"If I said the word, 'dyslexic', what would you think about first?"

OK, so I'm sat here with this thing, this blur in front of me. I hate it. Saying that so has everyone else in the room. They're doing fine though. The only thing is that we've been sat here for nearly an hour, everyone simultaneously turning pages, turning chapters. I however, am half way down the first page with this nightmare in front of me. And it's getting worse.

Oh no. Light-headed again. Right, remember what she said. Concentrate. Look at the word, split it up into little bits.

But that's as far as I get. I don't split up the word and I don't break it down; I tear the book up instead and breakdown within myself. Everyone is staring at me. I throw the remainder of the ripped up book on the floor and storm out of the classroom. The teacher says nothing, as usual. And as the door closes behind me I hear the sniggers of all the people who have ever pushed me around, of all the people who have ever stolen my dinner money and of all the people who have ever thrown my things on the floor just because I'm different… The ones who called me the "Dyslexic Thicko." You know, anything so long as it separated me from the rest of them. And to be honest, I think I preferred it that way.

The thing they didn't realise was that I had a talent. I had a talent that none of the others had and that none of them could ever have. I had the gift of dyslexia. So what if sometimes I couldn't control it. At least I had it in the first place.

To most people the thought of someone having any kind of learning difficulty provokes some sort of pity. But to be honest, what do we really think a learning difficulty is? Generally the understanding of such learning difficulties is quite shallow. Specific Learning Difficulties (SLDs or SpLDs) is just one of these more vague terms given to a number of conditions that affect a person's ability to learn. The most common and highest profile of these difficulties is dyslexia, but others include dyscalculia, developmental co-ordination disorder (DCD) and attention deficit (hyperactivity) disorder (ADD or ADHD).
There are several syptoms that relate more commonly to these conditions and they are the lack of ability to organise or process more complex pieces of information, a reduction in spacial awareness or an evident inability to follow directions.
In the UK dyslexia is thought to occur in around 4% of the population and around 10% show the symptoms of it. It has been defined by the British Dyslexia Association as "a combination of abilities and difficulties that affect the learning process in one or more of reading, spelling, writing. Accompanying weaknesses may be identified in areas of speed of processing, short-term memory, sequencing and organisation, auditory and/or visual perception, spoken language and motor skills. It is particularly related to mastering and using written language, which may include alphabetic, numeric and musical notation."
The other types of learning difficult that are often associated with dyslexia are:
• Dyscalculia: This relates to a difficulty in understanding and coping with numerical and spatial information, in particular a reduced ability to understand and/or apply mathematical processes. It can result in a difficulty in handling sequences of information or processing it.
• Developmental co-ordination disorder (DCD): This is an impairment in the development of motor co-ordination skills and can result in a reduced ability to perform tasks requiring a lot of coordination and fine motor control. Dyspraxia is also an example of a DCD.
• Attention deficit disorder and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADD/ADHD): This condition results in a reduced ability to concentrate and focus on specific tasks, and an increased chance of distraction, and reduction in memory capability. ADHD includes an aspect of hyperactivity, which if often in the form of fidgeting, excessive talking, a general excess in physical movement or impulsive actions.

Overall the general opinion is that dyslexics and people with other types of learning difficulties have an inability to do certain things. In many cases this is true but not many people actually consider the pure genius that comes from non-verbal conceptualisation instead of verbal conceptualisation. Most of the UK think verbally where they arrange sentences and meaning inside their heads with words, not pictures.
But ever wondered the creative aspects that come from thinking non-verbally? Dyslexics are able to look at the world in a view that none of the "normal" people can, a 3D view of words and pictures and this enables dyslexic people to find out so much more about the world and so are capable of knowing so much more. Some of the more famous dyslexics include Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Leonardo da Vinci, Whoopi Goldberg and Winston Churchill. Now do you think those sniggers from the ignorant people in my class could still be as plausible knowing this? Could they still place "dyslexic" and "thicko" in the same sentence?

© Camilla Barker 2006