***Dyslexia, ADD and ADHD: Change Deficit to Attribute

Quotes and comments are from an Article published at:
http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/webwatch/2008/08/fish_out_of_water.html

Subject: From A.D.H.D. to 8 Gold Medals

In a recent interview with the New York Times, Deborah Phelps, middle school principal and mother of Michael Phelps, the most medaled Olympian in history, remembers how her son’s elementary school teacher once told her, “Your son will never be able to focus on anything.”... When Michael was in 5th grade, his mother and family doctor discussed whether Michael might have A.D.H.D....Deborah Phelps watched her son, who couldn’t sit still at school, wait patiently for hours at a meet to swim a five-minute race. At 11, Michael was off Ritalin by his own choice and his coach, Bob Bowman, was already predicting greatness....Today, the Phelps name is an adjective, as in “phelpsian,” meaning "dominating in competition." A gift, most would agree, that requires laser-like focus.

My Comment: As a Seminar Instructor and teaching Mental Photography, I see many people that have ADD, ADHD, and Dyslexia. I think very highly when a person like Michael Phelps can learn to overcome this so-called deficit, and turn it into an incredible attribute.

A couple of re-occurring themes that do seem to accompany ADD, ADHD, and Dyslexia is the ability for that person to have incredible 'focus' on an objective, and they also tend to find school very boring. Many considerations to qualitatively monitor the environment where these individuals co-exist with everyone else should be a factor in any diagnosis.

Further Discussion: 1 out 4 people have dyslexia. There are 7 different types of dyslexia. A dyslexic person can experience more than one type of dyslexia. This in turn complicates the diagnosis.

Since more than 50% of school students can be taught to read, the education system calls this a victory. What if in that same school system, you score 50% on a test. That would most likely be graded as a failure. Why the change of heart? That approach sounds a bit hypocritical.

ADD and ADHD usually start from an observation, described as unruliness, disruptive behavior, disobedient, lack of concentration and initiative (initiative is sometimes the ideal of the teacher, or what the teacher would like to see.), and so on. The point being that many of these conditions are a qualitative observation, and not necessarily based on a set of parameters that can be gauged.

Environment plays a big part in what we react to and how we react. Environment also plays a considerable, mostly unconsidered, part of the diagnosis. How can a Doctor that is going to prescribe drugs for a specific condition, such as ADD, do such an act without so much as to have visited the school or conducted an on site study, relying on input from persons that may, without intention, be biased.

"Doctors are too important to people who are really sick,... to spend their time doing things like that!"

Other parameters that should be accounted for is diet, or in some cases, lack thereof, medications, drugs, and even the potential misdiagnosis that the student is not ADD at all. What if the student is Dyslexic?

Let me paint a picture for you. You are a student that cannot read. You are criticized, put down, stepped upon by the system. Maybe you are put into the 'SLOW' class. This is "Death of a thousand cuts" to a students self-esteem. How would YOU, as a student, react? Rebelliously? Distracted? These students not only know they have trouble learning, it's been ground into them by their piers and teachers - Like rubbing broken glass into an open wound.

If they show rebellion or distraction, doesn't it look allot like ADD or ADHD? IT SURE DOES!!!
~90% of people diagnosed with ADD or ADHD also mysteriously have Dyslexia.

Are you thinking something is wrong here yet? Many people would agree with me by now, there is! What if there was a way that people could bypass Dyslexia? Would that be worthwhile? That may actually get teachers out of the 50% victory to a passing grade, maybe even a 'B'. There are always going to be students that have other learning problems outside of the situations covered here.

That natural device that bypasses Dyslexia is Mental Photography!

*Kens Comment Re. My Comment:

Shannon,
Thank you for pointing out that there are many who question that ADHD is a deficit at all, but instead an attribute in the right context. I also appreciate your suggestion that the environment that a child is in may contribute to the diagnosis. I have a nephew with severe Dyslexia who also happens to have graduated near the top of his high school class. Like many people with Dyslexia he has some amazing compensatory strengths that allow him to learn well. If he were expected to do the same things as most other students, particularly listening and taking notes at the same time, school would be utterly frustrating for him. The more we study human behavior the more clear it becomes that each human, like each snowflake or grain of sand, is a unique individual made of many strengths. Our job is as educators is to find and match those strengths with the proper learning environment. Where is a good source for information about mental photography?

*My comment Re. Ken's Comment:
Thank you for your further interest. From my observations and thinking outside the square a bit, I have seen many examples of people that experience so-called deficits that move their lives in phenomenal ways. Some of the people had subtle things happen within their life, but others had rather dynamic changes in the ways that they approached and accomplished things. This was the result of them experiencing the world in a different way than what is classically referred to as normal.

There are many overlapping circumstances between Dyslexia and ADD. In some cases, professional diagnosticians may not be able to tell the two apart. That can be quite a problem, since the treatments are considerably different. My clients, by using Mental Photography, can bypass the function of Dyslexia. To them, it's a Godsend, and by giving them a heightened degree of focus, so they can turn down the internal chatter of ADD, is added benefit.

Dyslexia is a 'next step' in the evolution of humans.
I have come to the conclusion that Dyslexia is a normal function that exacerbates the human species -- we think we are immune to evolution. Dyslexia is a 'next step' in the evolution of humans. The reason for such an outrageous statement is that Mental Photography of information occurs at very high rates of speed. Greater than 25,000 words per minute, but can far exceed those numbers. Dyslexia gives the person problems when 'reading' at slow rates, because the dyslexic function deforms (corrupts) the information. Since Mental Photography takes 'pictures' of whole pages, the information on the page is not corrupted. Ergo, Dyslexics are automatically wired up to Mentally Photograph.

Dyslexics are naturally born to mentally function at a higher rate of speed. That's why many dyslexics find relief with Mental Photography over reading, or speed-reading.

Unfortunately, pride prevailed...
The following entries that appeared after this degraded the entire issue of what Michael Phelps accomplished, to a third-grader's cat fight about Ritalin and other drugs. So much for the open-minded, analytical adult approach to logically forming opinions.

What I find funny is that the one that was yelling the loudest mentioned that her daughter was found to be suffering from a 'un-named' learning disorder that stopped her ability to read... Sounds like Dyslexia to me...
Again, it is my aim to present to you provocative content to stimulate your mind. Your brain is magical in it's complexity. A simple intended pointing movement of your finger may activate most regions of your brain into action.

And wash that finger...You don't know where its been! Ha Ha!
I hope that I have been able to not only commend the accomplishments of the World's Greatest Swimmer, but also point out that things are not always as they appear. Even the astute observer must be on their toes. Good Luck to Michael, and Good Luck to you in your future endeavors. Now you may have another critical piece of information to make your decisions upon.

Great Things Happen!

Shannon