Signs of Dyslexia

Dyslexia signs aren't always negative; strengths may hide symptoms. Emerging as early as preschool, a person with dyslexia typically shows 3 or more warning signs.

In Preschool

Difficulties

  • Trouble learning common nursery rhymes, such as “Jack and Jill”

  • Difficulty learning (and remembering) the names of letters in the alphabet

  • Seems unable to recognize letters in his/her name

  • Mispronounces familiar words; persistent “baby talk”

  • Doesn’t recognize rhyming patterns like cat, bat, rat

  • A family history of reading and/or spelling difficulties (dyslexia often runs in families)

Kindergarten & First Grade

Difficulties

  • Reading errors that show no connection to the sounds of the letters on the page—will say “puppy” instead of the written word “dog” on an illustrated page with a picture of a dog

  • Does not understand that words come apart

  • Complains about how hard reading is; “disappears” when it is time to read

  • A history of reading problems in parents or siblings

  • Cannot sound out even simple words like cat, map, nap

  • Does not associate letters with sounds, such as the letter b with the “b” sound

Strengths

  • Curiosity

  • Great imagination

  • Ability to figure things out; gets the gist of things

  • Eager embrace of new ideas

  • A good understanding of new concepts

  • Surprising maturity

  • A larger vocabulary than typical for age group

  • Enjoys solving puzzles

  • Talent for building models

  • Excellent comprehension of stories read or told to them

Second Grade through High School

Reading

  • Very slow in acquiring reading skills. Reading is slow and awkward

  • Trouble reading unfamiliar words, often making wild guesses because they cannot sound out the word

  • Doesn’t seem to have a strategy for reading new words

  • Avoids reading out loud

Speaking

  • Searches for a specific word and ends up using vague language, such as “stuff” or “thing,” without naming the object

  • Pauses, hesitates, and/or uses lots of “um’s” when speaking

  • Confuses words that sound alike, such as saying “tornado” for “volcano,” substituting “lotion” for “ocean”

  • Mispronunciation of long, unfamiliar or complicated words

  • Seems to need extra time to respond to questions

School and Life

  • Trouble remembering dates, names, telephone numbers, random lists

  • Struggles to finish tests on time

  • Extreme difficulty learning a foreign language

  • Poor spelling

  • Messy handwriting

  • Low self-esteem that may not be immediately visible

Strengths

  • Excellent thinking skills: conceptualization, reasoning, imagination, abstraction

  • Learning that is accomplished best through meaning rather than rote memorization

  • Ability to get the “big picture”

  • A high level of understanding of what is read to them

  • The ability to read and to understand at a high level over learned (or highly practiced) words in a special area of interest; for example, if he or she loves cooking they may be able to read food magazines and cookbooks

  • Improvement as an area of interest becomes more specialized and focused—and a miniature vocabulary is developed that allows for reading in that subject area

  • A surprisingly sophisticated listening vocabulary

  • Excels in areas not dependent on reading, such as math, computers and visual arts, or in more conceptual (versus fact-driven) subjects, including philosophy, biology, social studies, neuroscience and creative writing

© Sally Shaywitz, Overcoming Dyslexia, pp. 122–125