Why Is Testing For Dyslexia So Important? And What More Could You Know Once You've Had A Dyslexic Test?
Dyslexia can be described as a condition that affects one's ability to manipulate symbols and sounds. It ordinarily appears as difficulties in reading, going forwards and backwards from letters to words and sounds, to meaning. As people do if they read aloud, for instance.
A dyslexic person's eyes see things just like a non-dyslexic's eyes. However with the dyslexic, the brain interprets the signals received in different ways. You do not "catch" dyslexia, you're born with it. Approximately 1 out of every 10 has some type of dyslexia, to some degree. Having a test for dyslexia would be the only way to know for sure whether anyone is dyslexic.
A dyslexic person can learn how to do practically anything the non-dyslexics do, but dyslexics learn in different ways. They have to be taught in the way they could learn. Otherwise, they may never "get it" by themselves, then get frustrated and stop trying, thereby shutting out a complete sector of learning and development for themselves.
Nowadays, school-age children are routinely screened for dyslexia, however it wasn't always like that. In fact, it has only been in the last 15 or so years that screening and testing for dyslexia has been the rule, not the exception.
Just about all adults who graduated from elementary school more than 15 years ago have never been tested. Consequently there's approximately 2 million dyslexic adults in the USA by itself.
What normally makes them difficult to find and help is the way the educational system treated them as children. They were not appreciated. They got branded as dull, lazy, underachievers and mental defectives (which nearly all were definitely not!) They were injured and embarrassed at their differences. As defense mechanisms to protect themselves, they learned to hide most of these differences.
Today you'll find them as people working at jobs way below what their intelligence would indicate they were qualified for. This to be able to avoid paperwork, needing to read anything for their work. An easy dyslexic test could very well set them on the road to overcoming dyslexia and opening a whole new world of possibilities...
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