My Favorite Book on Dyslexia: Overcoming Dyslexia, by Sally Shaywitz, M.D.
I want to share with you the best book I’ve read on Dyslexia. It’s called Overcoming Dyslexia: A New and Complete Science-Based Program for Reading Problems at Any Level, by Sally Shaywitz, M.D. For anyone interested in learning more about dyslexia, or if you have a child, student, or if you yourself are dyslexic, this book is a must read. For me, when I read it, it was like a veil of mystery had been lifted from the subject of dyslexia, and I could start to see dyslexia for what it truly is.
As many of you already know, if you are reading this on my website, “Reading Remedy Tutor”, I was a reading teacher for many years and I struggled with teaching certain kids to read. I, like many other people, was under the assumption that reading was somehow a natural ability. If you taught a child the basics, put print in front of them, showed them the value of reading, then magically all children would read. Reading, in my mind, was just like speaking. Everyone would master this skill. I was frustrated, because my experience in the classroom went against this hypothesis. Most children did master reading. However, some children did not. Some struggled and some children seemed unable to get it, no matter how hard they, or I tried.
Some children did not see patterns in sound. Rhyme was elusive to them. As a lover of rhyme I could not understand how this was not naturally heard. Sometimes I would read with a child and say cat, bat, sat, h___. Most children would say hat. But there were one or two each year that might not get the pattern at all and say hit. Frustrated with the lack of progress with some of my students, I would spend lunch time or planning time with them to go over the basics. But because I did not really know what I was doing, I felt like I was trying to throw as much teaching as I could at them and I just waited to see what would stick. I even purchased a “Dyslexia Work Book” from Amazon. Because Dyslexia was a word we were expressly told by our school system to never use in the classroom, I covered the workbook with gift wrapping so that no one could read the cover. My heart broke when I saw the deterioration that occurred with a child who could not read in the classroom. One of my students in third grade, who I would tutor in the library during my planning period, said to me. “Thank you for working with me here. Here I feel like here I can actually do something.” Sadly in the classroom, she could not really participate. The written word was a serious impediment to her learning.
The summer following the school year of using my dyslexia workbook, I started to research everything I could get my hands on about dyslexia. I came across articles and books by Sally Shaywitz, M.D, and her website for The Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity, www.dyslexia.yale.edu. It was through this portal that I began my search that finally led me to pursue my level 1 certification in the Wilson Reading System.
When new to learning about dyslexia it can be frustrating because there are so many myths about dyslexia. However, by reading the book, Overcoming Dyslexia: A New and Complete Science-Based Program for Reading Problems at Any Level, by Sally Shaywitz, M.D., it is my hope that you will become more knowledgeable and confident and that this will make you a more effective advocate for your child, student or yourself.
I will be reading and summarizing each chapter of this book for you in future articles on my website. For more information about dysexia tutoring please visit www.readingremedytutor.com. Please feel free to share other articles and books on dyslexia. There are great strides being made in legislation and awareness about dyslexia in the scientific and educational community. It is important that we share this information with each other and work together to make dyslexia less of a mystery and concentrate our efforts on the ways by which we can overcome it.
