Since the 1990s, I have had outstanding success in teaching people assessed as dyslexic to read. For around the last ten years, I have had similar success in spelling and basic maths, with which these people often have problems. The case studies are on this site and in my books, and I will happily explain the techniques to any teacher at the drop of a hat. As you will see from recent postings, I am just back from an international conference of British schools in Amsterdam, and have been running courses, seminars and follow up via skype for Yorkshire Publishing Organisation and individual parents. What I do works, and you have only to get in touch to find out for yourself.
What is wrong.
Gaps in knowledge.
Too many teachers have received in their training a presentation of English spelling that is simplistic and inaccurate. This is not the teachers' fault.
Too many trainers have not kept up with research in this field and continue to put out a blinkered and inaccurate picture. There is no excuse for the trainers.
Too many psychologists make simplistic comments about people's memory based on simplistic tests that do not consider how memory is used in the context of reading and writing.
In a recent psychologist's report, a child of eight was found to do better on a memory test where letters and numbers were mixed, than on one composed purely of numbers. This supports my view that making a judgement on memory in the context of literacy, using only numbers, is misconceived and misleading.
Weak teaching techniques.
Too many large organisations use teaching techniques that take little or no notice of individual problems and that do not explain spelling to pupils as it is. Too many of them grind pupils through one phonic pattern at a time, without showing them how to put everything together, as they must when they read. Too many adopt a look and say approach to irregular features, usually because the writers of their schemes have not taken the trouble to investigate the patterns in them and reasons for them. There is no excuse for large organisations or uninformed writers.
Failure to evaluate.
Too many large organisations do not evaluate their own teaching techniques, but use their own publicity machines and support structures to promote and sell them. The most conspicuous offender is Reading Recovery, which has not revised its manual for decades, but other organisations are almost as bad.
How to put it right.
Evaluate everything, beginning with case studies and leading to controlled trials as evidence emerges that makes it worth the time and expense of carrying them out.
Get up to date and stay that way. I am tired of introducing teachers to issues of light sensitivity and English spelling that have been in the public domain for years. Those at the top are too busy promoting their organisations to keep up to date themselves, and the organisations' only interest in research is promoting their own approach. There are too many fat cats.
Make psychologists and trainers teach. A psychologist should no longer be allowed to indentify a problem without offering a course of teaching that will tackle it. Trainers should teach on a regular basis - not necessarily full time, but enough to keep their saw sharp. Too many psychologists do just enough to get a teaching certificate, and then settie down to the more profitable business of taking parents' holiday money in return for churning out reports.
Stop subsidising vested interests. We need an impartial academic approach to this field that no-one is currently willing to provide - too much is tied up with matters of public funding and expensive pseudo-charities. The Augean stables are in full production, and need to be cleaned.
Correspondence, as ever, invited.