Dyslexia: What Reading Teachers Need to Know

Dyslexia is a neurological language-based learning disability. Several legislative bills related to dyslexia have recently been introduced in the United States so dyslexia can be understood and interventions in reading instruction can be provided. Studies have shown measurable improvements in the language areas of the brain's left hemisphere after reading interventions with students with dyslexia, and multisensory teaching strategies can be the difference between academic success and academic failure and frustration. Effective methods for working with students with dyslexia support an explicit, systematic, cumulative, and multisensory approach that integrates listening, speaking, reading, and writing and emphasizes phonology, orthography, syntax, morphology, semantics, and the organization of spoken and written discourse. The author shares what dyslexia is not, what it is, and how literacy teachers can support their students with dyslexia.