Reading Response #1 Adapting to Dyslexia Students

Being a tutor or SI means that you help students become better writers and better students. Sometimes you have students that are easy to connect with but then you have others who you have to take extra time and figure out what their difficulty is. When I say that, I mean that you need to read it over to them several of times, writing it down etc. All students learn in different ways and use certain tools in order to become better students. Having a learning disability can be challenging at times and can make you just want to give up.  Many people struggle with learning disabilities but the main one that I want to focus on is Dyslexia.  First off, Dyslexia is when you don’t see certain letter or may confuse them with another letter.  Dyslexia is a very common learning disability and a lot of people don’t even know that they have it.  But when a student knows that they have Dyslexia, it is our job to be able to help guide them into the right direction and help them become better writers.

In this particular article, Dyslexia : Surviving And Succeeding At College ,it talks about a college student that struggles with this learning disability and how she copes with it through her college career.  It talks about how she was able to find ways in order to adapt to her needs and she found tools so that other college students can use them if they have dyslexia. Being organized, having visuals, more auditory, and asking for help really does come along way. By doing these main key things, these students have a higher success rate and are able to become better students. She also states the importance of using the resources that you have at college like tutors, librarians, teachers etc. For example, the article says how some tutors might get frustrated but it is important for us to keep our composure and not add more stress to the student.  It states “any show of impatience is certain to make the situation worse, as it will make the student anxious and the anxiety will in turn increase the student’s difficulties” (Moody 97).  Showing that you are frustrated automatically reflects the student’s mood and can create a hostile environment for the student. That is why it is important for tutors and SI’s to stay calm and observe the student so that we can help them out and not add more stress to them.

In conclusion, no one is perfect and everyone has a different ways of learning including Tutors/SI’s.  Everyone gets frustrated and most people can think of a time where they were in a challenging position.  But most of us overcame it and found a way to make it successful so that the next time it happened; we are able to adapt to the situation. It is not our job to be a teacher but it is our job to help students gain confidence and to help students find tools so that they can be able to pass every class and be better writers. We are a community and we need the students to know that they are not alone and they we are here to help them not judge them.  Showing them that they can become successful writers and awesome students so that they can use these tools throughout their college career. :-)

Works Cited

Moody, Sylvia. Dyslexia : Surviving And Succeeding At College. New York, NY: Routledge, 2007. eBook Collection (EBSCOhost). Web. 14 Feb. 2016.