4 Top Tips that will make Going Back to School with Dyslexia Simple!
…And yes, they’re all about the C-Pen Reader 2.
Let’s go!
Going back to school with dyslexia is more than knowing you’re about to take on another year of learning and developing. For neurodivergent learners with reading differences, it’s about knowing that you’ll be taking on another year of reading too, and whatever pressure points that might entail: keeping up with assigned work, reading in front of others, isolation, grade impacts—the list goes on.
We’re two weeks into term and it’s around now that for a lot of learners, the novelty might be beginning to wear off. For some, the excitement of seeing their friends again has given way to trepidation mounting at the sheer scale of learning that lies before them, and anxiety has started to gain a foothold.
How do we ensure that learners are going into the new term feeling confident and supported?
When you’ve got the right tools for the job, it’s easier than ever to empower learners and ensure that they’re confident and even excited for the learning year ahead of them. And that’s where our friend the C-Pen Reader 2 comes in…
An award-winning tech hack for going back to school with dyslexia
Getting the right support in place is vital from the first days of term, and it can change the course of the whole school year for the better—especially when it comes to beating reading anxiety and supporting student mental health.
Here’s our run-down of how our dedicated text-to-speech reading aid, the C-Pen Reader 2, can transform learning for the new cohort of 2023, and support readers from their first day back in the classroom.
Remember that reading happens outside of the classroom, too
High-end tech packages that slot into computer learning systems are brilliant for supporting reading in school—but what happens when learners aren’t in school? Reading happens everywhere, and very few students have the opportunity to take school tablets and laptops home with them for homework.
This creates two separate spheres within a learner’s life when they’re going back to class with dyslexia: the school sphere, where they can read with support and confidence, and the home sphere, where it’s likely more of a struggle. It’s not just about dyslexia either— the same can be said of English Language Learners (ELLs), who have found themselves studying in English but hail from other language backgrounds, and struggle to access adequate English-language support at home.
Considering the benefits of reading for pleasure and the amount of paper reading that we encounter in our daily lives, this lack of home support creates a problem.
But from a fiction book at home to a bus timetable in their hand, a portable device like the C-Pen Reader 2 is real-life ready in that it doesn’t consign reading to just one place… and with a long-life battery and headphone audio loop, it’s pretty much ready to go when they are.
Put reader independence first this term
Especially when they’re in the very early stages of education, many learners who have literacy differences like dyslexia find comfort in having a human reader who sits next to them on hand, offering them reading support. But as time wears on, this relationship can change—many grow to feel that they’re being singled out, isolated from their peers or infantilised. It’s easy to feel policed with human support sitting next to you, and it can have negative impacts on self-image and their peer relationships.
Consistently going back to school with dyslexia year after year and being supported by a human reader can also lead to the development of a belief system in the learner that they need the support of a human adult to help them read. This can become problematic in later life, as when learners leave education for the world of work, the onus for reading support is largely on themselves and tech tools take the place of human professionals.
Scanning Pens’ flagship reading support, the Reader 2, is an intuitive, easy-to-use reading support system that allows learners to self-support and problem-solve their own reading hurdles, developing vocabularies and fostering reading independence from the very first use. This means that they never develop a feeling of helplessness when they are reading alone isn’t around—which is likely to be fairly often as they grow, and it’s good preparation for the time when that support relationship has to be individual, such as when they enter the workplace.
💡 It’s also worth considering that human readers can be expensive in terms of yearly budgeting for schools as well. There’s a bit of a shortage of these reading professionals in some areas too, so resourcing enough for every learner who needs support can be far more tricky than you think.
It’s probably a good idea to think about screen use after the pandemic.
We spent the best part of two years learning, working and socialising behind our screens… and that’s not exactly ideal. Excessive screen use, especially in children and young people, has been linked to a number of negative side effects on their mental and physical health.
Text-to-speech devices like reading pens move support into a hybrid audio-visual context, so as well as being accessible anywhere independent of Wi-Fi for reading on the go, learners can take a valuable break from their screens when they’re reading. It also opens up the world of non-digital reading materials, like those borrowed from a library, or books owned by siblings or parents that they didn’t feel confident enough to take on before.
Remember that educators are going back to school with dyslexia too.
Educator bandwidth is a hot topic at the moment—when expectations are higher than ever, ITT take-up and recruitment are in a slump and there’s a whole lot of pressure on effecting a learning recovery, preserving whole-class focus time is important. But so is ensuring that learners with dyslexia and literacy differences are adequately supported. How do we strike a balance?
The C-Pen Reader 2 works with educators to allow students to self-support, fostering reading independence and allowing those teaching to spend less time supporting single learners in decoding text and more time focusing on the whole class, and creating broad learning opportunities. It’s not about educators wanting to step away from individual support— it’s about ensuring that the individual support that learners are receiving is up to standard, and not having to compete with everything else that’s going on in the classroom.
There’s also a lot to be said for the emotional benefits of a reader being able to identify a problem word or sentence and self-support through the process of recognition, learning and definition: confidence is key in developing reading skills, and trust in their own abilities means that the next time it happens, reading anxiety doesn’t find the chance to take hold.
We’ll admit that the title isn’t strictly accurate. Going back to school with dyslexia is rarely simple, because it’s a complex and changeable landscape that needs a lot of support, understanding, and resilience on the part of our learners. Reading is the cornerstone of learning, and when reading skills let learners down, school becomes a site of stress and anxiety. Targets get away from them, and many feel unmotivated and embarrassed, and some may even disengage from learning completely.
But that’s why having the right tools for the job matters so much.
Many will be struggling with the idea of full-time learning and new horizons at this time of year, especially those who have moved institutions or started a new Key Stage a few weeks short weeks ago. They’ll be looking into the distance at the end of the year too, thinking about grades and next steps when most will know that they’re still a little on the back foot when it comes to learning progress.
Support that works first time and beats reading anxiety is the order of the day. Learners need tools that can transform the new term experience for good by making reading access simple, easy, and dependable— and empower them with the confidence to take on the next chapter.
Find out more about the The C-Pen Reader 2!