Did you know that the signs of dyslexia can start showing as early as pre-school? So, it’s important that parents should learn how to look out for them early. This way, we can better make more informed arrangements for our kids, for reading and writing to be more accessible during their school years.
Having to go through school without any support at all can be extremely daunting for a person with dyslexia. As parents, we should make sure that our kids receive all the support they can get.
ONE has come up with this handy guide for the signs of dyslexia just to help you. Here, we’re going to cover:
- What dyslexia is
- Signs of dyslexia in preschool
- Signs of dyslexia in primary school
- Signs of dyslexia in adulthood.
Ready? Okay, fantastic! Let’s get started.
What is dyslexia?
ONE Intervention has written plenty of resources about what dyslexia is! To start, check out this article, or this. But if you’re pressed for time, we can give you the really short version.
Basically, dyslexia is a learning disorder that makes it harder for affected individuals to read. In Chinese, dyslexia is 阅读障碍 – literally translated as ‘reading obstacle.’ That sounds about right.
Dyslexia is a result of individual areas in the brain processing language differently. People with dyslexia are not less intelligent. They do not have problems with hearing, vision, or work ethic. They simply need a bit more time and patience than most students when learning how to read and write.
All on the same page? Alright, great. One might imagine that it would be difficult to identify if an individual has dyslexia or not. After all, people may find reading and writing challenging for any variety of reasons. However, there are some signs of dyslexia that we can look out for depending on the age group of the individual. Let’s go through these one by one.
Signs of dyslexia in preschool
Late talking
People with dyslexia have problems identifying speech sounds and learning how these relate to letters, words or phrases. This is called decoding. For example, we might decode the word ‘determined’ as ‘de-ter-mined’. However, this skill may not come as naturally for a child with dyslexia.
Hence, at preschool, a child with dyslexia may not learn new words as quickly. They may have difficulty recognising the letters of the alphabet. Alternatively, another sign of dyslexia could be the child taking much longer than their peers to recognise the letters of their own name.
Difficulties with nursery rhymes and/or rhyming games
The child could have trouble learning common nursery rhymes. An example of this would be ‘Jack and Jill’, where ‘Jill’ (loosely) rhymes with ‘pail’ and ‘hill’. A child with dyslexia may struggle remembering the rhyme, or stumble over the rhyming words.
This is because they may be unable to recognise the rhyming pattern, causing them to be confused by the nursery rhyme. Alternatively, the child with dyslexia may enjoy listening to stories but seem to show little interest in the actual words.
While it’s normal for children to take a while before grasping the concept of rhyming, this learning curve will be steeper for a child with dyslexia. Hence, another sign of dyslexia could be said child having problems with nursery rhymes even after several repetitions.
Mispronounces familiar words
Likewise, another sign of dyslexia could be mispronouncing familiar words. This may happen even after repeated attempts to teach the child the word.
A child with dyslexia may be described as having persistent ‘baby talk’. They may reverse sounds in words, which is called muddling. For example, ‘butterfly’ may be mispronounced as ‘flutterby.’ ‘Cucumber’ could be muddled as ‘cubumber’.
Signs of dyslexia in primary school
Difficulty sounding out new words
This is because of the difficulty with decoding that people with dyslexia have. For example, a child with dyslexia in primary school may have to read out the word ‘photosynthesis.’ Usually, we’ll break this down into the prefix ‘photo’, ‘synth’ and ‘esis’. This would make the word easier to read in isolation.
However, a child with dyslexia may be slightly slower to learn the connection between letters and sounds. They might have trouble sounding out each individual part of the word.
Consistent reading and spelling errors
There are a number of types of reading and spelling errors, though that’s probably best left to be elaborated on by linguists. However, there are a few common errors that you can look out for. If your child appears to be making these mistakes despite corrections and obvious effort to do better, it may be a sign of dyslexia.
- Letter reversals – e.g. d and b; dog and bog becomes bog and dog
- Transpositions – felt and left
- Inversions – m and w ; n and u
A more detailed list of reading and spelling errors compiled by Reading Rockets can be found here.
Poor auditory discrimination
Auditory discrimination is the ability to differentiate between similar sounds, according to brightwheel’s article. For example, a child with strong auditory discrimination should be able to tell apart now from tow from bow, even though they sound similar.
Therefore, auditory discrimination also contributes towards helping children sound out unfamiliar words. Poor auditory discrimination would result in the abovementioned difficulty in sounding out new words.
Beyond just academics, auditory discrimination naturally extends to music. It helps us identify different instruments. For instance, through auditory discrimination we might determine that a high, whistling sound in a piece of music could be a flute. On the other hand, the low strings might be a cello or bass. So, another sign of dyslexia could be a child having trouble telling apart different instruments.
Signs of dyslexia in adulthood
Reads and writes slowly and with great effort
We’ve established that dyslexia is a learning disorder due to differences in brain development. Hence, this difficulty with reading and writing is a lifelong issue that can’t be ‘cured’ by medicine or special glasses. In any case, it’s to be expected that adults with dyslexia will read and write slower than someone without dyslexia.
This sign of dyslexia could appear as finding it difficult to scan or skim texts. Alternatively, one might need to re-read paragraphs a few times before being able to fully absorb the information.
Difficulty remembering people or places
It’s a well-researched fact that people with dyslexia have problems with memory – specifically, with working memory. Working memory is an active component of short term memory, according to Jennifer Love’s article on Enlightenlearningresource. This means that people with dyslexia may have trouble recalling people, dates or places.
Following this same logic, a person with dyslexia may find it difficult to follow several instructions at once. This is because they might forget the sequence of instructions by the time they finish the first or second task.
Difficulty with deadlines
Likewise, a person with dyslexia might have trouble remembering the deadline for a certain assignment. Alternatively, they might remember the deadline with no problem, but find it difficult to organise and manage tasks in order to turn in the assignment in time.
To clarify, none of this is due to ‘laziness’ or a deliberate attempt at obstinance. A weakness in working memory genuinely complicates daily tasks, processes and academic achievements. However, it does not render a person with dyslexia as completely incapable of doing it – just that they may need to put in more time and effort than a person without dyslexia.
If any of the above symptoms seem familiar to you or your loved one, you may want to consider going for a dyslexia diagnosis. The Dyslexia Association of Singapore provides a wealth of resources, including assessments for dyslexia and ADHD, amongst other services.
Alternatively, contact us to get in touch with our experienced child psychologist for an assessment today.
