Under the headline “Study shows stronger links between entrepreneurs and dyslexia,” Brent Bowers of the International Herald Tribune reported that a survey of business leaders showed an unusually high proportion of them consider themselves dyslexic. Liz Ditz covered this story a couple of weeks ago, which is fitting given her recurring coverage of high-achieving dyslexics.
Continue reading ‘Dyslexic entrepreneurs’
Archive for December, 2007
Alexa Posny, former Director of the US Office of Special Education Programs and now Commissioner of Education for the US state of Kansas, refused to support efforts by a parent group seeking legal recognition of dyslexia in Kansas. Writing under the headline “Education chief won’t endorse push for law recognizing dyslexia” in the Wichita Eagle, Jillian Cohan reported that Commissioner Posny told the Kansas Coalition for Dyslexia Legislation that she does not think legal efforts to provide services are effective.
Education chief Alexa Posny told the Kansas Coalition for Dyslexia Legislation that she agrees early identification of reading disorders is essential. Ideally, she said, Kansas institutions of higher learning should include training for future teachers on how to best help struggling readers.
The meeting was part of the coalition’s push for laws specifically recognizing dyslexia. When coalition member Terry Sader asked if Posny might offer guidance as the group lobbies the Legislature, Posny said she doesn’t think such measures work.
“When we want people to do the right thing for kids, they need to do that because it’s the right thing to do,” she said.”…Any time you make it mandatory, it’s not highly effective.”
Dyslexia almost always should be covered under federal and state protections for people with learning disabilities, Posny said.
I have to agree with Ms. Posny about part of her statement and strongly disagree with her about another part. She’s right when she asserts that dyslexia is included under Learning Disabilities. Thus, a statute protecting students with dyslexia would be redundant.
However, I must strongly disagree with her assertion about “doing the right thing.” I do, indeed, want people to do the right thing for students, but if schools were doing the right things for students, then there would have been no need for laws such as PL 94-142 and its successors. In fact, however, there was and continues to be ample evidence of schools not doing the right thing for students (just track Pete and Pam Wright’s or Charles Fox’s sites). Instead, schools fail to identify students who have real special education needs and also fail to provide services that meet those needs.
Reduced to its basic form, Ms. Posny has just argued that she does not think IDEA works.
Link to Ms. Cohan’s article. Link to an earlier story on the meeting. Links for the Wrights’ Wrightslaw site and Mr. Fox’s SpecialEdLaw Blog.
Bernard Chang and colleagues, who study a rare genetic disorder called periventricular nodular heterotopia (PNH), have found evidence that points to a specific relationship between certain brain structures and dysfluent reading. People with PNH have difficulty reading fluently and their genetic disorder causes a known aberration in neural structure. Their fluency in reading is correlated with the degree of disorganization in their brains.
Continue reading ‘Dysfluent reading in disorganized brains’
Jane Vance Rule, a novelist who had dyslexia as a child, died 27 November 2007. Among her many books and stories, Ms. Rule’s novel Desert of the Heart was the basis for a movie entitled “Desert Hearts” is 1985 by Donna Deitch.
Of course, it’s hard to know about the diagnosis of dyslexia, especially given that she was successful as a writer, so some might wonder about Ms. Rule’s problems with literacy constituted dyslexia. For now, I only have the Wikipedia assertion about Ms. Rule’s dyslexia. If some reader has additional data, I’d welcome posting of the evidence.
Link to an obituary from the Globe and Mail and to a Wikipedia entry about Ms. Rule. Flash of the electrons to Starr Hill Girl for alerting me to Ms. Rule’s death.
Self-concept in dyslexia over the years
Professor S. G. Ingesson interviewed Swedish teens and young adults who have dyslexia to learn about their educational experiences. His informants suggested a lot of interesting things to him. I was taken with one finding indicating that, as they aged, students reported differing feelings of well-being. Generally, they recollected that their feeling of well-being had been low during the elementary years. Even more reported feeling uncomfortable in the middle school years, but as they got older they got, they felt better, so that by their secondary years, the majority felt “good” or “very good.” In fact, in their last school years (ages 17–19 ) over 70% of the individuals reported that they felt “good” or “very good.”
Continue reading ‘Self-concept in dyslexia over the years’