[senco-forum] Dyslexia and general learning needs

Stuart

Of course 'Reading is always for meaning but not every teacher sees reading in that  way - some 'specialist' teachers actually  believe that reading is the business of vocalising or subvocalising text.

Some years ago I was giving a talk as part of an accredited course to an audience consisting of special needs teachers. As each teacher entered the room they were asked to define 'reading' by anonymously completing a sentence on a small piece of paper which said simply "Reading is ......"

At an appropriate part of the talk I opened some of these papers randomly and read out what these teachers has written - most of their definitions were so general as to be pointless, some caused howls of laughter and some, gasps of amazement. The important thing was there was no clearly agreed consensus about the true nature of the reading process among a group of 'specialist special needs teachers. How can any productive discussion on reading take place when this very unprofessional state of affairs prevails.

Eddie C.