Dyslexia – Discussion

I am so happy that our book covers dyslexia. The first brain imaging lab I worked for while I was a student studied dyslexia. At the time it was a hot topic and there was even a story about the research our lab was doing in Times Magazine.

Unfortunately, even though there are still so many interesting questions to ask about dyslexia and there are still so many people who have dyslexia it isn’t as popular a topic these days. In the lab we did fMRI studies comparing brain activity in dyslexic children and children without dyslexia. We found that there were average differences in brain activity patterns. Those differences in brain activity patterns lead to differences in the way the mind works. These differences lead to difficulties in reading and other tasks but they also lead to advantages. Please watch this 13 minute video that makes that point very well. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyab_VSBCAk (Links to an external site.)Links to an external site.

In the time I spent researching the brain in several different labs one of the things I noticed was that actually there are so many differences between everyone’s brain structure and brain activation patterns. That is one of the reasons that studying the brain can be so difficult. Differences in the brain lead to differences in the way our minds work. But that is an advantage if we work together! We have the option of getting someone else’s perspective on our problem or work because all of our minds work differently to some degree.

Read the section in module 13.2 (14.2 in the 11th edition) called “Dyslexia”.

There are several underlying difficulties that cause difficulty with reading in dyslexia. Make sure you understand what they are know the patterns in the brain related to those functions.

Then post about the following (about your own mind based on personal experience, not necessarily having anything to do with dyslexia): How does your mind work? What problems do you run into because of the way your mind works? How do you use the way your mind works to your advantage?

OR

Comment on a classmate’s post comparing the way your mind works to theirs in detail.