{"id":894,"date":"2022-10-11T13:46:14","date_gmt":"2022-10-11T12:46:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/academic-and-employability-skills\/?p=894"},"modified":"2022-11-21T13:32:04","modified_gmt":"2022-11-21T13:32:04","slug":"learning-a-language-with-dyslexia-10-tips-to-unlock-the-barriers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/academic-and-employability-skills\/2022\/10\/11\/learning-a-language-with-dyslexia-10-tips-to-unlock-the-barriers\/","title":{"rendered":"Learning a language with dyslexia - 10 tips to unlock the barriers"},"content":{"rendered":"

To mark the recent Dyslexia Awareness Week<\/a>, Languages Course Leader Carmen Schembri Wismayer offers some strategies to help students with dyslexia if they\u2019re learning a foreign language.<\/em>
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\nYou might be surprised to learn that, according to the British Dyslexia Association<\/a>, 10% of the population are believed to have dyslexia. This means that on average in every language class we run, two of our students will have dyslexia-related difficulties.<\/p>\n

Dyslexia shouldn't be seen as a disability that hinders people in their daily life but as a specific learning difference in acquiring new knowledge and skills. If you\u2019re dyslexic and you want to learn a foreign language, you can do so successfully. You may just need to do it a bit differently.<\/p>\n

Considerations for dyslexic learners<\/h2>\n

Dyslexia is a language-based learning difficulty. Most recent research suggests that there are neurobiological origins of dyslexia and it is often inherited.<\/p>\n

Dyslexic students tend to process verbal information differently from those who don't have dyslexia. They often have shorter memory spans when it comes to processing language input, which may result in a reduced ability to identify and mentally manipulate the sounds and sound structures in a syllable or word.<\/p>\n

That's not to say students with dyslexia are always at a disadvantage when it comes to language. On the contrary, they can have keen analytical skills, be very creative, and be good at problem-solving and thinking outside the box. These are all essential qualities when you\u2019re confronted with a new linguistic system and unfamiliar grammar to map and explore.<\/p>\n

In this FutureLearn video<\/a>, students with dyslexia talk about some of the difficulties they face*.<\/p>\n

\u2018Opaque\u2019 vs \u2018transparent\u2019 languages<\/h2>\n

Just like people, languages are all different. Some languages, like German, Spanish and Italian, are considered to be 'transparent' languages with clear sound-letter correspondence. Languages like English, French and Danish, however, are classed as 'opaque' languages with irregularities in spelling and pronunciation.<\/p>\n

Students with dyslexia are likely to find a 'transparent' language easier to pick up.<\/p>\n

And how about those languages that don\u2019t have an alphabet, such as Mandarin? Learning Chinese entails matching meaning and sound to a specific character. This uses a different part of the brain for processing than an alphabetic language. There have been studies that show dyslexic students have fewer difficulties learning to read and write in character-based languages. (Check out this blog by one of our students of Mandarin Chinese who is dyslexic<\/a>).<\/p>\n

Strategies to help you learn a foreign language<\/h2>\n

If you have dyslexia, and even if you don\u2019t, here are some tried and tested strategies to make learning a foreign language easier:<\/p>\n