Doctor Explains Why More English Speakers Have Dyslexia!

[roseashkiiii]

Dyslexic people trying to learn french:

[fnp-bb]

I always wonder why my dyslexia affected my English more than my Spanish.

[-desertpackrat]

I knew a kid in my Mandarin Chinese class in high school who was dyslexic and also had dysgraphia, and he couldn't write letters at all, anything he wrote looked like random dots and lines. But he had no trouble writing in Chinese characters once we learned them.

[finite]

As someone with dyslexia, I find learning other languages especially ones that are more phonologically clear i.e. Spanish very rewarding

[OptimusPhillip]

So Percy Jackson might've been onto something with the "demigods are dyslexic because their brains are built for ancient Greek"

[ashleycurzon]

This gives me new appreciation for being born english without dyslexia, the language is hard enough as its without any neurological glitches getting in the way.

[stellars]

I speak both English and Russian and I am dyslexic in both of them. 😭

[bionicwizard]

I find it funny that I could understand and read that dyslexia page pretty easily

[fariesz]

important to note that there are various forms or dyslexia (arguable various different disorders that are just lumped together)
i for one never had a problem with orthography for instance, not even much in English which is (technically) my second language. but i rotate and mirror letters all the time in my head and used to do so all the time in writing, and i couldn't for the life of me get my brain to read words instead of individual letters. this literally only got significantly better when i learned Japanese as that somehow rerouted my brain.
still despise reading though. some wounds never close i reckon.

[raeannshinabarger]

I wasn't diagnosed until I was in my early 20s. I was/am smart & quiet. These traits allowed me to "pass" as "normal" until a college professor looked deeper and recommended testing.

I speak multiple languages. Not all of them well, but most of them are good enough to be understood. Even after years of study, I have difficulties with Japanese Kanji, hiragana, and katakana. They don't move around/ flip-flop as much as English letters do, but there's still some movement. (For some reason, Cyrillic writing doesn't move around at all.)

[axvyrall]

I love Romanian for being so easy to read

[laratheplanespotter]

Absolutely true! I recently started learning German and I can get that right most of the time. I’ve picked it up pretty quickly too. But I’m dyslexic and need screen overlays and my journal articles printed on pink paper. Now you’ve explained it, it’s not so weird

[JuliaFrancisEmilyLouise]

I’m British but I live in Australia and learnt another language, graduated university with a qualification in that language. I’m also dyslexic and learning was a big battle for me. On my second language journey I discovered that you can have a speech impediment in one language and not another

[spvillano]

I’m dyslexic, but due to merciless drilling and training from an early age, I’m well compensated. I’ll only decompensate with extreme fatigue.
One odd thing is, I see through camouflage easily, both natural and human varieties. That came in handy in the military!

[sjappiyah]

I actually read the beginning part perfectly except for the word “process” lol.

And this is so true, English pronunciation is easy (as in the sounds needed to be made) it’s the inconsistent spelling system that’s horrendous 🤦🏿‍♂️

[ghostratsarah]

When I was a kid, I would do essays on the completely wrong topic, because I'd misread the prompt. I put an incredible amount of effort into one in kindergarten, the prompt was typed at the top of the page so I was regularly reading it. It was supposed to be if I preferred baseball or soccer. I spent 3 whole days in class and as homework, fawning over basketball. My dyslexia was so bad that I was nearly held back in first, because they thought I didn't know how to read, write, or do simple math. Was almost diagnosed with autism until I magically started reading college level books and writing complex essays- my creative writing was highschool level. They realized I just couldn't process letters and numbers. I had gotten a ton of practice in so I could win a contest at our local library over that summer- which I did.

I think it was the fact that I was being exposed to more and larger words, and reading them out loud with my mom. My reading comprehension countered my vision. I couldn't practice like that in class. First grade books were way too simple, not to mention they played around with words to make them interesting, so I couldn't use context clues. I was still constantly struggling with their simplicity, but second grade level short novels were a lot easier to make sense of. I would get docked points when we had to read out loud- because I would insert words that weren't there, but the words I put in made contextual sense. My parents really should have fought those grades, based on disability.

Math I could never, still can't, get right. I confused the heck out of tutors in middleschool- it was really hard to trace where I went so wrong to get such absurd answers. It was down right comical.

I have equal trouble with every language, Kanji/Chinese pictography is impossible.

[infinitejest]

Dr Karan’s floating head never fails to amuse me 😂

[resourcedragon]

On a related (but slightly different issue), the script itself can speed up or slow down learning - significantly. Not going to lie here, I am a big fan of the Roman alphabet, the letters are both distinct and elegant. (Lower case letters do tend to be a bit more problematic, b & d and p & q are tricky, and m, n & r could also challenge some people.)

The other script I love is the Mohenjo-Daro / Harappa script, the characters (probably syllables, rather than single phenomes) are wonderfully distinct and really very elegant.

Where problems can start to arise is with scripts where the letters look more alike, like the Arabic alphabet. In the article I read, Iranian children (Farsi uses the Arabic alphabet) are about a year behind counterparts who use an alphabet with more distinct letters. You have to work harder to read it.

And while ideograms (like the kanji characters) may not be a problem for people with dyslexia, they take a lot of learning, resulting in Chinese children being a long way behind counterparts who don't have to learn so many characters.

[antine]

I agree to some extent. Dyslexia isn't just a reading disability, it's a language disability which impacts reading. It's much harder for dyslexic people to learn new languages compared to non-dyslexic people. It is true it shows differently in different orthographics, particularly visual ones, but that's not the only factor (speech and language therapist here)

[amandah]

That's crazy! English really is a nightmare to learn.