Spotting Dyslexia in the Classroom

  1. Does he/she have trouble with sequence?

  2. Does he/she have trouble with "critical symbols?" (d-b/p-q/m-w/f-t/6-9/h-y)

  3. Does he/she form letters with a clockwise, rather than a counterclockwise, motion?

    • Does he/she mark from the bottom up (as in 7,t, f, p,g,d)?                                             
    • Does he/she mix capital and lowercase letters?
    • Does he/she mix manuscript and cursive styles?
    • Is he/she prone to use capital B and D instead of b and d?
  4. Does he/she fall apart under time limits and pressure? Does he/she work very slowly?

  5. Does he/she skip punctuation cues in reading?

  6. Is it unsually difficult for him/her to learn and remember multiplication facts?

  7. Does he/she have difficulty copying from the board?

  8. Does he/she have difficulty with many aspects of time?(Telling time; remembering his/her birthday; learning/remembering the days of the week and months of the year; idenifying sequential patterns)

  9. Does he/she have difficulty following directions? Oral directions? Written directions?

  10. Does he/she repeatedly ask you what you said? Does he/she need constant reminders of what to do?

  11. Does he/she have problems with word retrieval, especially in recalling nouns?

  12. When reading, does he/she exhibit preservation and/or telescoping of words (leaving out syllables)?

  13. In spelling, does he/she transpose silent letters within words? Can he/she not recall the exact order of sounds/letters? Does he/she frequently misplace silent /e/?

  14. In math, does he/she sometimes work left to right when the opposite direction is required? Does he/she reverse processes while computing? Does he/she reverse numbers? Is he/she unable to organize facts in story problems?

  15. When reading, does he/she sub-vocalize and use his finger as a pointer?

  16. Wtach him/her write the alphabet on ruled paper. Does he/she hesitate? Does he/she switch from manuscript to cursive? Does he/she know the correct letter shapes? Does he/she know these promptly? Is the alphabet in the proper sequence? (The teacher should attempt to recreate his/her handwriting style by tracing over and observing errors in directionality.

  17. Does he/she show an inability to tell whether words sound the same or different? Does he/she have difficulty in identifying/reproducing/generating rhymes? Can he/she speak in "pig Latin?"

  18. Do his/her papers -- especially spelling papers -- look like chicken scratch? Do papers have many erasures, mark-overs, erratic spacing?

  19. Does he/she exhibity avoidance tactics at times? When? Does he/she consistently ask to be excused at reading time? When it is reading time, does he/she unexpectedly lose materials or have a need to leave the classroom?

  20. Does he/she act out more at reading time than at other times? Does he/she hit others? Does he/she twist his/her hair? Does he/she pop their knuckles, squirm, etc?

Jo Polk
1980