Teaching Children to Cope with Dyslexia

The article I read this week was about teaching children to cope with dyslexia.  When I chose this article I thought it would contain some suggestions for children to use when reading.  It did contain suggestions but they did not pertain to reading but to self confidence.  I never really looked at this component when reading about dyslexia.

This study took place in Australia. In this study they created an entire school that was a dyslexia friendly environment.   When speaking with adults diagnosed with dyslexia they said that they were angry that no one taught them how to cope with their disability when they were a child.   In this study they looked at children in sixth grade and seventh grade. They included child with and with out dyslexia in the study.  They had found that children by middle school who cope with dyslexia tend to become aggressive depressed and withdrawn. It is at this point that many children begin to distinguish that they are different from their friends.  The feel isolated and defined by their dyslexia.  If a child is taught adaptive coping skills they are able to learn to deal with the disability and not become defined by it.

Some of the techniques that they used with the children were that when they became frustrated they would write a negative word on a balloon and step on the  balloon to let out their frustration.  They also had adult guest speakers who also suffered with dyslexia so they could share their stories and the coping techniques that they used. These people sometime became mentors to the children.  They role played, and made videos.   In the classroom setting the teachers incorporated more listening activities, used pictures to tell stories and had children use their own talent such as singing, drawing or acting out a story they had to tell.

They did not have any special education teachers at these schools on a full time basis they took an assistant principle and a teacher and trained them to implement this work.  They did have a weekly check in with the researcher who has extensive training in dyslexia. All children received 10 weeks of a coping program teaching them techniques to use when frustrated or discouraged and given the opportunity to learn martial arts to focus on mindfulness.  The teachers then implemented the changes in the classrooms.  They found that they all of the students benefited from this instruction.  They found that as these students progressed their self esteem and confidence grew that they learned how to use other abilities to help make their dyslexia less disabling.  The students that did not suffer from dyslexia also benefited they too had learned ways to cope with frustration and depression.  They feel that more research needs to be done but more schools in Australia are going to try and implement the tools that were used in this study.

I feel that this article was very helpful for me.  I don't know that I ever imagined that great about of emotional issues that come with suffering with dyslexia.  My girls at this point can fit in even with their lack of ability to read and preform math at grade level.  They are approaching this age and I am going to encourage my oldest daughter to try some of these ideas.  My second child is very self confident but I think I will share these ideas with her as well.  I would love for my school district to read this study.  I don't know if its something that they would ever try but it doesn't seem to have very many negative effects and might be able to be done with a low amount of cost.   I wonder come there are schools like this in Australia and in the UK and none here that I know of.  I hope that there is some follow up work done by this group or that another group picks up this research and brings it to the United States.






Firth, N., Frydenberg, E., Steeg, C., & Bond, L. (2013). Coping Successfully with Dyslexia: An Initial Study of an Inclusive School-Based Resilience Programme. Dyslexia (10769242), 19(2), 113-130. doi:10.1002/dys.1453