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Let’s talk learning difficulties. Impacts of dyslexia.

Togo - CHRONIQUE - Autres
First impacts of dyslexia

Dyslexia is a specific language-based difficult which impacts on individuals in different domains. Although dyslexic individuals are intelligent, they often have difficulties with: reading, writing, spelling, memory, spatial awareness, mathematics, sequencing, organisation and concentration. These on their own can be a great source of distress to individuals with the condition. Nevertheless, the secondary social, emotional and psychological impacts of dyslexia are equally detrimental.


Secondary impacts of dyslexia

The reading, writing and spelling difficulties experienced by the dyslexic students who rarely understand the reason for their condition increase the social, emotional and psychological impacts of their dyslexia. Particularly in the context of the African education where the prevailing situation is that greater number of dyslexic students is undiagnosed.

Furthermore, the actual education systems where teachers hold an authoritarian position and fail to see their ineffective teaching approach with dyslexic students, in general, these students’ poor academic performance is comfortably blamed on their ‘lack of willingness to work harder’. Hence, in addition to be humiliated by teachers and their peers, dyslexic students also suffer similar attitude from their family and their community. It is sad to imagine students going through continuous humiliation, teasing, name calling, insults and sometime corporal punishment throughout their school years from school and from home for having dyslexia. However, what makes the situation more heartbreaking is the dyslexic students’ own failure to comprehend the ‘why’ of their condition coupled with the feeling of rejection from the overall society. Consequently, they are more likely to:

Feel stupid or unintelligent
Be self-critical and negative
Be extremely anxious
Feel depressed
Fail to imagine positive future prospects
Feel helpless and hopeless
Feel stressed
Feel marginalised and excluded
Feel angry
Feel frustrated
Become a drug addict
Become alcoholic
Lack self-esteem
Lack confidence
Lack motivation


Behavioural manifestations of dyslexic students

Further to the psychological and the emotional scars endured by dyslexic students, they display behavioural instabilities in the classroom by:

Stopping their peers from learning by playing the class clown or disrupting the sessions intentionally
Disliking other students who are not quick in their performance
Being dislike by peers owing to own unpleasant attitude
Being easily bored, frustrated or challenging
Being uncooperative
Being impatient and lack of diplomacy
Asking indiscrete questions
Using insensitivity to hide own feelings

Or

Enjoying time wasting
Preferring to work in isolation
Appearing to be preoccupied
Communicating less with peers and teachers
Taking longer to finish tasks
Equating dyslexia with foolishness

The above consequences produce, usually, adolescents and adults dyslexic who:

Drop out of education
Have little or no qualifications
Are in low pay jobs or jobless
Have poor career progression
Are into criminal activities


Dyslexia is a serious matter that needs urgent attention because it is not only detrimental to individuals suffering from it, but it is harming the entire society that is failing to raise potential geniuses and contributors to economical growth.



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Delali Idrissou, Dyslexia Specialist
MA Inclusive Education, MA FE Practitioner
Postg SpLD Dyslexia - AMBDA
Dip. Cognitive Behavioural Therapy
Dip. Adult Numeracy
Member of PATOSS
Member of Institute for Learning (MIfL) - QTLS
[email protected]