Areas › Focus, starting, and ADHD › Reading, numbers and learning differences
When reading results lift across a whole state after every teacher is retrained, the lesson is uncomfortable and hopeful at once. A good part of what looks like children failing is teaching that has not caught up yet.
One state moved from flat to clearly improved reading in years when many others slipped, and what changed was not the children but how teachers were trained to teach reading. Worth holding in mind before a meeting where a child's effort or home life is being offered as the whole explanation. It also lifts blame off the individual teacher, who is usually using the method they were themselves taught.
Qur’an and Sunnah
He has placed no hardship in your religion (Quran 22:78). The principle that what is asked should suit the person is a good one to carry into how a class is taught.
وَجَٰهِدُواْ فِي ٱللَّهِ حَقَّ جِهَادِهِۦۚ هُوَ ٱجۡتَبَىٰكُمۡ وَمَا جَعَلَ عَلَيۡكُمۡ فِي ٱلدِّينِ مِنۡ حَرَجࣲۚ مِّلَّةَ أَبِيكُمۡ إِبۡرَٰهِيمَۚ هُوَ سَمَّىٰكُمُ ٱلۡمُسۡلِمِينَ مِن قَبۡلُ وَفِي هَٰذَا لِيَكُونَ ٱلرَّسُولُ شَهِيدًا عَلَيۡكُمۡ وَتَكُونُواْ شُهَدَآءَ عَلَى ٱلنَّاسِۚ فَأَقِيمُواْ ٱلصَّلَوٰةَ وَءَاتُواْ ٱلزَّكَوٰةَ وَٱعۡتَصِمُواْ بِٱللَّهِ هُوَ مَوۡلَىٰكُمۡۖ فَنِعۡمَ ٱلۡمَوۡلَىٰ وَنِعۡمَ ٱلنَّصِيرُ
Strive hard for God as is His due: He has chosen you and placed no hardship in your religion, the faith of your forefather Abraham. God has called you Muslims––both in the past and in this [message]––so that the Messenger can bear witness about you and so that you can bear witness about other people. So keep up the prayer, give the prescribed alms, and seek refuge in God: He is your protector––an excellent protector and an excellent helper
Qur’an 22:78read it in the library
Translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem, The Qur'an, Oxford University Press, 2004.
What the research says
That state programme is not among the studies here, so treat the story as encouraging rather than as evidence. What the reviews do say is that dyslexia is a difficulty in learning to decode and spell, and that the older idea of one hidden cause unrelated to general ability has given way to a multi-factorial account. A difficulty in learning is the kind of thing teaching can move.
Snowling MJ, Hulme C, Nation K. (2020). Defining and understanding dyslexia: past, present and future.. Oxford review of education doi
Strength of evidence: one line of research. A single study, or a theoretical account.
Why it works
If changing the teaching changes the outcome, the outcome was never only about the child.
This one is still a draft. It is waiting on a scholar and a clinician to read it before it is published.
Near this one
After a course of intensive work, this student's sound skills moved from the middle of the range to near the top. Average was never the ceiling. It was simply where an untreated difficulty had left them.
Ask a struggling ten year old what division actually is and you will often get a blank, or a method with no meaning under it. Going back to what each operation does is usually worth more than another go at this term's work.
A child working words out from the pictures and the shape of the sentence is guessing well, not reading yet. It usually holds up until around the third year of school and then gives way, because the pictures stop and the words get longer.