Blackboard
Dyslexia: Handle with care

Each individual has the ability to process information in all number of ways, finding one's own most effective mode is vital if intellectual potential is to be fulfilled. The use of varied teaching approaches, therefore, would benefit all students but it is essential when working with a dyslexic

Dyslexia is a language-based disability that affects both oral and written language. It may also be referred to as reading disability, reading difference or reading disorder.

Dyslexia, in psychology, is a developmental disability in reading or spelling and generally becomes evident during early schooling. To a dyslexic, letters and words may appear reversed, e.g., 'd' may appear as 'b' or 'was' may appear as 'saw'. Many dyslexics never learn to read or write effectively, although they tend to show above average intelligence in other areas.

Problems faced by Dyslexics

In many cases, dyslexia appears to be hereditary. Dyslexia is not a disease. It is a condition in which a child has to face serious problems with reading and/or writing. This root problem further deprives a dyslexic of his/her ability to concentrate on the spoken words and thus following a list of instructions becomes extremely difficult.

All dyslexic children experience varying degrees of stress at school, doing their homework, and even at out-of-school activities they attend. Thus, school becomes a special challenge, as much of their day is focused on dealing with text.

A dyslexic child knows that something is wrong with him but cannot understand why they find it so hard to do the work that other children can cope with easily. Thus, they can easily become very stressed. Apart from this, many dyslexic children and teens often experience problems with mathematics because of their difficulties with sequencing and many do not understand mathematical sums beyond addition.

Improving a dyslexic child's self-confidence is a very critical element to their academic growth and success. The way a child perceives him/herself can positively or negatively impact every aspect of their academic career and beyond. This may also affect his/her parents as well because they have to face a real struggle in supporting their child.

Possible causes

The first thing that needs to be understood is that, dyslexia is NOT brought about by poor parenting. On the contrary, it is the initiatives taken by the concerned parents of dyslexic children that have brought dyslexia to the forefront.

To be quite honest, nobody knows at the moment, what is the rootcause of dyslexia. There has been a real increase in the amount of research taking place and a number of possibilities are beginning to emerge, but nothing is for certain. The overall picture is that dyslexia can be caused by inherited factors, and/or hearing problems at an early age.

Inherited factors

It is clear that dyslexia is very frequently found in families, and is often accompanied by left-handedness somewhere in the family. This does not mean that a dyslexic parent will automatically have a dyslexic child, or that a left-handed child will necessarily be dyslexic.

The brains of dyslexic children show an unusual variation in left and right side brain activity. Recent research has found that, whereas non-dyslexic children use the left side of their brain for language work, dyslexic children have to use the right side as well. This is not the side of the brain that is wired for language work, and as a result, the brains of dyslexic children and adults have to work about six times harder. This may be why dyslexic children and adults become fatigued by language work and dealing with text.

Hearing problems at an early age

If a child suffers frequent colds and throat infections in the first five years, the ears can get blocked from time to time due to which that hearing is impaired. The parents can easily be unaware of this until a doctor actually looks into the child's ear. This condition is sometimes known as 'glue ear' or 'conductive hearing loss'. If the difficulty is not noticed at an early stage, then the developing brain fails to make links between the sounds it hears.

This early learning of sounds and words is fundamental to the child's developing ability to handle language and text. If a child cannot hear clearly, he will be unable to hear the difference between words like 'pin' and 'thin', or 'fan' and 'van'. The lack of clear hearing will also delay the child's phonemic awareness since the ability to hear words are made up of smaller sounds and syllables, like 'c-a-t', or 'in-ter-est-ing'.

A delay in phonemic awareness causes lifelong difficulties, if corrective action is not taken at a very early stage. The most common treatment is the insertion of a tiny tube or grommet into the child's ear. This allows the fluid to drain off so that the child's hearing is restored. Another treatment is the removal of the tonsils, which are sometimes the cause of the repeated infections.

A combination of both

Sometimes a child has inherited genes, which dispose him or her towards difficulties dealing with printed word, and has also experienced early hearing problems. These children are often found to be quite severely dyslexic, and need a lot of support through their school and college years as well as in the workplace.

Tips for teachers

There are compensating strengths for dyslexic persons. Dyslexic children and teens benefit greatly in three important areas:

1- creativity

2- physical co-ordination and

3- empathy with others

Teachers working with dyslexic children and teens see examples of their creative and imaginative drawings in school, and their skills and pleasure in sports, games, swimming and other activities, which require the physical co-ordination that many non-dyslexic children find hard.

Every dyslexic child experiences problems and frustration at school, often including bullying unfortunately and they learn to empathise with other people's experiences of difficulty.

