Friday, 27 August 2021

I embrace being dyslexic 100%

 Hello there blog readers hope you are all well


Ahhh here we go again someone telling me I am dyslexic and therefore something is not functioning properly because my brain is broken sigh. Lets wheel out the old medical model of dyslexia AGAIN! Lets focus on a negative model thats says dyslexia is about deficits, disorder and discrepancy.  A medical model of dyslexia that has got we dyslexics exactly nowhere. A medical model of dyslexia that shackles us to a negative stereotype that basically boils down to this. Dyslexia is a problem to be fixed.

I have just read that if we dyslexics go through one particular programme 80% of dyslexic problems disappear. Hmmmm dyslexic problems? Ahhh does this mean teacher training is going to include training on ways to support dyslexic learners in an inclusive learning environment in the future I ask myself?

Hmmmm nope not on your nelly does it.

What it means is our dyslexia issues just disappear and we are no longer dyslexic if we go through this programme. Or is it that we are still dyslexic but somehow cured of those pesky dyslexic problems?

Dyslexia does not disappear it is a part of us. It was a part of us when we were born and it will be a part of us until the day we pop our clogs and go to meet our maker. We need to be enabled to understand and work with our dyslexia.

From my perspective dyslexia is a very important part of me because it enables me to do so many very positive things well. In my life I have been a professional musician, an inclusion and dyslexia specialist, a social entrepreneur etc. I don't think I could have done any of these if I had not been dyslexic.

Dyslexia is a difference that represents the diversity inherent within the human race. How much art, how much science, philosophy etc would have been lost if it were not for the way the dyslexic brain works. I don't say the dyslexic brain is broken I do say it is just different.

#ViveLaDifference I say.

I will finally say I do not suffer with dyslexia. I embrace it for what it gives me. But what I do suffer with is education systems that still fail the vast majority of dyslexic kids at schools all over the world.

Who I do feel for are all the dyslexic students I have worked with in colleges and universities after listening to their nightmare experiences of being dyslexic at school.

By the way happy dyslexia month to you all......keep fighting the good fight

ta for taking the time to read my blog

regards

Steve

Tuesday, 24 August 2021

Feeling chuffed because of good news

Prestige Award Logo

Hi everyone hope you are all well

One of my Unique Dyslexic Eye blogs has been selected to kick off the Disability Unions Disability Pride Month, I am chuffed: disabilityunion.co.uk/we-need-to-cha Please support #DisabilityPrideMonth #UniqueDyslexicEye #DisabilityUnion

Second bit of news, my company Dyslexia Pathways CIC has won a 2021 / 22 Prestige Award for the best dyslexia support organisation in Scotland.

#PeaceLoveGroovyness to you all

Steve McCue

Monday, 23 August 2021

Our education system is dyslexia unfriendly

 

This shows an art installation I did as part of our Unique Dyslexic Get Creative campaign. 
Hi blog readers hope you are all well

The light over the letter I expresses the positivity I have about being dyslexic. (I know positivity may not be a real word but it should be LOL)

It also expresses the impact that my own dyslexia assessment had on me and my life. My dyslexia assessment enabled me to re evaluate the difficulties that I experienced at school as an un-assessed dyslexic learner. 

It wasn't me that couldn't learn it was the education system that couldn't teach me in ways that enabled me to learn. It was then my dyslexic light switched, the eureka moment in my life.

Also I wanted to say it's not how you write but what you write that's important. 

Be that by hand, by keyboard or by speech to text technology etc.  They say a picture paints a thousand words. Especially, if that thousand words looks like gibberish.

Writing by hand is just a strategy but its not the only strategy. 

Find the strategy that works for you. Its only a non dyslexic society that says we all have to write by hand.

For me personally I would never have achieved academically without access to a computer keyboard. The lowly computer keyboard freed me from the tyranny of my own handwriting scrawl.

Question for you all:

How would you express dyslexic positivity? 

Please share your ideas in the comments section of my blog.

Peace love and groovyness to you all

If you enjoy my blog please share on your social media. If you have any comments please leave in the comments section of this blog.

#PeaceLoveGroovyness to you all

Steve McCue ( I am a dyslexic dyslexia and inclusion specialist, social entrepreneur, podcaster and broadcaster )

Thursday, 12 August 2021

Episode 3 from series 2 of the Unique Dyslexic Eye Show

 

Unique Dyslexic Eye Logo

Hi blog followers 

Below is a link to Episode 3 from series 2 of Unique Dyslexic Eye Show

https://www.podbean.com/ew/pb-tpn4n-10b0a2c

Episode 3 from series 2 of Unique Dyslexic Eye. Please consider leave a like,

 subscribe or follow my Unique Dyslexic Eye Show

#podcast #dyslexia #neurodiversity 


Graphic is my Unique Dyslexic Eye Logo

Saturday, 7 August 2021

#UniiqueDyslexic #PeaceLoveGroovyness to you all, embrace your diversity love your difference

 

Hi ya all

Hi all hope you are all well

#iamdyslexic

As a dyslexic and as a dyslexia and inclusion specialist I believe terms like I have dyslexia reflect a negative medical discrepancy model of Dyslexia. It implies I am broken or in need of a cure. Which I don't believe I need or want for that matter. 😎


I believe being dyslexic is more about diversity and difference. I support the social model of dyslexia which basically tells us society disables. When I know from my own research that only 19% of dyslexic adults were assessed at school you can see how society disables. We see that only 5% of undergraduates are dyslexic and we know that 10% of the population are dyslexic.

