Coming to terms with the challenges dyslexic students face can be daunting. Here, Dr. Louisa Moats dispels assumptions to illustrate five realities about dyslexia that parents and professionals must embrace.

October is National Dyslexia Awareness Month. During this month, we celebrate the amazing stories of the many people who have overcome challenges associated with dyslexia to be more. Some of these people have gone onto to lead incredibly remarkable lives, people like Richard Branson, Pablo Picasso, Henry Winkler, Agatha Christie, Octavia Spencer, Tim Tebow and Steven Spielberg – showing that they are not defined by their diagnosis.

Henry Ward Beecher once said, a word is a “peg to hang ideas on.” A single word can conjure a host of meanings and associations. “Dyslexia” is such a word. In the last couple of years, well-known and respected researchers have been arguing that it is time to do away with the “D word.”

I attended and spoke at the annual International Dyslexia Association (IDA) meeting in Dallas. IDA remains the best interdisciplinary conference for all professionals, advocates, and families concerned with reading, writing, and language difficulties.

Rather than focusing on text reading this month, let’s turn our attention to one of the critical components of language necessary for comprehension: vocabulary.

At the end of October, I attended and spoke at the annual International Dyslexia Association (IDA) meeting in Dallas. IDA remains the best interdisciplinary conference for all professionals, advocates, and families concerned with reading, writing, and language difficulties. IDA meetings, over the past three decades, are where I’ve obtained my real education.