Time To Stop The Dyslexia Scam
By Bruce Deitrick Price
Dyslexia is the most used word in our K-12 system. Dyslexia means not being a good reader, so we know our Education Establishment still has not figured out how to teach reading. This is odd. A century ago, we had almost universal literacy.
Let’s play Sherlock Holmes. Is there a crime here? Who is committing it?
Here’s my conclusion. The Education Establishment promotes a method that doesn’t work, generally known as sight-words. As a result, there are many damaged and illiterate children. How do you cover up your crime? Easy. Blame it on a mythical disease called dyslexia.
Dyslexia, you see, is the all-purpose alibi, excuse, and get-out-of-jail-free-card. The professors haven’t done anything wrong. It’s just bad luck that millions of American children somehow end up academically dysfunctional.
Siegfried Engelmann (1931-2019) is one of our real educators. He summed up the matter this way: “One of the greatest myths perpetrated by the establishment is dyslexia…. There is precisely nothing wrong with the dyslexic kid except the teaching failed….We have worked with thousands of kids and never seen one who failed to learn to read when the teaching and management details are in place.” Think about that.
Here are the big events that define our national reading crisis. In 1931 the public school system suddenly outlawed phonics, and has been on a downward trend ever since. However, three years earlier Dr. Samuel Orton completed a field study which concluded that sight-words do not work. Equally bad, they will ruin the child for life. The professors knew all this, from the beginning.
Dr. Orton, a neurologist, a real scientist, was shocked by his own findings and warned: “faulty teaching methods may not only prevent the acquisition of academic education by children of average capacity but may also give rise to far reaching damage to their emotional life.” During the 1930s, 40s, and 50s, when sight-words were enforced in the schools but didn’t improve literacy, the heavy thinkers pushing sight-words came up with lots of psychoanalytic explanations instead of admitting the role of sight-words. It was easier to slander the parents as alcoholic, mentally deficient, et al. Point is, professors insisted that illiteracy was not caused by sight-words. But it was.
Years later Samuel Blumenfeld, another of our great educators, wrote a short booklet titled: “Dyslexia: The Disease You Get In School.” Notice there’s no mention of bad parents, bad brains, or any of the other clichés. The cause is the school!
Here’s what ruins all the giddy theories. In the 1930s the educrats told parents that the children would routinely learn—that is, recognize on sight — 700 words each year. Problem is, people need a near-photographic memory to retain all those words, but only a small percentage have that.
History shows that each year goals were reduced, to 500 words a year and then 300. By the 1960s they were down to less than 100 per year, a joke compared to early claims. For ordinary kids, the realistic goals are around 50.
Do the math. Even the most successful students, at the end of high school, have only learned a fraction of English words needed for real literacy. Proving that sight-words were never a genuine option for students learning to read.
The professors settled on 20% as dyslexia’s failure rate. One in five children are genetically doomed to low literacy. Whenever the school officials have to deal with a worried parent, they can claim, well, we shouldn’t be surprised if your kid has dyslexia because a fifth of them do!
This whole thing is a scam and a bad joke. Kids won’t typically have reading problems unless you force them to do the impossible, i.e., try to memorize thousands of sight-words.
Kids are told to guess and skip ahead. This guarantees constant confusion. Words may appear to move. You may get the first word, the fourth word, the seventh word, and so on. You jump back-and-forth from the things you know. Everything becomes jumbled, which is the essence of dyslexia.
A famous phonics expert said, the real problem is not dyslexia but the teacher’s flawed instruction. Dyslexia, the expert said, should be called dysteachia.
There are several million children in our public schools at this minute who are being defeated by sight-words. Don’t let it happen to anyone you know.
Everyone interested in dyslexia will want to read these articles:
THE STRANGE TRUTH ABOUT DYSLEXIA — Features a powerful quote from Siegfried Engelmann. In his experience no kid with an IQ over 80 had dyslexia. https://youtube.com/watch?v=VeFLLnRWROQ… (Video, 4 minutes)
HOW DOLCH WORDS CAUSE ILLITERACY AND DYSLEXIA — Best explanation you’ll see for how sight-words mess up the human mind. (Video, 7 minutes.) https://youtube.com/watch?v=SCNDFTBkPBQ…
DYSLEXIA: THE DISEASE YOU GET IN SCHOOL — Blumenfeld wrote a dozen books but this short piece may be his masterpiece.
Notice there’s no mention of neurotic parents, defective brains, or any of the other clichés. The cause is the school. (Print article, 8 minutes.) http://donpotter.net/pdf/dyslexia_school_disease.pdf…
———————————————in conclusion—————————-
Dyslexia is costing us many billions of dollars each year. Millions of children are damaged. Treatment often consists of more sight-words. ——————————————————————
The whole country should see this article. Please help me in this campaign–visit Support Education Reform
http://spot.fund/SupportEducationReform…
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Updated March 13, 2024 1:30 pm
Bruce Deitrick Price is a maverick in education reform and tells it like it is.
It is unconscionable that millions of perfectly normal children have been “diagnosed” with dyslexia by the corrupt and colluding American education industry which places political ideology over literacy.
When collectivism/socialism is the political goal, a dependent, unaware and compliant citizenry is required. Illiteracy is the strategic objective and sight-words are the proven tactical weapon. Sight-word reading instruction is educational child abuse.
Linda Goudsmit
Pundicity page: goudsmit.pundicity.com and website: lindagoudsmit.com
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Categories: Contributors, Education