Dyslexia in Children is one of the most common learning difficulties. Each child learns and develops at his or her own pace. Some children are fast to pick up things and some are slow. Some children start crawling first and some start walking. Reading is another such ability with which most of the children have found difficulty at some point in their developmental stage. Some children learn to write the alphabet first, and then learn to read and some children learn to read with the help of phonic sounds. But, if reading becomes a difficulty wherein your child starts falling behind his or her classmates and do not learn even after repeated efforts then this is something that you should be concerned about. Then it is possible that the child is suffering from a learning disorder like dyslexia.
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What is Dyslexia in children?
Dyslexia is a type of learning disability in children. In Dyslexia a child is not able to process words or numbers. There are several different types of learning disabilities. Dyslexia is a term that is used when it affects the child’s ability to recognize and manipulate the sounds in the language. Such kids have a hard time decoding new words or breaking them down into pieces they can sound out. This can then lead to difficulties in reading, spelling, and writing. These types of kids will have trouble recognizing new words and retrieving the familiar words or can be slower retrieving the familiar words.
Dyslexia has nothing to do with the child’s intelligence or it does not mean that a kid is stupid. It is just the gap between a kid’s ability and achievement. With proper help and strategies for compensating their weaknesses, students can easily learn to read and write and excel in the fields of their interest. But, dyslexia is not a condition that goes away or is curable. You have to live with it for your entire life.
What causes dyslexia in children?
Dyslexia is not a disease but is a condition that a person is born with. It runs in the genes of the family. Some people might think that kids with dyslexia might be stupid or lazy. No, they are not. Most of them have average or above-average intelligence levels and these kids have to work exceptionally hard to overcome their difficulty in reading.
Dyslexia happens because of the way a person’s brain processes information. When people with dyslexia read, they use different parts of the brain, than people without dyslexia. The brains of people with dyslexia do not work efficiently while reading.
What are the signs and symptoms of dyslexia in children?
The preschool and elementary school kids can have the following signs of dyslexia
- Having a speech delay
- Struggling to learn simple rhymes
- Pronouncing longer words
- Learning the alphabet sequence, days of the week, months of the years, and different color patterns is a tedious task for these children.
- Having trouble following directions
- Cannot tell left from right.
- Repeat or omit short words like as, the, am, etc.
- Learning to read and write his or her own name.
- Reading and spelling similar words with correct letter sequence.
- Finding difficult to take notes and copy words from the board.
- Have difficulty spelling and sounding out new words.
- Lack fluency compared to other children of their age.
- Avoid being called out to read or write on the board.
- Reverse letters and numbers when reading.
And all of these leads to frustration in a kid and dislike towards reading and studying. Dyslexia affects children out of school also. Here are the things that might affect them.
- They find it extremely difficult to learn a new language.
- Get easily frustrated and become more emotional.
- Find it difficult to decode logos and signs.
- Struggle with reading and telling time.
- Cannot keep track of multi-step directions.
Dyslexia in Children and social and emotional impact
Dyslexia affects not only the reading habits of the kids but also, the social life of the kid and which in turn affects the emotional life of the kid. A person who has difficulty finding words can also find difficulty in expressing their feelings with language. Kids with dyslexia usually suffer from low self-esteem and it impacts the social life of people a lot. Not, many people understand what is dyslexia and may make rude and wrong comments for these people. This discourages them even more.
How to diagnose Dyslexia in Children?
If you or the kid’s teacher feel that your kid is lagging behind in the school in reading habits, then you can take help from the school in getting it diagnosed. They will perform an evaluation that will test your child’s intellectual capacity and reading skills to see if there is an achievement gap. They will then share with you the results and discuss with you the possibilities of how they can help you and your kid in improving their learning capacity. If you want you can also schedule a private consultation with a psychologist.
How to manage Dyslexia in Children?
With the help of proper assistance and care from parents as well as professional trainers and teachers, a kid with dyslexia can manage to learn to read and write and manage to be in the class with other normal students.
The students usually work with a specially trained teacher or a tutor who helps them to learn to read, write, spell and manage their overall condition. Your kid’s teacher, psychologist, or pediatrician may recommend an academic therapist who is trained to work with kids with dyslexia.
In the United States of America, there are federal laws that entitle kids with any kind of learning disabilities to special treatment like instructions, help with the homework, giving extra time during the test, help taking notes, and a lot more in the public school itself.
What else should we know as parents?
- Kids with dyslexia always feel that they are as smart as their other classmates. As they grow up and move to higher standards,the problem might get worse as reading becomes more important for learning.
- Kids with difficulty in reading start to avoid reading as it is more difficult and stressful for them and then they fall farther behind.
- As a parent we should encourage and assist our children in their efforts of reading and learning. Also we should try to give our child confidence in other areas like sports, arts, hobbies, drama, and other activities.
So, here is all that I wanted to share with you regarding dyslexia in Children. If you think that your child has dyslexia, then talk to your child’s doctor, teacher, or specialist about it. The sooner it gets diagnosed the better. If you know of something else, do let me know in the comments section below.