Thus, learning strategies to overcome the difficulties associated with dyslexia can make a huge difference to the performance of a dyslexic child or adult. In particular, a 'multi-sensory' method can really help which involves teaching children to learn spelling, for example, not only by hearing and saying the sounds of the letters, but also by using their visual and tactile (touch) memories by writing the letters in the air, on the carpet, making them with plasticine or in very large (joined) handwriting on big sheets of paper. This gives their brain a visual and tactile memory of the word as well as the memory of hearing the sounds of the letters. Joining the letters together in joined writing helps the brain to remember the order of the letters in a word.

To summarise, each individual has the ability to process information in all number of ways, finding ones own most effective mode is vital if intellectual potential is to be fulfilled. The use of varied teaching approaches, therefore, would benefit all students but is essential when working with a dyslexic. Computers and new technologies can help students but the emphasis must be on making the curriculum as accessible as possible.

Keeping presentations of information short and punchy is vital, but the most important thing is to make use of different visual and graphical ways. More effectively, try to make it fun wherever possible. 

Sources: Various books and articles by Jean Herold, Mike Juggins & research work of NIMH

Institute
Quality education with dedication
The school is aimed at imbibing moral and ethical values in the children and inculcate a sense of discipline among them

 By our correspondent

The exam fever is over, at least at school level where the students in primary and secondary sessions have completed their exams. Now they are either waiting for their results or have started taking new classes after their result was announced earlier this month. Most of the schools, while preparing for the summer vacations are also holding their annual result ceremonies and one can see the marriage halls in different areas being occupied in the day and evening time for such functions.

The Programmers School, working on a motto of "Allama Bilqalam (Education or knowledge through the pen), recently, held its Annual Ceremony to announce the results for its primary and secondary sections, at a local marriage hall in North Karachi.

In the current session of 2007-08, around 650 students up to elementary classes appeared in the exams. The result of pre-primary section was 100% while that of Primary and Elementary classes was 98%. Top achievers were given awards in this ceremony. The audience, a mix of parents, students and academicians gave big accolade to the award winners.

During the session of 2006-07, 100% students who appeared in the Board Exam passed out with A-1 and A grades. This was the first batch of matric students.

Starting its journey in 2002 from scratch, the school has been working under the able guidance of Wing Commander (Retd) M Zaheer Yusufzai, the Administrator and Farzana Zaheer, the Principal of the school. Manned by a dedicated and professionally experienced team, the Programmers School was registered as Secondary School but initially the students till class VI were given admission. Seeing the first year's result, the school received an overwhelming response from the people in the adjoining areas. Within two years the school, which was opened in a small building ran short of space and in order to accommodate the increasing strength of students, in the year 2004, an adjacent building was also rented and the classes were expanded. The school got recognition from the Board of Secondary Education, Karachi in the year 2005.

Presently, the school is housed in two triple stories buildings and around 700 students are studying in conducive environment. The school has a regular scholarship programme through which three bright students are given monthly scholarship in each session.

Giving quality education, the school also takes care of the IT education of its students. In this connection, a full-fledged computer lab along with the faculty has also been established in the school.  Islamic education is also the part and parcel of its regular curriculum followed in the school. The school is aimed at imbibing moral and ethical values in the children and inculcate a sense of discipline among them. In the words of M Zaheer Yusufzai, the Administrator and Farzana Zaheer, the Principal: "We want to see school grow immensely in terms of providing quality education to maximum No of students from the adjoining areas and make a name for itself in the near future."

Last but not least, these days there is an increasing trend of using marriage halls for such ceremonies, due to the non-availability of space in the schools, the large majority of which comprises bungalow schools. Although a good step in terms of arranging such ceremonies comfortably, it is usually seen that in these halls most of which are open air, no arrangement for fans is done on such occasions.

As a result, there is a no concentration to the announcements done for the results as there is so much noise due to the constant conversation by the uncomfortable audience who sweat in such a warm weather. If the ceremonies are held in close halls, with proper fans or air-conditioning facilities then it will result in focused listening by the audience.            

 Horizon
Multiple intelligences and teaching methodology
Each individual manifests varying levels of the different forms of intelligences. The one, which is dominant on others, can indicate the possible ways of learning 

Compiled by Maria Anwar

The theory of multiple intelligences was developed in 1983 by Dr Howard Gardner, professor of Education at Harvard University. It suggests that the notion of intelligence, based on IQ testing, is quite limited. Therefore, he proposed eight different types of intelligences to account for a broader range of human potential in both children and adults. They are of the following types:

• Linguistic intelligence (word smart)

• Logical-mathematical intelligence (number/reasoning smart)

• Spatial intelligence (picture smart)

• Bodily-Kinesthetic intelligence (body smart)

• Musical intelligence (music smart)

• Interpersonal intelligence (people smart)

• Intrapersonal intelligence (self smart)

• Naturalist intelligence (nature smart)

Our schools and culture focus most of their attention on linguistic and logical- mathematical intelligence. It is because of this that we esteem the highly articulate or logical people of our culture. However, Dr Gardner says that we should also place equal attention on individuals who show gifts in other forms of intelligences that is the artists, architects, musicians, naturalists, designers, dancers, therapists, entrepreneurs and others. Unfortunately, many children who have these gifts don't receive much reinforcement and encouragement in school and end up being labeled as "learning disabled", ADD or simply underachievers.