You can see how society disables. But we also know 35% of entrepreneurs are dyslexic, we know many dyslexics bright, creative and smart people. But when our education systems fails us and marginalises us it and fails to nurture and grow according to our talents and gifts it surprising any one us succeed at all.

Brian ENO said we are all born unequal with our own unique set of talents, gifts and strengths. The issue is that out education system singularly fails to nurture the talent, gifts and strengths of dyslexic, neuro diverse and disabled kids

#UniiqueDyslexic #PeaceLoveGroovyness to you all, embrace your diversity love your difference

Steve Mccue

The joys of hourly paid teaching work lol

My Dyslexia Pathways CIC logo

Hello there hope you are all feeling fab

Zero hours contracts oh joy, no holiday no sick pay no worker rights lol. Here is a little story about that.

When I first qualified as a teacher, way back in 1995, I had to work on a number of these zero hours term time only contracts.

I worked at three different colleges across London at the same time, I didn't know from day to day where or when I was working.

I got a call one morning from one college asking me to come in and teach a group of students with learning disabilities. I was given maybe 45 minutes notice to get there and had to get a cab. It was during the rush hour and the cab got caught in traffic and I was 15 minutes late.

I met with the head of department who threw me into the class without any idea of what the students were doing and she failed to let me know the class was being inspected. Talk about scary, it was the first time I had been inspected, I had no learning materials, there was no learning materials provided, not even the names of the students.

Anyway, if being a musician has taught me anything its how to improvise how to playing by ear, to jam. To cut a long story short the session went really well. The inspector was impressed at what we did. Not so impressed by what the college had done.

After the class I went back to see this head of department who promptly thanked me and then said she god bless you but she would be paying me for the two hours taught less the 15 minutes because I was late. Zero hours contracts no thank you very much.

Things have not changed much since then, I have been working at one university here in Scotland through my social enterprise Dyslexia Pathways CIC. Again its on a semester time only hourly paid basis. Been doing this for 12 years now. Almost all study support specialist teachers in universities across the whole UK have hourly paid semester time only contracts. This may suit some of them.

These specialist teachers do not know from week to week how many hours they are working, no holiday pay no really employment rights. Often they will not know where they will be working on any given day. They cannot apply for Access to Work funding if they are disabled.

Ok that's enough from me for this blog

#PeaceLoveGroovyness to you all

Steve McCue


Wednesday, 4 August 2021

Why I am so passionate about dyslexia

 

NOV

 



Hi readers hope you are all well
I was at some training yesterday and realised that I hadn't really communicated reasons why I set up my dyslexia focussed social enterprise, Dyslexia Pathways CIC and why I am so passionate about dyslexia.
Founded in 2008 Dyslexia Pathways CIC was the world first dyslexia focussed social enterprise. We also support and promote the social model of dyslexia. We believe our social model of dyslexia and social enterprise offers a more positive dyslexic solution to the issues we face on a daily basis. 

We support and promote the social model of dyslexia. The social model of dyslexia says that it is society which disables us rather than dyslexia in itself. This disabling begins at school where we are not taught in ways that we can learn effectively. We do not see this as a fault within teacher. Rather it is the failure of initial teacher training to provide prospective teacher with the skills they need to effectively teach dyslexic children.

We challenge the medical discrepancy model of dyslexia because we see it as inherently disabling and has nothing positive to say about dyslexia or to dyslexics. I would say this model has only served to disable us further rather than liberate and enable us.

There are 6 million dyslexics in the UK alone over 55 million in the USA. It is believed that between 10 to 20% of the population of the world are dyslexic. Many dyslexics can feel isolated and alone. Always remember you are not alone.


Research indicates that many dyslexics never receive an assessment for dyslexia. Indeed, our own research carried out in 2016 shows only 19% of those assessed as dyslexic were assessed at school.

Sylvia Moody, (2010) wrote that for an undiagnosed person there is a commonly experienced sense of, “not knowing who you are”. Pennie Aston MSc, MBACP said,” this lack of self-esteem and self-confidence often feel bewildering and shaming and even long-term depression”.

As the social model of dyslexia suggests many

dyslexics fail within education and training.

Not because they are not bright enough but because

our education and training system fails them.

As a result, dyslexics are six times more likely to be

long term unemployed than their dyslexic peers.

Negative experiences at school can leave many

dyslexics with low self-esteem, poor self-confidence

and even long term mental health issues.


