Dyslexia can affect a wide range of abilities.  Primarily learners with dyslexia will have difficulties with reading, writing, and spelling but dyslexia can also affect processing speed and working memory.  Students with dyslexia often struggle with reading fluency, understanding what they have read, and also formulating their own ideas into a logical order.  Students can also have difficulty with remembering instructions and switching focus.  

Dyslexia can affect confidence as students may feel 'left behind' or less capable.  A specific understanding of these difficulties, tailored recommendations, and assistive technology can turn this all around.  A diagnosis can help to identify and use strengths.  

I cannot guarantee a diagnosis of dyslexia, but the process of dyslexia diagnosis testing goes into great detail to investigate underlying ability and literacy skills.  I will be able to pinpoint specific difficulties and make recommendations of how to overcome these.  A dyslexia report can also highlight strengths and boost confidence, and a dyslexia diagnosis lasts for life.

A diagnosis will not change who the learner is, but it will help in understanding and addressing difficulties.  Recommendations will be shared with schools/colleges/ universities and will help the learner to achieve their potential.

If you are applying to go to university, an official diagnosis will enable you to apply for DSA (Disabled Students Allowance), which can provide you with mentoring, study skills support and assistive technology to help you on your course.  This makes the diagnosis worthwhile financially as the student will benefit from thousands of pounds worth of support in the HE institution.

A formal assessment takes approximately 3 hours and therefore a certain level of maturity and concentration is required.  The BDA states that a child can be assessed from age 7 upwards, but I do not assess before the age of 9. Children develop at different stages and by age 9 most students have a more established style of reading, writing and learning.  

ADHD is another neurodevelopmental disorder which can also affect education and is often associated with dyslexia.  Many students have difficulty with sustained attention, but if these symptoms of inattention are so severe and causing a real problem in education, then the learner would benefit from an assessment.  As a specialist teacher and assessor who has undertaken additional training in ADHD, I am able to ‘identify ADHD characteristics’ for the purpose of education using the DIVA questionnaire.  This is not a medical diagnosis, but is enough evidence to apply for DSA and for the student to be classed as having ADHD.  The ADHD assessment takes place as an add on to the dyslexia assessment. This is because the dyslexia assessment delves into detail of underlying ability and literacy skills, and this is also necessary for an ADHD assessment. 

If a student is struggling with some aspect of exams, they can be assessed to ascertain if they would benefit from exam access arrangements.  These are reasonable adjustments that can be put in place, such as extra time, reader and scribe in order to allow the student to access the exam and reach their potential. Most schools/ colleges complete their own EAA assessments, but you may wish to have this completed as part of a more in-depth assessment.  This would have to be done in conjunction with the school.

A primary education assessment would assess a child in detail in terms of their underlying ability and their literacy skills.  This can also be used as evidence for the school to apply for additional time and other exam access arrangements for SATs and or 11+ exams. 

Initially, detailed background information from the school/ college/ university, parents and the young person would be collected. An assessment appointment will be arranged either online or at the student’s home or school.  The assessment for Dyslexia usually takes between 3-4 hours and therefore can be done over the course of 1, 2 or 3 sessions.  For an ADHD assessment there is an additional hour of testing. 

For exam access arrangements and for primary educational assessments the assessment process takes approximately an hour. 

The full report will be completed within 4 weeks of the final assessment session and a feedback session will be offered.