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Astigmatism is fairly common in the population, results in blurry vision which impacts reading and thus impacts education. It often also results in behavioral issues from the frustration caused in kids with blurry vision who don't know how to express that's the problem.
Anecdotal experience of a couple family members who struggled, once their Astigmatism was corrected they went on to excel.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I’m paid to manage a penguin farm. Weak penguins need additional feeding. Thin penguins are just thin. But there’s no objective criteria to tell weak from thin. And I have a budget. Now, my penguins happen to have owners . But they don’t pay for their penguin, they pay into the penguin system.
That is extremely cool. Poetry. What does it mean?
I've known a person diagnosed with Dyslexia, and he was simultaneously one of the most well-read, eloquent person I'd known, and the most struggling with spelling. Even words he had to write daily (being a teacher and all), he couldn't spell with high accuracy.
If you tell me, he was just "struggling" with spelling, that's no different than telling me a myopic person is just "struggling" to see, or a person with a club foot is just "struggling" to walk.
Of course, I don't object that there are difficulties in the diagnosis or even a precise definition of dyslexia. But, to me, that sounds like we need more research to understand what's happening. If you want me to believe that the condition alltogether doesn't exist, I'd like to see some more evidence.
I'm a dyslexic, and I was given extra attention is school that significantly helped me. I have a pet theory, and this article seems to agree with it to some extent, that there are several or many different neurological conditions that are often put in the same label 'dyslexia'. I hope that one day more research is done to separate out the different underlying neurological states so we can better teach all children to read. The article's conclusion -- that because dyslexia is an inprecise term we should abandoned it to an even less precise term -- is flawed. We should instead work towards creating more precise language and understanding around the different ways low literacy manifests in children.
If I was an incredibly wealthy technocrat this would be a pet research field of mine. If we can improve childhood literacy education it will have massive returns on that person's lifetime contribution to society. Understanding how the brain processes language also has significant implications for other lines of research as well.
> The method for diagnosing dyslexia, known as the discrepancy model, was relatively straightforward: test a child’s IQ and their reading age, and if there was a discrepancy between the two – average-to-high IQ, low literacy – that child was dyslexic. Elliott felt unsure about these assessments. The children he tested for dyslexia all struggled to read and write – that much was clear – but their literacy difficulties…
> The method for diagnosing dyslexia, known as the discrepancy model, was relatively straightforward: test a child’s IQ and their reading age, and if there was a discrepancy between the two – average-to-high IQ, low literacy – that child was dyslexic. Elliott felt unsure about these assessments. The children he tested for dyslexia all struggled to read and write – that much was clear – but their literacy difficulties…
It may well be dyslexia (or a more specific term) may mean some other treatment can be helpful only for those who have it, and not for the general population of poor readers. This hasn't been suggested (to my knowledge), but it is possible.
Though I will note that the definition of Autism has gotten broader over time as treatments have been discovered to help kids who didn't fit the previous definition.
I tend to even switch words when I read my kids because the font isn't normal to me, as opposed to when I'm on a computer.
I'm surprised Astigmastism is not mentioned: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astigmatism Astigmatism is fairly common in the population, results in blurry vision which impacts reading and thus impacts education. It often also results in behavioral issues from the frustration caused in kids with blurry vision who don't know how to express that's the problem. Anecdotal experience of a couple family members who struggled,…
In the 70s, when dyslexia had a jump in 'popularity' (according to google ngram too), an education psychologist I knew had a curious experience. There was a television program about this thing called dyslexia. In the following weeks and months, many parents came to him to announce that their child had dyslexia and must be treated specially. I guess this is not actually that curious. In the sense that conditions seem…
Of course the above gives quack a start, once you can explain something with BS you can spread it for money. I don't have a solution.