9th December 2009 9:00
By Blue Tutors
In a recent government report, Sir Jim Rose identified a need to increase the help available for dyslexic students in our country’s primary schools, the BBC has reported. Ed Balls has since announced that £10m has been budgeted to give extra help to parents and teachers, which includes the training of 4,000 to help them to recognise and manage dyslexia in their students.
Sir Rose’s report attempted to define dyslexia saying that it is a ‘learning difficulty which primarily affects skills involved in accurate and fluent word-reading and spelling’. This was welcomed by many who feel that it is helpful to have a definition for a condition that has long been seen an explanation for a poor student. However, Professor Julian Elliot of Durham University highlighted that the definition was too ‘woolly’, and didn’t allow distinction between students who had dyslexia, and those who were poor at school for separate reasons.
The chief executive of Dyslexia Action, Shirley Cramer, welcomed the report, but added that it is misleading to consider dyslexia as one specific condition, when in fact it is a name that covers a broad range of learning difficulties; phonological awareness, verbal memory, attention, organisation and sequencing are all learning difficulties encountered by students, and the myth that it is simply an aspect of reading doesn’t accurately communicate the problems that some children have.
The report was warmly received by the National Union of Teachers, but a spokesperson warned that 4000 newly trained teachers is not necessarily enough to fully combat the problems faced, and that more resources may be needed to adequately help students affected by dyslexia across the country.