5 Things All Professionals Need to Know About Reading & Dyslexia - it impacts 1 in 5 students

1. Dyslexia is defined as trouble with words, but it most commonly causes difficulty learning to read & sound out words accurately and fluently - typical readers do not struggle to sound out words, easily learn sight words & they fully understand what they are reading. This article explains more details: https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/dyslexiateachingdisability-who-really-has-learning-tim-conway-ph-d-
2. Dyslexia & a child's typical development of reading skills comes in part from genetics and in part from educational experiences; the brain learns via "experience-based plasticity" which means that for a person to learn to speak French, then someone better begin speaking French to the child or adult. Without these learning "experiences" a person's brain cannot build the new wiring it needs to learn new skills, like speaking French. These video clips of a lecture given at a Florida college explain more about the role of genetics and the environment in developing reading skills: Video clips from a professional lecture on language development progressing from spoken language 1st, to learning to read and spell 2nd, and lastly to learning written composition skills.
3. Scientific studies have identified key learning experiences/intervention methods that help the majority of children to fully develop their reading skills, even children at risk for or already diagnosed with dyslexia. One powerful study showed that children most likely to struggle with learning to read can be easily identified at age 5 years old by one simple test; do NOT "wait and see" if the child's struggle goes away, as research clearly shows a small gap in learning to read at age 5 will be a larger gap at age 6, an even larger gap at age 7 and so on, until the child is far far behind by 1, 2 or more grades in reading skills. Early intervention with methods that have been fully tested by scientists and proven to be highly-effective is the BEST approach for helping close the gap in reading skills - children can close the gap and learn to read at their full IQ/ability level. This article explains more details: https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/dispelling-dyslexia-myths-medical-endeavor-should-tim-conway-ph-d-
4. Dyslexia is genetic and runs in families, but even public schools (no tuition) with small-group or classroom instruction can help children close the gap and learn to read on grade-level, IF the school is using an intervention/literacy method that has been well-researched and proven to be highly-effective. This article explains more details about a school approach that is FREE and not an expensive tuition, large fee private school - NOTE: many expensive private schools for dyslexia teach children how to compensate for their difficulties with learning to read (eg using the strategy of forming words in clay to better memorize words, or learning lots of letter/sound memory strategies, or being taught tons of phonics rules that most adults with fully developed reading skills do not even know and didn't need to know to become fluent and accurate readers - hence, these schools commonly use methods that have not been proven to treat the most likely causes of difficulty learning to read and instead are aimed at improving the symptoms of the learning difficulty, but not its most likely cause. https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/can-children-dyslexia-learn-read-grade-level-tim-conway-ph-d- [also see Figure 1 below]
5. IF parents demand early intervention, but ONLY with an evidence-based neurodevelopmental language method (not a phonics program) that professional scientific publications/research has proven this method to be highly-effective, then they CAN help make sure their child reads on grade level by 2nd grade. Yes, his would empty most of the ESE/SLD classrooms and help the majority of children read on grade level, again, before the end of 2nd grade. Currently, 20 years of national assessments of our school systems show that nation-wide our USA educational system has made little to no improvement in helping larger proportions of students to read on grade-level. This article explains this data and the poor outcomes of our educational system for the past 20 years: https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/empty-sldese-classrooms-tim-conway-ph-d- [See Figure 2 below]

DID YOU KNOW: The USA educational system's ESE/Special Education classrooms with highly regarded Individual Education Plans (IEP's) actually have a 95% FAILURE rate and only a 5% success rate - only 5% of students in Special Education/ESE classrooms with IEP's improve their reading skills enough to learn to read on grade level, leave Special Education programs/classes and return to regular education classes. Science has proven how schools can achieve far better outcomes for a larger percentage of students, so that more students read on grade level & could be less likely to enter the juvenile justice system, less likely to drop out of high school, less likely to be on welfare or in jail at least one time in their lives, less likely to be in prison, and more likely to have an income that is above the poverty level - literacy is an equalizer that dramatically improves individuals' opportunities and positive outcomes in life. Without literacy, then many children will live the life of Ameer Baraka and end up in prison, illiterate and with a bleak future. Ameer explains his life experiences of how Dyslexia & Illiteracy were not "Superpowers", did not help him become educated, let alone the CEO of a company and left him with a critical life choice - learn to read or spend the majority of his life struggling to live - his story is explained further here www.Kingbaraka.com

Figure 1. Neurobiology of Specific Learning Disabilities in Reading / Dyslexia

Figure 2. Sample Outcomes of Classroom Instruction to Remediate Poor Reading Skills

Dr. Conway is a father of two children with a prior history of poor reading skills, a clinical research scientist with expertise in Neurodevelopmental Disorders (including Dyslexia), professionally trained as a PhD neuropsychologist, a serial entrepreneur focused on bringing scientific clinical research into daily educational practices and teacher/SLP training, a co-founder of the first public charter school in the USA exclusively for children with dyslexia and providing them with FREE & evidence-based/highly-effective intervention methods, a 2nd generation professional focused on improving literacy and dyslexia interventions [his aunt and uncle, a Speech-Language Pathologist and linguistic were world renoun for their pioneering and tireless work to provide effective interventions/literacy instruction for children and adults with dyslexia - beginning with their San Luis Obispo Medical Clinic work in San Luis Obispo, CA] and because of significant dyslexia in his own family Dr. Conway received early intervention at age 5 in the Lindamood's "Auditory Discrimination in Depth" program [his aunt and uncle's 1st Dyslexia program published in 1969] to increase the odds that he would not struggle to learn to read or spell, like his father had. Dr. Conway can be reached at [email protected] or through one of his three medical clinics called The Morris Center 352-275-5778