So what is dyslexia? ItвЂ™s a neurological, often genetic disorder that makes it hard to recognize and process letters and sounds accurately and automatically. Finally, dyslexia does not affect intelligence in fact most students with dyslexia are of average or even above-average intelligence! In fact, dyslexia originates in the brain, not the eyes, so reading through colored lenses or other forms of vision therapy will not help a dyslexic child to read. Another common myth is that dyslexia is a vision problem. Most young children make these errors, sometimes frequently, when learning to read and write, and the reversals tend to stop with time and practice. Contrary to popular belief, reading a word backward or reversing letters like b and d is not necessarily a sign of dyslexia. First, letвЂ™s dispel a few common myths about dyslexia.

While dyslexia is a diagnosis, not a cognitive construct like the topics above, itвЂ™s a well-known, commonly misunderstood phenomenon that we feel deserves mention here. For beginning readers, weak orthographic memory can hurt reading fluency because every single word is a struggle. Poor orthographic memory can make spelling very challenging, even for older kids who read well. The culprit could be a weakness in the part of long-term memory that stores letter patterns and spelling, called orthographic memory. Sight words just donвЂ™t seem to stick for children like this. Even when a student like this has just read a particular word in a sentence, she may not recognize the very same word in the next sentence and have to sound it all over again, making reading very laborious. Great knowledge of letter-sound correspondence isnвЂ™t so great when a student has to sound out every single word, every single time, however. They know which sound each letter represents, and theyвЂ™re able to decode each word accurately. Sometimes, we work with students who can sound out each word on the page like a pro. This type of memory is used heavily in the younger grades, but less so as students advance through school. When it comes to reading, paired associate memory is what allows a student to remember which sound a letter represents. Recalling someoneвЂ™s birthday or name, learning the names of shapes and colors in preschool, or remembering that mesa means вЂњtableвЂќ in Spanish all require paired associate memory. Note that weak phonemic awareness is not a result of poor hearing kids who pass audiology tests with flying colors can still have weak phonemic awareness because it is a function of the brain, not the ears.ДЄnother skill required for effective reading is paired associate memory, a specialized part of long-term memory that is responsible for pairing two arbitrarily related pieces of information. Some kidsвЂ™ brains are adept at these distinctions, but those who have difficulty are at a real disadvantage and need work developing their phonemic awareness.

Before a child can learn that the letter b makes a /b/ sound, his brain must be able to recognize the sound and differentiate it from other, similar sounds. This skill is called phonemic awareness, and itвЂ™s a critical prerequisite for learning to read. If you think about it, none of these tasks actually require literacy skills one needs only to be able to process and manipulate the sounds, or phonemes, that make up words. Imagine hearing the following instructions: вЂњName a word that rhymes with вЂњblue.вЂќ Tell me how many sounds you hear in the word вЂњchat.вЂќ Say the word вЂњnoteвЂќ without the /n/ sound.вЂќ

Why is cannot one word