More detailed description about dyslexia

In the initial phase of reading acquisition, the most important task is the recognition and transformation of visual symbols (letters) into spoken sounds as well as linking individual letters into meaningful units (words). Reading is said to be acquired when the technical ability to read is combined with the comprehension and the ability to use the contents that have been read.

Just like other linguistic functions, the reading process itself is in the domain of the left brain hemisphere. It is enabled by undisturbed functioning and cooperation of several brain areas. A gross division of reading disability is into the acquired reading disability (alexia) and the innate or developmental reading disability (developmental dyslexia). Developmental dyslexias are reflected as a problematic acquisition and mastering of reading abilities in children with normal intellectual development who have neither visual nor auditory disturbances and who are part of a comfortable socioeconomic environment. Developmental dyslexias have a genetic basis.

Dyslexia is usually discovered when the child enters school. Because of inferior ability to process visual and auditory signals, dyslexia is expressed in the form of a diminished ability to transform sounds into written sign (letters), a diminished ability to remember letters, difficulty in differentiating similar letters and similar sounds, poorer analysis and word synthesis, frequent substitution, omission or addition of letters within a word and wrong understanding or complete absence of understanding of the contents read. Oftentimes, reading disability is associated with writing disability and difficulty with mastering mathematical tasks.

Prevention

Dyslexia is a disorder of reading acquisition that appears in children with normal psychophysical development, good eyesight and hearing as well as normal intellectual abilities. Dyslexia is characterized by a discrepancy between the child's expected and actual reading ability.

It is not entirely clear what causes dyslexia, but it is generally believed that the causes are genetic. Dyslexia is namely most often passed from generation to generation. Because no preventive measure for dyslexia exists, it is important to discover it as early in the child's development as possible as time is a good therapeutic prognostic factor.

Therapy

Special pedagogues, logopedists and psychologists are involved in dyslexia treatment. Most often, children with such problems are referred to counselling centres or other institutions that specialize in such disorders. Many therapeutic approaches to dyslexia exist worldwide, all based on the idea of improving or ameliorating dyslexia symptoms via various learning methods and strategies. They aim at developing auditory and visual perception and discrimination, stimulating speech and language development as well as performing orientational exercises and acquiring associations between sounds and letters via various senses.

It is important to stress that true dyslexia cannot be cured, it can only be managed and accepted as part of our lives by employing various strategies. Many well-known and successful people had dyslexia so one needs to be aware that children with dyslexia possess various artistic talents that need to be discovered and developed as much as possible.

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