Paul Sanchez, the advocate extraordinaire, has accomplished the second wish of his 8 wishes in his campaign to promote awareness of Learning Disabilities. Way to go, guy!
Archive for February, 2007
The Virginia (US) chapter of the Council for Learning Disabilities announced its spring symposium. It’ll be at The Inn at Virginia Tech and Skelton Conference Center, Blacksburg, Virginia. I hope to attend. Link to the annoucement.
In January of 2006, the London (UK) Times carried this headline: “10-minute test helps tell if your child is dyslexic.” Of course, this evoked a “hmmmm?” (said with chin moved down and toward one side and with eyes narrowed) from me. Skeptic flags waving, I read the story by Alexandra Blair, Times Education Correspondent.
The ten-minute test, developed by speech therapists and psychologists, screens young children for language disorders from the age of 3. By testing simple grammatical and pre-reading skills, parents, teachers or assistants can check whether a child is “school-ready” or may need more help.
In a post entitled “Relief in sight for Micheala’s reading disorder,” Jayne Hulbert of the Taranaki (NZ) Daily News describes the case of a child who has been diagnosed as having Irlen Syndrome and is helped by viewing text through colored overlays. It’s the usual….
Micheala Kennard can’t wait to be looking at the world through her orange-tinted glasses.
But for now the Ohawe 11-year-old is making do with a coloured plastic overlay she puts on top whatever she’s reading. The tinted plastic stops words from moving around the page.
Micheala has a visual processing disorder called Irlen syndrome which means when she reads, words jumble and move around.
The National Association for the Education of African American Children with Learning Disabilities (NAEAACLD) is an organization that seeks to promote high-quality education for children and youths with Learning Disabilities who have African-American heritage. The NAEAACLD, which was formed in
2000, provides resources such as “One Child at a Time . . . A Parent Handbook and Resource Directory for African American Families with Children Who Learn Differently” and Internet links for information about Learning Disabilities for parents and others. Link to the Web site of the NAEAACLD.
Personal stories
That’s the good side of talking about high-achieving individuals with Learning Disabilities. The bad side is that the press, in my opinion, shines the light on too few individuals and selects almost exclusively those who are celebrated because of extraordinary achievement (e.g., Charles Schwab or Greg Louganis), mistakenly sending the message that everyone can be a celebrity. Worse: Only those who accomplish great things are to be admired.
A realistic accounting would show that there are many more individiuals with Learning Disablities who have managed to achieve well, if not at the level required for celebrity. It is these folks whom we should be celebrating. They have accomplished lots, even if their lives are quiet and essentially normal. There are some personal stories of this sort in a section of Richard Wanderman’s site, LD Resources.