10 Things That You Should Know About Dyslexia!

Did you know that October is Dyslexia Awareness Month? Here are 10 things that we would love everyone to know about dyslexia.

Hey everyone, we're Nick and Sonja and this is Dyslexia Journey. And a quick note here at the beginning before we get into the 10 things that we would like everyone to know about dyslexia, which is that we have our email address in the description box below and we would love it if you contact us with any comments, ideas for topics, or if you have someone who you think would be a great person for us to interview.

So the first thing that we would like everyone to know about dyslexia is that one in five people are dyslexic. So that's 20%. So that's pretty high and, you know, not commonly known that it's actually that high. Yeah. And one in five, I mean, that means that even if you don't think you know someone who's dyslexic, you almost certainly do know someone who's dyslexic. Right. And that also means that pretty much every teacher in school is going to be teaching dyslexic kids, whether they realize it or not.

Right. All right. So point number two for Dyslexia Awareness Month that we think it's important for everyone to understand is that dyslexia is actually, there are actually observable brain differences in dyslexic people as compared to the general population. And scientists have discovered this through various imaging techniques such as functional MRIs. And we talked about this in more detail in one of our previous episodes, exploring some recent scientific articles. So we can link to that. But for now, it's just important to understand that dyslexia is a real physical difference in people.

Right. So point number three for Dyslexia Awareness Month that we would like everyone to know is that being dyslexic is a whole brain difference. So what we mean by that is that it's not just about reading and writing, it is it's really more about how information is processed and taken in. And so it's much more really complex than that. And it affects lots of different areas of life because of that. Right. And that leads right into point number four for Dyslexia Awareness Month, which is that dyslexia, often people think of it as just being negative, that it makes it harder to read and harder to write. But in fact, dyslexia has lots of positive qualities that come along with it as well, such as strengths in the visual spatial area, creativity, thinking outside the box and so on.

There are many, many strengths that have been identified in dyslexic people. Yeah. And it'll vary, of course, somewhat from person to person. There's individuality there, but that has been shown. Those particular ones that I mentioned have been shown to be more correlated with being dyslexic. All right. The fifth point that we would like everyone to know about dyslexia for Dyslexia Awareness Month is that dyslexic kids are at higher risk for depression and anxiety.

And we've had a couple of therapists on. So you can check out those episodes to hear more about signs to look for, you know, and just how to sort of address that issue that unfortunately can, you know, go along with being dyslexic. Yeah. And if you're a parent of a dyslexic kid, it's just especially important to, you know, you don't have to worry about this, but it's just important to be aware of it and to know kind of what signs to look out for there.

Right. Point number six for Dyslexia Awareness Month is that being dyslexic does not mean that you are not intelligent. And this is a super important point. If you, if you take only one thing away from today's episode, I would like you to take this away that dyslexia is not correlated with intelligence. So as we know, at a population level, there is a range of intelligence and that range of intelligence looks approximately the same for people with dyslexia and for people without dyslexia.

So it's really important to understand that people with dyslexia can do, be quite intelligent and do quite well in school and often need to be challenged in ways that people assume that they can't handle. Right. Right. Okay. So number seven, dyslexia can't be cured and you wouldn't want to, right? Sort of based on some of the other points that we made, it's really this overall difference, you know, in processing information and learning.

And it has, like we said, even, you know, traits that would be considered positive that come out of it too. So we wouldn't want that kind of change and it's not a disease. So, you know, it's, it can't be cured, but it's really about learning to remediate, learning how, you know, a dyslexic kid learns best. It's really about that. So it can't be cured and you wouldn't want it to be. Right. And extending from that point number eight is that while dyslexia can't be cured, people with dyslexia can, can learn to read and write quite well.

Right. So dyslexic, being dyslexic does not mean that you are never going to learn to read. and so it's important to understand that it is probably going to be more challenging for people with dyslexia to learn to read and write fluently, but with proper instruction and by proper instruction, I mean, instruction, using techniques that are known to work for people with dyslexia, instructed by people who are trained in teaching dyslexics. dyslexic kids can, or dyslexic adults can, learn to read and write quite fluently.

Right. So our ninth point that we want to make and want everyone to know for dyslexia awareness month is that many highly successful people are dyslexic. And so maybe you've heard of some, of some people mentioning this, even if you didn't know, you know, that it's 20% of the population. but let's, I'm just going to give you a couple examples here. So Keanu Reeves, Anderson Cooper, Caitlyn Jenner, and Cher are all dyslexic.

Yeah. And, and these successful people really span the range of, of possible careers and ways to be successful. Right. Yeah. We didn't mention business people here, but a lot of business people as well. Yeah, exactly. Okay. Our final point today for dyslexia awareness month, this is point number 10, is that it's never too late to get identified with dyslexia and to, work on remediating your dyslexia. So, you know, work on, on learning to read and write more fluently or, or whatever areas of weakness you particularly might have.

Now that's not that it's not important to catch it as early as possible. so I, I want to make sure that people understand that, the earlier you catch it, the, perhaps, or hopefully, easier time your child is going to have in school because once they're identified, then they can have the proper instruction and not be left to struggle and, and, and start to, to feeling, not good about themselves. but again, it's never too late.

So even if your child is in high school or in college, or even if you're an adult who you think you might have dyslexia, look into it, get identified, and, and just never too late to work on, helping improve your skills there. Happy dyslexia awareness month, everyone.

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