Tutor Doctor | Aug 10, 2015

How to Tell if Your Child Is Dyslexic

Categories: Elementary School, High School, Middle School, Tutoring, K-12, K12

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Dyslexia is a learning disorder that makes it difficult for students to read letters and symbols. Dyslexia is the most common learning disorder which, sadly, often goes undiagnosed. As a parent, you are in the best position to pick up on dyslexia and help your child with techniques especially formulated to overcome the problem. Children with dyslexia can go on to have extremely successful academic careers.

There are several factors which help you to identify dyslexia. If your child displays one or more of these tendencies, have them tested by a specialist. The earlier you identify dyslexia, the better. When dyslexia goes undiagnosed, children may fall behind at school or develop negative attitudes towards education.

Confusing the order of numbers and letters: This is the most common attribute of the dyslexic child. Children will switch the order of letters, symbols and numbers. This means that they have trouble recognizing words or solving math problems. It is completely natural for beginner learners to do this, but if the problem persists after the first and second grade, it may cause them to fall behind.

Learning to talk: Children who have dyslexia tend to take longer to learn to talk. They may mispronounce words or mix them up and usually have trouble pronouncing R’s and L’s, M’s and N’s. Of course every child has these issues when learning to talk and this shouldn’t be seen as a definitive sign, but if the issues continue after most babies have mastered speech, it may be cause for concern.

Delayed dominance: While most children have a dominant side early on, children with dyslexia may struggle with this. They can have trouble knowing left from right, may be clumsy, they may use their hands and feet interchangeably etc.

Copying: Because of the mix up with letters and symbols, children who have dyslexia may have difficulty with copying text and math problems. This means that if they are working from a text book, website or from the board, they may copy things incorrectly.

Slow readers, fast learners: Dyslexia is no indication of intelligence, so you may see your children lagging behind in reading, but having no issue in grasping complex concepts or learning new ideas and skills. Reading skills are especially affected and along with the mixing up of letters in a word and words in a sentence, dyslexic students will also have trouble with rhyming words. It will be difficult for them to recognize rhyming words or provide a rhyming word for a given word. For example; if you ask them to find a word that rhymes with can, they would struggle to come up with the right answer.

Many of the early signs of dyslexia can simply be the normal issues that all children face when learning language, numbers and symbols. If these issues persist, it may be time for more in-depth investigation. If you suspect your child may have a learning disorder like dyslexia, seek the council of a developmental psychologist who can not only test your child to identify leaning difficulties, but can also help you and your child to overcome learning problems.