Dr Ross Cooper 2006 wrote, “We challenge the deficit models of dyslexia in favour of a social model that maintains that we are not ‘disabled’ by our dyslexia, but by the expectations of the world we live in.  There is nothing ‘wrong’ with being dyslexic per se. 

We would argue that dyslexia is an experience that arises out of natural human diversity on the one hand and a world on the other where the early learning of literacy, and good personal organisation and working memory is mistakenly used as a marker of ‘intelligence’. The problem here is seeing difference incorrectly as ‘deficit’.

Put in practical terms, for example, it is disabling to expect that everyone:

  • thinks in the same way as each other, when dyslexic people are more likely to think visually than verbally (or laterally than logically, or intuitively than deductively….)
  • learns to read in the same way; reading is about accessing meaning, the rest is merely strategy and there is always more than one way to learn anything.
  • makes sense of information in the same way (they don’t, which is why multi-sensory information is easier for everyone to understand).
  • can take in multiple instructions.
  • can learn to take notes while trying to listen.”


 Dyslexia in Education
In relation to teaching dyslexic children: 74% of teachers did not feel satisfied that their initial teacher training provided them with the skills they need to identify and teach children with dyslexia. Dyslexia Action 2012

In an independent YouGov survey, commissioned by Dyslexia Action (2012) almost two-thirds of parents felt dyslexia was not recognized across the system.

Pupils with SEN, (Special Educational Needs) including dyslexia without statements are around ten times more likely to receive a permanent exclusion than pupils with no SEN; compared to pupils with a statement of SEN who are around six times more likely to receive a permanent exclusion.
One of the ways society disables dyslexics is education. From day one at school the vast majority of dyslexic kids are failed.
Consequences of in assessed dyslexia

Further consequences of unassessed dyslexia. Research by Jack Rack from the Dyslexia institute showed that dyslexia is three to four times more prevalent in the prison population than amongst the general population. Up to 50% or people in our prisons are dyslexic costing society £35,000 a year. It is thought unassessed dyslexia costs the UK one billion pounds a year.

The Dyslexia Behind Bars project showed 53% of (2,029) prisoners at Chelmsford during the project were diagnosed as having dyslexia, compared to 10% of the UK population (data: British Dyslexia Association). Note I cant find the figure but each person in prison costs society around £35.000 a year to keep there.



Focus Prisoner Education said, “It costs £65,000 to imprison a person in this country once police, court costs and all the other steps are taken into account. After that it costs a further £40,000 for each year they spend incarcerated”.

Research by the Westminster Achievability Commission 2017
WAC, for Dyslexia and Neurodivergance showed some of the barriers to employment dyslexics and people from other neurodivergant communities face.

“Many neurodivergant people, this includes dyslexics, are ready and willing to work but find themselves faced with insurmountable barriers, WAC 2017.

A few of the key findings from the report:

·       There is a lack of awareness of what we can do

·       Disclosure can often lead to bullying and discrimination in the work place

·       Government measures including Access to Work are inadequate

·       The Equalities Act is being implemented inadequately

Dyslexics can and do succeed is all areas of society. For example, 35% of entrepreneurs are dyslexic.
Over 90% of successful dyslexics say they were successful because they were dyslexic.
Dyslexics tend to be lateral thinkers, have strong emotional intelligence and empathy, are big picture thinkers, can see the big picture and can think three dimensionally.

We were the first dyslexia focussed social enterprise in the world. Dyslexia Pathways CIC also has a social model of dyslexia focus and believe that our social enterprise and social model of dyslexia vision offers dyslexics a more positive, empowering new way forward.
We must change how we think and talk about dyslexia or risk repeating the mistakes that are still happening.
ta for reading
please share share share
peace love and groovyness #PeaceLoveGroovyness
Steve McCue founder of Dyslexia Pathways CIC and Unique Dyslexic


Unique Dyslexic Eye Series 2 Episode 2 of Unique Dyslexic Eye

Hi all

Only 19% of dyslexic adults were assessed while at school. This podcast explores the impact this can have on dyslexic.

#PeaceLoveGroovyness to you all

Steve McCue

 

Sunday, 1 August 2021

Vaccination anxiety


Hi all hope you are well

To all my followers and friends, if you have not yet had your COVID vaccinations please try to prioritise getting them done this week. COVID vaccinations can save your lives and the lives of friends and family and people in your community.

If you are struggling with going for the vaccine for any reason with anxiety or feeling very stressed or a needle phobia. I know its scary but with a plan there may be a way forward.

Try doing it in stages:

First, just go to the a venue where vaccines are being provided. You dont have to go in just sit outside in your car or on a wall.

Go with a friend or family member. Do this a couple times if you need to. Next, try going into the place where the vaccines are happening. Get used to the place, go a few times if you need to, maybe speak to one of the nurses.

Then, if you feel you can, go get your vaccine. Finally, if you get your vaccine give yourself a reward of some kind.

#PeaceLoveGroovyness to you all.

Steve McCue