Does my child have dyslexia?
According to the current diagnostic criteria, dyslexia has become defined by some as any reading disorder. Unfortunately, the term dyslexia has different meanings to different people. For some, dyslexia is seen as the rotation of letters and numbers in space (“m” for “w”; “b” for “p” “d” “q”; etc.). for others, the term is used to describe letter confusion within words (“maht” for “math”)
Or in numbers (34for43). These visual distortions have different instructional implications. Schools may not use the term dyslexia in order to avoid confusion
If my son can not" see" letters and numbers the right way, how do you know if my son's learning problem is a learning disability and not a vision or hearing problem?
Routine vision and hearing checkups are a good idea all school aged children. Frequently schools request information from these specialists to rule out a vision or hearing problem before proceeding with the comprehensive educational evaluation.
However, for many children who rotate or reverse letters and numbers, the problem is not their eyes' ability to see (visual acuity) but what the brain does with that visual information that creates the processing deficit.
Likewise, a child's difficulty learning sound-letter pairings is not a hearing (auditory acuity) problem but an auditory processing deficit. The information obtained in comprehensive educational evaluations helps to better define the nature of the academic difficulties.