Tuesday, October 10, 2006
World of Dyslexia Discussion Forum Link
http://www.dyslexia-teacher.com/t98.html This is a link to the World of Dyslexia Advice Line and Discussion Forum. I read quite a few entries today and found a lot to look further into. Many posts deal with public school situations, but aside from legalities people ask for advice and others post helpful tips or methods, sites to explore and more.
This is one of the posts I read and thought it might be of interest:
Have any of you ever tried "narrow columns" for reading?A number of my students have visual anomalies that make tracking a line of print across a full line, then skipping back to next line, very difficult. They all, of course, have been taught to read word-by-word. I have toyed with making columns of print only two or three words wide so that the reader can RELAX THE FOCUS, grasp the PHRASE, and read DOWNWARD. From the reaction of my students I think I was on to something... (This is what speed-readers do with longer lines of print - a skill which may develop over time if emphasis is put on "seeing" an increasingly wider span of words at a glance.)Details of what I did are on the Learning Disabilities Resource Community's website (ldrc.ca) in my short article "Narrow Columns for Dyslexic Readers".I think double-spacing, pale blue paper, and perhaps, larger print, may also be important.Those of you familiar with "graphic novels" will know that it is very possible to produce books that read from traditional "back" to traditional "front". For years we have also had large-print books. IF narrow columns with double-spacing helps more readers, why not start producing books in this style also? (Newspaper and magazine columns are too wide for beginners, but that would be a next step - those, and "graphic novels" where speech in cartoon bubbles is never more than a few words wide!)Change the nature of the task instead of trying, always, to change the child.Ann Thompson
This is one of the posts I read and thought it might be of interest:
Have any of you ever tried "narrow columns" for reading?A number of my students have visual anomalies that make tracking a line of print across a full line, then skipping back to next line, very difficult. They all, of course, have been taught to read word-by-word. I have toyed with making columns of print only two or three words wide so that the reader can RELAX THE FOCUS, grasp the PHRASE, and read DOWNWARD. From the reaction of my students I think I was on to something... (This is what speed-readers do with longer lines of print - a skill which may develop over time if emphasis is put on "seeing" an increasingly wider span of words at a glance.)Details of what I did are on the Learning Disabilities Resource Community's website (ldrc.ca) in my short article "Narrow Columns for Dyslexic Readers".I think double-spacing, pale blue paper, and perhaps, larger print, may also be important.Those of you familiar with "graphic novels" will know that it is very possible to produce books that read from traditional "back" to traditional "front". For years we have also had large-print books. IF narrow columns with double-spacing helps more readers, why not start producing books in this style also? (Newspaper and magazine columns are too wide for beginners, but that would be a next step - those, and "graphic novels" where speech in cartoon bubbles is never more than a few words wide!)Change the nature of the task instead of trying, always, to change the child.Ann Thompson
# posted by Bright Minds @ 7:02 PM 
