Glenn - I said clearly that the label is entitlement to services - but maybe
I didn't say it clearly enough.  I certainly appreciate that fact.  I
encourage parents, often wary of labeling, to understand all the advantages
it offers.

Self-esteem is something I see blossoming in every student I help.  Success
breeds success - and attaining it enhances that fragile thing we call
self-esteem.

Thank you, always, for your insightful comments.   Lucille
  -----Original Message-----
  From: learningdisabilities-bounces at nifl.gov
[mailto:learningdisabilities-bounces at nifl.gov]On Behalf Of Glenn Young
  Sent: Saturday, April 04, 2009 6:57 AM
  To: 'The Learning Disabilities Discussion List'
  Subject: [LearningDisabilities 2909] Re: dyslexia


  Lucille . I could not disagree with your last e-mail more strongly . In
the US .. the label is not irrelevant because the label is the access to
special education and civil rights protection under IDEA, ADA and Section
504 . without the label this is now disability . without the disability the
person is just another "poor student" "dump kid" or what ever label . There
is no civil rights protection or having learning difficulties . learning
differences or different learning styles . there is only disability
protections for people with disabilities ..



  And the label is also key to personal self awareness the we have a
disability and that self awareness has the potential for leading to great
personal growth (or if mishandled and misdirected . a lot of problems  .)
The problem in not in the label .. but in the poor expectations that often
come about as the issues projected on to the person with the disability, or
as it has become known as "The short bus syndrome."



  One thing I use to say in trainings that most did not understand . is that
we, as persons with LD, need to develop a sense of self-love and self
acceptance within persons who do have LD ///



  So I said we needed to paraphrase James Brown song of "Say it Loud I'm
Black and I'm Proud" to one of saying  . Say it loud I'm LD and I'm
proud .and  as with a certain necessity of the Black movement for social
justice . persons with LD have to do this stuff for themselves and demand
liberation for themselves . and not to rely on the "teacher" as the
liberator . but on themselves as the liberator . not the parents, but the
consumer.



  And to get to that point the label is critically important  . not from the
view point of teachers, or parents or psychologist etc . but from the view
point of the consumer .



  Self acceptance, self love, understanding of self . smashing of shame and
shame inducing forces .. That is the key to LD progress . and that can and
must come about by having a solid and accepted label







  Glenn Young

  CSLD

  530 Auburn Ave

  Buffalo NY 14222

  Cell 703-864-3755

  Phone/Fax 716-882-2842

  website: glennyoungcsld.com


----------------------------------------------------------------------------
--

  From: learningdisabilities-bounces at nifl.gov
[mailto:learningdisabilities-bounces at nifl.gov] On Behalf Of Lucille Cuttler
  Sent: Friday, April 03, 2009 3:43 PM
  To: The Learning Disabilities Discussion List
  Subject: [LearningDisabilities 2891] Re: dyslexia



  May I suggest that a label is irrelevant,if not sujperfluous.  I founded
Project Literacy/outreach, Inc., to develop volunteers using O-G.  Learners,
with or without a diagnosis of dyslexia, couldn't read - so why not use a
method appropriate for a dyslexic (a word that means inability to read).
This would satisfy the needs of the "lowest common denominator" -
acknowledging a broad spectrum of reasons for illiteracy.    Many volunteer
tutors learned for the first time the structure of English - even those
prepared to be "Reading Teachers."   So get past the label, and start
addressing the problem, using all the tools in your toolbox.  What most
toolboxes miss is O-G.



  Indeed, when the schools of education include O-G in the curriculum to
prepare K-6 teachers, there will be fewer adults craving to become literate.
Lucille Cuttler







  . -----Original Message-----
  From: learningdisabilities-bounces at nifl.gov
[mailto:learningdisabilities-bounces at nifl.gov]On Behalf Of HKerr at aol.com
  Sent: Friday, April 03, 2009 7:50 AM
  To: learningdisabilities at nifl.gov
  Subject: [LearningDisabilities 2881] dyslexia



    In a message dated 02/04/2009 21:47:30 GMT Standard Time,
KSandmanHurley at sandiego.gov writes:

      I have not read your book yet, so I am curious what you believe is the
reason people who are able to access education are not able to read as well
as their peers - if it is not dyslexia?

    There is so much to be said that a few posts here and there can't do the
work justice. In a few words, though, there is (in my opinion) no "it" for
"it" to be.



    Dyslexia or, to put more circumspectly, the strange difficulties some
people experience when faced with 'literacy', will one day turn out to have
been a range of issues. In my view affect is likely to be the most common,
but there will also turn out to be a range of neurological, and visual and
auditory issues which will, one day, be better recognised and even,
hopefully, treatable. None of them will (can) be specific to 'literacy'
though, apart from affect which certainly can.



    I am a veterinarian by training, so I am acutely aware that the real
issue is clever diagnosis. Successful treatment rests entirely upon it. It
is urgent that the correct systems are correctly examined. Dyslexia is a
blunderbuss term, one effect of which is to take the eye off the ball of
clear thinking, precise examination and good diagnosis.



    There cannot, logically, be an innate (genetic) 'deficit' in 'literacy'
as (and I am speaking biologically) Homo sapiens has not been doing it long
enough and it has not mattered enough (had sufficient survival importance)
to be genetically encoded. It is, though, possible that various skills only
incidentally related to 'literacy' are genetically affected. Let's go look
for them, though, not at one symptom. This is no way to diagnose
effectively. (And when we do go looking, we have a problem finding these
'deficits' reliably - it's all in the book below!).



    I promise, I am trying to be helpful, not snide. People are assuming
many things about me and about my approach and opinion which are not at all
justified. I am a scientist, and science is scepticism (by which I mean
humility, doubt and incessant questioning). I am a veterinarian and my
science has always had to be applied in a very, sometimes painfully, real
world. This means I have become rather fiercely sceptical and practical.
Science has to work in the real world. Dyslexia doesn't, in my opinion. But
this is not a bad thing if it makes us look better and in the right places!



    Hugo

    at: http://www.hugokerr.info

    "We're here to help each other get through this thing - whatever it
might be." (Kurt Vonnegut)


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