Eli, The Boy Who Hated to Write: Understanding Dysgraphia

Some strategies are effective and efficient, and others are not. Those that are both effective and efficient share characteristics that fall into three categories: content features, design features, and usefulness features. The content of the strategy refers to its steps and what they are designed to facilitate during the learning process. The design features refer to how the steps are packaged to facilitate learning and subsequent use of the strategy. The usefulness feature refers to the potential transferability of the strategy to everyday needs in a variety of settings. Ellis and Lenz (1987) identified a number of critical features across these dimensions.

There was something wrong with my brain. What had previously been a shadowy suspicion that hovered on the edge of consciousness became certain knowledge the year I was nine and entered fourth grade. I seemed to be like other children, but I was not like them; I could not learn to read or spell.

In this first account of what it is like to grow up dyslexic, Eileen Simpson vividly recreates the frightening world of a child living in the limbo of illiteracy. Simpson’s lack of reading skills so exasperated her teachers and relatives that they began to think she was mentally retarded. She could get lost walking to the grocery store; at times she felt as if she had no control over her speech. It was not until she was twenty-two that her future husband, the poet John Berryman, finally named her mysterious ailment.

Simpson intersperses her narrative with nontechnical explanations of dyslexia and what is being done to treat it. But despite growing public awareness and advances in research, dyslexia remains a frustrating and frightening disorder.

With Faking It, Christopher Lee and Rosemary Jackson offered a moving account of Lee’s struggle and ultimate triumph over dyslexia. Now, Lee combines his special insight with Jackson’s expertise as a special education trainer to offer specific help to teachers and parents of other misunderstood learners.

“Difficult.” “Picky.” “Oversensitive.” “Clumsy.” “Unpredictable.” “Inattentive.”

Children who have been labeled with words like these may actually be suffering from Sensory Integration Disorder — a very common, but frequently misdiagnosed, condition that can manifest itself in excessively high or low activity levels, problems with motor coordination, oversensitivity or undersensitivity to sensations and movements, and other symptoms. This guide, written by an expert in the field, explains how SI Dysfunction can be confused with ADD, learning disabilities, and other problems, tells how parents can recognize the problem — and offers a drug-free treatment approach for children who need help.

Public libraries will want to purchase this book for their education and parenting collections. It is a brief, upbeat, always realistic look at what learning disabilities are and what problems LD children and parents face at home and at school.
— Library Journal

It is a parent’s deepest heartache: watching a child struggle in life, desperate to help. When Katherine Cunningham’s daughter Tricia (“Tiger”) is diagnosed with dyslexia, roadblocks appear at every turn, and the entire family is forced to create its own solutions.