Video of Dyslexia Recording transcript

"When I first started doing research into dyslexia I started looking online at different techniques but because reading is not my strong point I didn’t have much luck. I then tried looking at books with audio and it did help to a certain point but it just wasn’t for me.

I then started using coloured pens to help with writing. One problem I always had was when I wrote everything in black ink and went back to look at it a day or two later, I was having difficulty in trying to work out what I had written. With the pens, I could use a different colour for each sentence or when it came to writing stories it was one colour for each character.

Then, one day I came across this website called Cross Bow Education www.crossboweducation.com. So I had a catalogue sent to me. Had a look through the catalogue and found some interesting things. I ordered a set of different coloured Duo Reading Rulers. The ruler has a 1cm narrow tinted strip and a 3cm wide tinted strip. I always had a problem when trying to read books. Every time I hear a noise my mind would get distracted and follow the noise and when I return to the book to carry on reading I have a hard time finding my place. All the words look the same and it turns into a puzzle. Then when it happens consistently it’s annoying and it puts you off reading. After going through all the colours I found that only one colour worked well for me and that is Apple Green. I also ordered tinted A4 writing pads. There are eight different colours so I went for green and blue to try the two different types. A combination of the coloured pens, reading ruler and tinted A4 writing pads work quite well for me.

There was this one time when I was assisting in a therapy group and I was asked to set up a table for dyslexia so I did. I was getting interest from people who were having problems reading presuming they were dyslexic and there was also interest from people who had no knowledge on dyslexia and found it fascinating.

I was doing a training course and was asked to put together a short presentation so I did a presentation on dyslexia awareness. The feedback was amazing.

I was once in a dyslexia class and the tutor was talking about this website called tint my screen www.tintmyscreen.com. You pay £5 to take a visual test and according to your results it gives you colour codes for your chosen coloured screen tint, font type and font size. So you download a software programme onto your computer. You then type the colour codes you were given or enter your email address and it gives you a tinted screen for any software program you use on any computer.

At the end of the day everybody is unique so it’s what works for every individual.

Thank you for listening!"

Video of Easily Available Dyslexia Resources transcript

"Some useful sites to look at are:

Door Way Online

This dyslexia friendly and free software works with plenty of colour to assist you in finding your way around the keyboard. There’s a suit of fun activates including:

• Literacy
• Numeracy
• Time and Money
• Typing and Touch Typing
• Memory, Matching and Targeting

Tipp 10

Tipp 10 is another free touch typing program that will also teach you ten finger touch typing. It has a few interesting word games to enhance your learning and make it fun.

Crossbow Education

Crossbow Education have been award winners from 2012 – 2014 for their resources and customer service. Crossbow Education is an online shop that offers dyslexia teaching resources and visual stress support. It has very helpful resources at the reasonable price.

Tint My Screen

Definately worth adding some colour to your life. It doesn’t solve the problem but it does make it more bearable. Whether you’re using reading rulers, screen overlay or tinted software, they all take a little while to get use to.

Information on Dyslexia

There are also free information based web sites like Dore and Dyslexia Action that offer information for both adults and children to help with explaining what Dyslexia is, coping strategies and all sorts of training courses. Most of the time people don’t know this information is out there until it is pointed out to them."

Audio of My Life Story transcript

"Going back to my school days I was not the brightest pupil. I have to be honest; in the classroom I was useless. I hated English. I hated maths and I couldn’t draw! But, outside the classroom it was a totally different story. I had a talent with sport. I seemed to do really well at it.

As I was growing up I got into reading short books and I quite enjoyed them. As I got older I got into more teenager books and again quite enjoyed reading in my own space. When I got to secondary school that’s when all the problems started. I just couldn’t adapt to the books the class was reading and it was a real struggle. I wasn’t at school for very long. I kept missing classes for a while then gave up education and got a job in a garage doing all sorts of work except reading and writing. So that went on from 13 years of age till I was 17. I decided to go back to college. I went and did a computer course because I did have good knowledge on computers and it would be a good starting point for me to get back into education.

