Dyslexia - how real is it?

[swallow]

Overdiagnosed, and used overmuch as an excuse. I've got a similar issue with numbers transposition, but I just go back and recheck everything I wrote down to make sure it matches and 99 times out of 100, I catch the mistakes.

Yeah, me the same, with the same solution.  My grand dad used to have to do exactly the same and still managed to be an accountant.  I'm not sure, however, about people faking it as an excuse though - I thought in England that the reading age had to be under 9 to be diagnosed as nneding official help with duslexia - and that would be average reading age rather than normally bright 9 year old age

[Norgy]

Most things are overdiagnosed nowadays. Its easier than accepting that some people are just born crazy.

"Not all children are smart and clever, got that?  Kids are like any other group of people: a few winners...a whole lot of losers."
--G. Carlin

George knew the score. 

[Baron von Schtinkenbutt]

"Not all children are smart and clever, got that?  Kids are like any other group of people: a few winners...a whole lot of losers."
--G. Carlin

I have that routine on CD.  Its great.

I haven't heard much about dyslexia used as an excuse or overdiagnosed, but unlike ADD (which I agree with you completely on) there isn't a convenient pharmacological treatment, so there's less motivation for overdiagnosis from the doctor's perspective.  Parents claiming their kid has dyslexia is a different story.

As for the Asperger's thing, aside from our high profile former member I haven't heard much about this disorder being used as an excuse.  In fact, from what I've found the rate of official diagnosis for Asperger's is less than that for full-blown autism.

[BuddhaRhubarb]

I never thought I was dyslexic until I started working with inventory and catching my own transpositions of numbers over and over.

[Palisadoes]

I don't believe in it, though that is likely because I don't understand how it can possibly exist (letters and numbers move on a page !?!?).

[swallow]

I will say that when I was a kid, I'd be reading music and the lines and notes really did start to shimmer and then zig zag up and down the page.  It was a very real physical thing.  It also made me better at music because I had to read ahead and that gave me the time to interpret the music rather than just read and play the notes.

[DontSayBanana]

I haven't heard much about dyslexia used as an excuse or overdiagnosed, but unlike ADD (which I agree with you completely on) there isn't a convenient pharmacological treatment, so there's less motivation for overdiagnosis from the doctor's perspective.  Parents claiming their kid has dyslexia is a different story.

As for the Asperger's thing, aside from our high profile former member I haven't heard much about this disorder being used as an excuse.  In fact, from what I've found the rate of official diagnosis for Asperger's is less than that for full-blown autism.

From what I've seen, it seems to mostly be parents and school districts looking for government leniency in poor academic performance. It's another fad disorder in that kids who get in arguments or don't pay attention get ADD/ADHD pushed on them, and kids that don't perform well in math or reading get dyslexia pushed on them.

I'm going to second what swallow says, though. I've found the "read-ahead" effect to be pretty helpful- I tend to keep sharp on arithmetic by making it a game and racing cashiers/fellow students with calculators.

[Valmy]

Now, from my friends who have school-age kids, I understand it's much more common these days, with about 20-30% of kids getting diagnosed with dyslexia meaning that if they misspell something in a written paper, they don't get their marks reduced etc.)

Dyslexia is very real.

Kids get diagnosed with huge amounts of crap these days though to explain why they goof off in school.  When these kids become adults they will magically no longer have dyslexia, ADD, whatever anymore even though that should be impossible

[derspiess]

In college I dated a girl who had dyslexia (her emails made Tim & Berkut look like typing tutors).  Frustrating as it was for her, it was probably a net benefit overall, because it pushed her to be an overachiever.  Kind of the same way Patton's dyslexia helped motivate him.

[Ed Anger]

In college I dated a girl who had dyslexia (her emails made Tim & Berkut look like typing tutors).  Frustrating as it was for her, it was probably a net benefit overall, because it pushed her to be an overachiever.  Kind of the same way Patton's dyslexia helped motivate him.

aks ofr naal.

[grumbler]

Knowing something about the disorder, how it is manifested, diagnosed, and compensated for, I find this, like many other languish discussions between the "armchair experts," wildly funny.

Mart, to answer your original question, dyslexia probably is not more common today, but it is diagnosed more because the science is more advanced and so more subtle forms of it are being recognized in the testing.

If the Polack school system allows students to avoid being marked off for mis-spelling just because they say "OMG man Im teh dslyectic lol so u cnat do anything 2 me if I rite like these, lol," then I would say your problem is with Polacks, not dyslexics.  I have taught maybe 100 dyslexic students through the years, and none were excused for mis-spellings (though some had accommodations that allowed them to type papers and use a spell-checker, or to use the Kerzweil machine and have tests and whatnot "read" to them using the machine).

As for those who "don't believe" in it, what can I say?  there are people who don't "believe in" all kinds of science.  Go visit your intellectual cousins in the creationist movement.

[Palisadoes]

I have taught maybe 100 dyslexic students through the years, and none were excused for mis-spellings (though some had accommodations that allowed them to type papers and use a spell-checker, or to use the Kerzweil machine and have tests and whatnot "read" to them using the machine).

As for those who "don't believe" in it, what can I say?  there are people who don't "believe in" all kinds of science.  Go visit your intellectual cousins in the creationist movement.

*Currently* science doesn't really back up dyslexia. The way dylexics are "diagnosed" is by assessing their ability, not by taking a piss sample, or whatever. For this reason, to believe in dylexia is more similar to believing in creationism, than it is not to believe in science.

This is why I don't "believe" in dyslexia. I just can't understand how people's brains can make them perceive words jumping across a page, etc... plus there is no actual scientific proof besides testing ability (perhaps people who can't dance have a learning difficulty too?).

Saying all of that...

I think a lot of illnesses are just extreme forms of things which we all have to some extent. For instance, dyslexia and poor spelling, OCD and being tidy, bipolar and having mood swings. The extreme ends of the spectrum are offficial diseases/illnesses/disabilities. I can believe in a spectrum which we are all on in some degree.

[The Brain]

Can't you just listen to their bodies?

[Valmy]

*Currently* science doesn't really back up dyslexia. The way dylexics are "diagnosed" is by assessing their ability, not by taking a piss sample, or whatever. For this reason, to believe in dylexia is more similar to believing in creationism, than it is not to believe in science.

Well in the future when we understand the brain better it may be possible to diagnose simply by a brain scan of some sort.

[Palisadoes]

*Currently* science doesn't really back up dyslexia. The way dylexics are "diagnosed" is by assessing their ability, not by taking a piss sample, or whatever. For this reason, to believe in dylexia is more similar to believing in creationism, than it is not to believe in science.

Well in the future when we understand the brain better it may be possible to diagnose simply by a brain scan of some sort.

Yeah, it is a possibility, though far from a certainty.