Ah-ha moment with dyslexia training

I had an "Ah-ha!" moment while my son and I were sitting in the Dairy Queen.

I've always known that he could read things that have been reversed. The other side of a sign didn't seem to give him as much trouble as the front side. I used to think, "Well, duh, he's dyslexic." Truthfully, I didn't fully grasp what dyslexia was. Like most people, I just thought letters were backwards for dyslexics. I could empathize with how difficult it would be to read, with many of our letters looking so much alike, but I didn't fully grasp all of the details.

As I learned more about it from other dyslexics, I began to understand that it's more than just backward letters. The letters move, swirl, run off the page, disappear, and generally just won't stay put. Most of the time it seemed my son was skipping letters or not looking at all of them when he would read "them" or "they" as "the" or "wench" as "wrench" and, most frequently, reading words that end in "s" without the "s."

It was frustrating until I realized that he may not be seeing the letters. I've read so many accounts since that explain how dyslexics view the page and the words. It's mind-boggling but also explains so much.

So, when we were at the Dairy Queen, we were having fun reading the words on the signs posted outside. Of course from the inside they are backwards but that just made it easier for my son. I wondered why for a bit, looking at the sign, looking at the letters and trying to determine why it was so easy for him to read it backward than forward. The letters are still letters, even if they are backward. Would being backward be just as confusing?

Then it hit me. I have learned that many dyslexics are visual-thinkers. They are very good at solving puzzles and dealing with visual challenges because they can rotate, move and rearrange items in their heads like some kind of virtual reality video game. That's why there's such a challenge with reading, because their brains automatically rotate, move and rearrange the letters as well.

But why would a word written backward be easier to read? The brain would still try to rotate, move and rearrange the letters right? Exactly! Because my son knows the word is backward, it becomes a puzzle to solve. Plus, seeing it backward allows him to see all the letters of the word. They don't disappear like when he's reading forward because they are now pictures that represent part of a whole and not just letters of a word. The deciphering of the code is less of a challenge, I think, because it's now a visual representation and not a word. I'm not sure if this is a conscience effort on his part, but it seems to work for him.

So how do I work that into his dyslexia training program? Well, I'm still working on that and would welcome ideas. I have been thinking about taking a word and writing each of the sounds on separate cards (for example boat would be separated into b-oa-t because the "oa" make one sound) that are spread around out of order. He could then put the word together like a puzzle. I've seen this trick before in phonics training, but I can see the uses in dyslexia training.

If anyone else has any ideas, please share.