Does my child have Dyslexia?

I get many calls from parents who want to know if their child has Dyslexia.. Is there a cause for worry.. Does she need Remedial Education.. Is there anything they are missing.. etc..
Many proactive teachers also ask me the same question.

I am happy to see so many people wanting to know more about Dyslexia.. This can save a misdiagnosis as a slow learner or something else. So for all of us here I am writing down a list of Symptoms to look out for.

• Reading
• Slow and hesitant reading.
  
  • Tires easily with reading or complains of sore eyes
  • Sounding out when reading
  • Failure to recognize familiar irregular words, e.g. “whose”, “right”, “hour”
  • Reading words as anagrams, e.g. “was” as “saw”, “on” as “no”
  • Confusion between “b” and “d” and sometimes” “p”
  • Repeatedly getting stuck on the same words throughout a passage
  • Difficulty understanding overall content
  • Dislikes reading
  • Omission or addition of words or lines
  • Poor standard of reading in comparison with oral ability
• Writing
  
  • Slow at learning to spell
  • Letters and numbers often reversed
  • Spelling tends to be bizarre
  • Incorrectly formed or written letters
  • Failure to write “p” and “g” or “q” sitting down on line
  • Confusion between “b” and “d” and sometimes” “p”
  • Difficulty in keeping writing on lines of page
  • Confusion between “b” and “d” or always writing them as capitals
  • Order of letters within a word frequently incorrect
  • Great difficulty in spelling common words.
  • Words spelt in different ways in same piece of writing
  • Difficulty in reading back what he/she has written
  • A dislike or avoidance of writing
  • Difficulty in copying from book or blackboard
  • Poor standard of written work in comparison with oral ability or drawing
• Other
  • Confusion between right and left
  • Difficulty tying shoelaces or remembering which foot to put each shoe on
  • Difficulty doing up buttons into correct buttonholes
  • Difficulty in carrying out more than one instruction at a time
  • Difficulty in remembering what day/month it is
  • Difficulty in remembering anything in sequential order, e.g. stories, songs, rhymes, months of ear etc.
  • Difficulty in learning to tell the time, learning times tables or number sequences
  • Easily distracted, Poor concentration on reading or writing tasks
  • Generally lacking in confidence
  • A bright child who wants to learn and understand how things work

Remember not all of them can exist in one child at the same time. There may be some other co-morid conditions as well. These are just are minimum to raise the flag. You must consult a Child Psychologist or an Educational Assessment Centre to understand more after this.

If you live in Bangalore we could do an educational assessment to find out if your child has any learning difficulties and if yes then what help and how much help he needs.