD.

"We confirmed yet again that dyslexia is genetic," says Gruen. He's an assistant professor of paediatrics at the Yale Child Health Research Center at Yale University's medical school.

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Brain Function, Spell Reading, and Sweep-Sweep-Spell By Abigail Marshall – March 2005

Two of the most important Davis tools for building reading fluency and word recognition skills are Spell-Reading and Sweep-Sweep-Spell. During these reading exercises, the student reads a passage out loud in the company of his support person. When he encounters an unfamiliar word, he spells it out letter by letter; after he says the name of the last letter, if he recognizes the word, he says the word, and then moves on. If he does not recognize the word, his helper supplies it for him, and the student repeats the word – and then continues.

Spell-Reading and Sweep-Sweep-Spell are important because they build a vital center for reading in the brain. Beginning readers often rely exclusively on phonetic decoding strategies for all words, a process usually centered in the mid-temporal lobe of the left hemisphere, where letter sounds are connected to words. This is a workable means of decoding words, but it is slow – and it is particularly difficult for most dyslexics.

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Brain Science and Dyslexia: How the Newest Studies Show why Dyslexics Must Use Unique Strategies for Reading, and How Davis Methods Build those Strategies: By Abigail Marshall – July 2003

Brain scan research shows that dyslexic adults who have overcome early reading problems and acquired strong literacy skills use different neural pathways than non-dyslexics.

Typical, non-dyslexic readers rely on a brain system that begins with perception of the letter sequence or words via the visual cortex in the posterior region of the brain (Visual Word Form Area or VWFA), and continues in the auditory cortex in the left temporal (midbrain) region, where sounds of speech are ordinarily processed (Wernicke's area). For more complex reading tasks, the left frontal regions involved in logical thought and speech production (Broca's Area) are also invoked.

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The gift of dyslexia Children with reading disability finally feeling good about themselves – By Mia Stainsby February 2001

"I really, really, really love reptiles - snakes, turtles, everything. When I grow up, I want to become famous and save the tuatara - they're almost extinct and they've been here for about 200 million years and they live on a tiny island. There are only about 65 tuatara left and I want to bring the numbers up. I want them to survive."

It's not hard to see that Daniel Scott, who adores his pet gecko, Gex, came into this world to make a difference. Here is a smart, chatty boy with a mission to rescue an endangered creature. Maybe it's because for a time, he too, was on an endangered list. ...Daniel is dyslexic.

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Dr. Berninger's Research Supports Davis Symbol Mastery and Davis Learning Strategies for K-3 Publish in Health Day New – February 12

Specialized training can reorganize the brains of dyslexic children and help them read better, researchers report.

"The idea is to really understand nature-nurture interaction; how the brain influences learning, but also how instruction influences the brain," says Virginia Berninger, a professor of educational psychology at the University of Washington's Center on Human Development and Disability.

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A Framework for Understanding Dyslexia - The Davis Counselling Approach Article Published in Department of Education and Skills - UK Government Website

The Davis approach to working with people with dyslexia is based on the principle that dyslexic strengths and difficulties share the same root - the dyslexic thinking style. Dyslexics tend to think primarily through pictures and images rather than through the internal monologue used by verbal thinkers.

People who think in pictures tend to use global logic and reasoning strategies, capturing the whole picture rather than working through a process in sequential steps. When they are confused or intrigued by an object or situation, they will mentally move around and explore it from different viewpoints or angles. From this, they develop many abilities and talents in areas such as spatial awareness, creativity, practical skills, lateral thinking and problem-solving.

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Demystifying Dyslexia - The Challenge and the Gift By Sonia Weir

Contrary to popular belief, dyslexia is not a 'reading disability'. It is a unique manner of brain-functioning found in 10-15 percent of the population, impacting the capacity to read, write, spell, process symbols, and concentrate. The condition manifests in a variety of symptoms. According to Dyslexia Research Institute, 60% of those diagnosed with ADD are, to some degree, dyslexic. Yet, because only five percent ever receive the proper diagnosis and assistance, many children grow up illiterate, thinking they aren't intelligent. But, dyslexia is not a sign of low intelligence and in some cases it is a sign of advanced intelligence. Until a few years ago, there was no scientific explanation for its cause.

In 1998, for the first time, researchers at the Yale University of Medicine proved that dyslexia is a very real neurological disorder when they discovered physical evidence of the brain malfunction involved. Dr. Sally Shaywitz, a Yale Pediatrics Professor, led the research team, using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), which allows the researchers to look into their subjects' brains.

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I Can See Clearly Now: Beating Dyslexia With Clay By Brigid McConville

As all too many parents know, the quest for "solutions" to dyslexia can be a long and frustrating one. But now a new teaching method - in which dyslexics model key words in clay - promises to put an end to the problems of dyslexia once and for all. The Davis Dyslexia Correction Programme, which was devised in America in 1982 by Ron Davis (himself a dyslexic), has come to Britain where it is rapidly winning converts.

The programme, essentially a week's one-to-one tuition with follow-up work to do at home, claims an extraordinary 97 per cent success rate. Its basic premise is that people with dyslexia have a special gift: they think mainly in three-dimensional pictures rather than words. This means they can be immensely talented but that they cannot think with abstract words. Every time they read words such as "a" or "the" (which they can't picture), they experience a mental blankness. As these blanks accumulate, confusion sets in, causing "disorientation" (distorted perception) as they try to make sense of the two-dimensional words in front of them.

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Deciphering Dyslexia By Katherin Dedyna

Teen Mathew Lee is no longer fighting with words since he learned a system that helps him keep letters in their place.

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