All too often children are labeled as slow or stupid; they are put aside into special classes for the slower kids and looked down upon by the smarter kids. Teachers and parents look at them in disappointment for the great potential they once saw in their child’s eyes has gone to waste. Many teens that now believe that their stupidity is a truth were once as young children, praised for their quick learning and brightness. There must be an explanation for this. The explanation for me along with many other kids is the learning disorder called dyslexia. “As a complex neurological condition, the symptoms may effect many areas of learning and function and may be described as a difficulty in reading, spelling and written language” (Reid 2), as defined by The British Dyslexia Association in 1997. This is a common definition of dyslexia. The other definition of dyslexia is “ an inherited neurological difference, resulting in language, perception, processing, and attention concentration deference’s” (Dyslexia Research Institute 1). Dyslexia is a serious disorder that effects an “estimated 5 percent to 15 percent of children” (UniSci 1).
This number is extremely high; yet many do not know the effects that dyslexia has on the learning process and the emotional development of children, or understands what dyslexia even is. It has been found through research that dyslexia is a disorder occurring in the brain. On the UniSci WebPages, it was stated that “an issue of the American Journal of Neuroradiology provided evidence that dyslexia is indeed a brain-based disorder” (1). Many tests and researches have been done to prove and also further the discovery of how the dyslexic brain works so that we may better understand it. Researchers