The theory of multiple intelligences proposes a major transformation in the way our schools are run. It suggests that the teachers be trained to present their lessons in a wide variety of ways using music, cooperative learning, art activities, role play, multimedia, field trips, inner reflection and much more to provide equal learning opportunities to students possessing different intelligences.

The theory of Multiple intelligences has become the focus of attention of many educators all over the world and hundreds of schools are currently using their philosophy to redesign the way they educate children.

The theory of multiple intelligences also has strong implications for adult learning and development. Many adults find themselves in jobs that do not make optimal use of their most highly developed potentials/intelligences. Sometimes they are stuck in a job, which is not at all according to their natural abilities and hence leads to unhappiness in the workplace. The theory of multiple intelligences gives adults a whole new way to look at their lives, examine and explore potentials that they left behind in their childhood (such as a love for art and drama) and allows them to develop those through courses, hobbies, or other self-development programs.

According to this theory there are eight different ways of teaching and learning as it provides eight potential pathways to learning. If a teacher is having difficulty reaching a student in the more traditional linguistic or logical ways of instruction then the theory of multiple intelligences suggests several other ways in which the material might be presented to facilitate effective learning.

Whether you're teaching or learning, you can use the information to achieve results by connecting it with words (linguistic intelligence), numbers (logical-mathematical), pictures (spatial), music (musical), self-reflection (intrapersonal), a physical experience (bodily-kinesthetic), a social experience (interpersonal) and/or an experience in the natural world (naturalist intelligence).

For example, while teaching or learning about supply and demand in economics, you might understand the information in the several different ways using the different types of intelligences. You might read about it (linguistic), study mathematical formulas that express it (spatial), observe the laws in the natural world (naturalist) or in the human world of commerce (interpersonal), examine the law in terms of your own body (e.g. when you supply body with lots of food, the hunger demand goes down and vice versa), (bodily-kinesthetic & intrapersonal).

Each individual manifests varying levels of these different intelligences, and the one, which is dominant on others, can indicate the possible and most effective ways of learning and teaching as well as choosing a career in future.

  Heidian district.

Exam
A useful guide to systematic study
Remember that every one has a different capability and mental calibre but there is no substitute for hard work

 By Kanza Tariq

Have you ever sat down to study but found yourself at a loss and didn't know what to do? Where to start, how to learn and how to develop and understand concepts? Here are a few tips to make studying much more easier:

Set a target

Set a target for yourself and be clear about what exactly you have to study. Start off with difficult subjects and leave the easier ones for the end since studying gets difficult, as your mind tends to get exhausted with time. Allocate a particular period of time to each subject, after analysing how much time you need to devote to each topic.

Ambience

The room in which you are studying should be airy, moderately cool and has ample light. Place your cell phone away and on silent mode.

Focus

Concentrate on the subject and do not think about irrelevant stuff. Start with the name of God and try to accomplish the goal you have set for yourself by the end of your study session.

Read aloud

Try to read aloud, because it has scientifically been proved that reading aloud is more effective in helping one retain the content. Also, look at the illustrations and diagrams and try to memorise them as the human brain is more receptive to conspicuous images.

Understand

Instead of repeating the lines to yourself immediately after giving one reading, try to develop a concept. Note the key points or highlight them on the book. Rote learning may help you reproduce the content during the paper but forgetting even a sentence of the crammed material leads to a chain reaction and you tend to forget rest of the matter too.

Break up into pieces

Never dive head first into a pool of new concepts that would be difficult to remember. Break the content up into pieces and give headings to the content. This would make things easier to remember. Keep in mind that your studying stamina is built over time and once it is built, you can cover a major chunk of syllabus in one go.

Mnemonics

Sometimes students come across an enumeration or a set of facts or formulae that are difficult to remember. Instead of wasting hours on trying to learn them, the easier way is to make mnemonics. Although time taking at the first time, but these can never be forgotten and make learning all the more easier.

Repeat:

Once you are done with the learning phase, repeat the key points to yourself. When you are sure that you have retained the concept, move on to the next topic. After getting done with the next topic, repeat again, along with the topic you did first. In this way you can have multiple revisions as you move forward.

Hard work

Remember that every one has a different capability and mental caliber but there is no substitute to hard work. You may need to concentrate more and spend a major chunk of time while studying but in the end consistency and regularity will pay off. Believe in yourself and in your hard work and be sure that God will let you through.