In this article I'm going to explore three common challenges for dyslexic students who are doing remote learning and what they can do to improve the quality of their learning whilst at home. Together we're going to explore working memory, maintaining focus and difficulties with writing skills.

Introduction

One would think that for many dyslexic learners this current experience of remote learning should be a positive process.  There are many reasons why remote learning could be great especially as levels of distraction from being in a large classroom should be reduced, workloads in learning are perhaps dealt with in a more relaxed way (the usual timetabling doesn’t apply), and the student can find a way to be physically more comfortable during the learning process. 

However, there are caveats too.  The students will be experiencing less one to one time with their teachers and learning from a computer screen will be monotonous and potentially uncomfortable on the eyes.  The net result may be that the level of motivation for students will drop and that will impede the quality of their learning.  If a student simply doesn’t feel like doing something, then they are going to need to put in a lot of energy to get over feelings of apathy, and engage again.

Parents we will be feeling anxious about getting their dyslexic students engaged, after all they still need to work towards good results and for some improve their final G.C.S.E results that are even more dependent upon demonstrating quality learning.  The temptation is to always be on the students case and push them to keep engaging. If we understand in more detail what is happening to make the student de-motivated as a result of having an SpLD maybe we can help our student to build up motivation.

Experiencing dyslexia and other specific learning differences (SpLD) automatically makes it hard to learn in the way that teachers would want them too.  There are three common aspects of being dyslexic that can make this a difficult process.  These are working memory, maintaining focus and poor writing skills.

Working Memory

According to the International Dyslexia Association ‘working memory’ is crucial for learning.  The term refers to the ability to hold and manipulate information mentally over short periods of time.  Working memory is a process and is different to ‘rote’ memory that involves the passive memorizing of static information.

I understand working memory as the process that takes place before you can commit a piece of information to the long term memory.

Imagine, being handed a book that you need to put on a book case.  The book is in your hand, you have read the title and now you need to be able to find the right place on the book shelf to put the book, so that you know where to retrieve the book later on.  Whilst you are mulling over what the book is, how it feels and looks and where the title fits in alphabetical order, the phone rings.  You put the book down and then engage with the phone call.  You come off the phone and then go back to sorting out the job that you were doing before the call.  By then, someone has handed you another book and you successfully go through the process of popping that onto the right place on the shelf, but the original book has been forgotten about.  Therefore, there is a gap in the information that the book shelf is holding. 

The book shelf symbolises long term memory and recall of that memory and the process of getting the book to the book shelf is the working memory element. 

Working memory is fragile in that it can be disrupted and distracted.  If too many processes are taking place at the same time, somehow pieces of information are going to be dropped and the resultant recall of information will be compromised.

When in a learning environment, if a student with poor working memory is given too many instructions or information without being given time to process what they need to do with the information coming at them, then it is likely that some of that information will get lost.

Imagine that you are a dyslexic student, having poor working memory and you are on a live lesson using MS Teams and you have to not only listen and understand, but also write notes at the same time whilst the hustle and bustle of family life is taking place around you. It is likely that the quality of the your note taking is going to be poorer and so upon review, the revision experience could then be difficult.  You would have put in loads of effort, but the end result will feel dissatisfying.

The benefit of remote learning is that on the live teaching lessons it is possible to record the sessions and then be able to review what was said in those lessons, hearing exactly what it was that the teacher was saying, and this will help.

Maintaining Focus

I have already explained the challenges with working memory and a part of the problem with working memory is maintaining focus.

Let’s face it, staring at a screen is exhausting and if your dyslexic student is not feeling fatigue, it will still be having an underlying effect upon their cognitive abilities and focus.  Distractibility will inevitably creep in, there will be moments of zoning out and this is normal.  It is just that for the student with dyslexia and other SpLDs, maintaining focus is much more of a big deal.

Strategies that can help with maintaining focus during live sessions with the teacher will be keeping hydrated (water, not caffeinated drinks), having snacks to keep hunger away, having everything that the student needs to write notes in an effective way to hand e.g coloured pens and paper to hand, being seated on a comfortable chair at a good sized desk or table etc.  Sometimes it is useful to have something to fiddle with whilst listening or chewing gum.  It allows the body to move in some way whilst helping with focus.  Personally, I like fiddling with magnets or smooth pebbles.

In the context of the learning process, maintaining focus is essential for learning, but always a challenge. We need to be able to find strategies for capturing information for those times when our focus drops out.  We need to be able to be confident that we can get to the information later on, that we missed during moments of our focus dropping out.

Writing Skills

One of the challenges that I experienced personally when in class was that my handwriting was uncomfortable, and the rate of capturing information was too slow versus the rate that the teachers were delivering that information. 

Real time notetaking using handwriting will be a challenge to many students with dyslexia and SpLDs.  With slow handwriting, there is a need to rely on working memory to hold the information that is being delivered ahead of where the student is in writing their notes.  This process can be frustrating and riddled with anxiety about what information may have been missed.

With remote learning, hopefully teachers are providing Powerpoint slides and other information to refer to upfront.  It can be helpful to record sessions.  It is also useful to take ‘screen dumps’ of what is being looked at on the screen.

In any timebound situation that requires effective notetaking using handwriting, it will be difficult to get everything down on paper.  I found that my notes during my studies often where written down in haste and then I found upon reflection that I had somehow written down the wrong bit, or that I had misinterpreted what I had heard.  In the lesson itself, I was so busy with focusing in information capture that I didn’t really have time to process the information and that affected the quality of my notes.

Could this be a useful solution to notetaking during remote learning?

I have already mentioned recording lessons as a way to overcome some of the challenges of learning with respect to working memory, maintaining focus and writing skills but simply recording hour long learning sessions could bring about other challenges, not to mention having the time to sift through long recordings to get that essential piece of information.

Call Scotland shared the following useful video on You Tube about how to manage the challenges that come with remote learning.  Please take a look and then let me know your thoughts in the comments below about how useful this strategy is? If you want to try out the Glean software that is being mentioned then feel free to click the banner below the video to arrange a free trial.