Teacher with Dyslexia Wins Top Award

“My dyslexia is a gift–it is the reason that I teach the way I teach.”

One of my most favorite publications is the Dyslexic Reader put out by Davis Dyslexia Association International.  The most recent issue had a great article about a dyslexic teacher, Edward Vickerman, being awarded the UK’s most outstanding teacher of the year.

Teacher overcomes discouragement from being dyslexic.

I could relate to how he felt when he was wanting to become a teacher, and yet he wasn’t ever expected to succeed in school and was very discouraged due to his learning disability of dyslexia.

I love it that Mr. Vickerman has taken the obvious knowledge that all children learn differently and has been able to radically revolutionize his classroom and the curriculum that is taught in the classroom.

Textbooks are only used in case of an emergency.

“They don’t use books very much, they have them in case of an emergency!”  I loved that part!  My daughter who is the same age as Mr. Vickerman’s students is always complaining about how boring the text books are and how rarely “real” practical knowledge is taught.

The article really inspired me to continue to provide unique opportunities for my own children who also don’t enjoy spending much time in the textbooks.

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One Response to “Teacher with Dyslexia Wins Top Award”

  1. Damefrank February 23, 2011 at 12:11 pm #

    I love success stories. My daughter, who was so challenged with dyslexia throughout school that she dropped from high school before graduation. This was frustrating to me on two counts. One, I was not only a literacy tutor at the college level for ten years, but also was writing the phonetic dictionary she tearfully asked for when she was 13. The dictionary took too long and she moved out to the big, bad world without necessary tools to excel.

    12 years later I finished that book for her. Published it and sent a copy to her in Texas. She acquired her drivers license with it and used it to fill out a resume which landed her the job she maintaiined for the next 2 years. When I traveled down to Texas for the TX Library Conference where we were showing off “Gabby’s Wordspeller & Phonetic Dictionary” for the first time, we met up our first contacts with Davis Dyslexia Assoc. Int’l (DDAI). My daughter went to one day of the workshop and then visited with facilitators who were present. She came home and cried and cried. Tears of joy that she had met such nice people who could relate to her so well. Geez…I’m tearing up just writing this.

    With all my experience in English, the fact that I was a Mom who loved my daughter so much but couldn’t help her (because I didn’t understand dyslexia either) overwhelmed me at how touching seeing her meet these people was for me. And although she does not have a single book in her home. She took home Ron Davis’ book promising to read it. One month later, I’m back home in WA and she phones me just bawling (she’s in her 20’s mind you). “Mom, this book reads like it can see my soul. These things they say are all the struggles I had but couldn’t put into words!”

    Okay, I need to quit writing, I’m crying too hard!

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