When I was doing the course I was doing well. Not just well, really well. So that went on from 1993 – 1995. Also, during that time I was confronted with a big problem I was struggling with English and maths. There was this one time where the tutor asked us to do a piece of writing, just a paragraph, on a piece of hardware. I didn’t have a clue what to do so I found a computer book, found a paragraph on a piece of hardware and memorised it. When it came to the exam I wrote what was in the book and failed. I ended up leaving in 1995.

The problem was getting to me so much that I had to get help. I went for counselling for several years but nothing. Tried hypnosis but had no luck. I couldn’t work out why I could be top at so many things but when it came to reading etc I was struggling. But at the same time I did focus on my strong points which were doing sport. Then when I went to the GP and asked for help, I was sent to see a specialist. The specialist asked me three questions and put me under mental health as schizophrenic. So before I was given that label by a specialist I was a trained martial artist, trained to end a fight within three seconds. I had a full car licence and a full bike licence and I had a girlfriend and all that was taken away from me with three questions. Shortly after I went to see a psychiatrist and he said to me, “You're schizophrenic but we don’t know what it is. It’s a bit like Jekyll and Hyde. You will be on medication for the rest of your life and you’re not allowed to drive or ride”. Between then and now I haven’t been told not much more about schizophrenia.

Shortly after that, I was moved out from the family home because of problems with being bullied and spent the next three years in hostels. I moved to the flat I’m still in today in 2000, which is in supported housing with support workers. I had a lot of challenges with this, was very unhappy and not making progress, and there were many changes of support workers. I stayed indoors at home for years, making my appointments with psychiatrists and psychologists. I knew I would like to get a volunteering job on a farm. It’s something I have wanted to do for a long time. It’s something that doesn’t really involve reading or writing so as long as I can count how many chickens there are I should be good at the job. With a support worker, we made a list of five farms to visit, one of them was Spitalfield City Farm but at the time we didn't make any progress on this.

I went to volunteer in a cycling group at Homerton Hospital because I wanted to see the other side of the NHS. There are two sides to everything and it was no different to being a patient but I did enjoy being involved with the cycling group. The NHS stopped funding the cycling group after one year and it came to an end.

When I got a phone call to come to Crisis I stopped all support and it’s been like that since. I mentioned to my neighbour once that I wanted to do English and maths courses but I didn’t want to go to college. Because he’s a Crisis member, he passed my details on to Annette at Crisis and she called me to come in for a chat. Annette is the first person to give me  real individualised help and I am very grateful to her. She taught me how to use grammar and punctuation and she taught me how to write. It was the same with maths. If I had a problem I couldn’t work out then Annette would sit with me and break the problem in a way that it was understandable. What Annette done for me in a short space of time no doctor, no therapist and no support worker could do for me in 20 years. Annette even helped me fill out an application form to volunteer on the farm.

Then, I found out I was dyslexic through Crisis. Not long after I stopped my regular psychiatrist appointments too. You would think that finding out you're dyslexic (having some answers and explanations!) would make you happy but if I'm very honest it makes me angry knowing that I had to suffer for twenty years for no reason. Even if I put myself to one side,  I’m concerned about all the vulnerable people out there who have problems that they don't understand and don't know how deal with, can’t defend themselves and have to go through unnecessary suffering.

Since finding out I’m dyslexic a lot has changed for me. I learnt that if you need to get from A to B it can be straight forward for some people but for some people it can be difficult but it doesn’t mean it’s not achievable. With a few changes here and there to make things a bit easier you can get to your destination. So basically, if you take that problem and you break it down. Then you break it down again and again and again until you can make sense of it so you can still achieve your goals. When I’m writing it’s not straight forward. It’s all in bits and pieces. Bits of the middle, bits of the end, bits of the beginning, then it is all joined up to create something meaningful. Look at a computer as being a tool with a million different tools on it. You pick which tools you want to learn and use. That’s why it really helps to have computer knowledge because it gives me a way to understand my dyslexia.

My experience in life has taught me that anger can be turned from negative to positive and can be used to your advantage. It does feel like I’m doing all this for the wrong reasons but to make those wrong reasons right. But now that I have the answer to my problem there is no stopping me. Although I do have a hard time reading because of my dyslexia, if I have to go to college in order to get a piece of paper so I can get my point across then I will."