Coping with Dyslexia | Learning with Dyslexia

See also: Teaching Skills

Our page on Understanding Dyslexia explains that dyslexia is one of a family of conditions known as specific learning difficulties. It affects the brain’s ability to process information, primarily around words. Dyslexia usually affects phonological awareness, verbal memory, and verbal processing speed.

This means that people with dyslexia find it harder to take in, understand and remember words and information. They also often have problems with languages and with mathematics (which is, effectively, another language). This can have significant effects on how they learn, and which subjects they feel able to study. This page provides some ideas to help people with dyslexia can learn to cope with those effects, and manage their learning.

A Question of Attitude?

Dyslexia is not a question of attitude. It is not about needing to ‘try harder’.

Almost inevitably, however, people with dyslexia find that they typically need to put in more effort than their peers for the same results.

This is partly because there is no ‘magic bullet’ to overcome the issues associated with learning and dyslexia.

Unfortunately, most schools and learning systems around the world are set up to cater for neurotypical people. This means that neurodivergent people—and this includes people with dyslexia—do not necessarily fit in. Accommodations can be made to make life slightly easier, but they do not fully compensate.

For example, many people with dyslexia are permitted extra time in exams, to give them more time to read and understand the questions, and think about how to respond. However, there is no way to find extra time to revise. There are only 24 hours in any given day, and everyone needs to sleep.

  • For example, many people with dyslexia are permitted extra time in exams, to give them more time to read and understand the questions, and think about how to respond.

  • However, there is no way to find extra time to revise. There are only 24 hours in any given day, and everyone needs to sleep.

Possibly even more unfairly, people with dyslexia often find that they cannot work for such long periods without a break, or for as many hours in a day, as their peers. This is because the effort of concentrating on processing information is very tiring.

Having a specific learning difficulty like dyslexia is therefore a drawback in learning, to put it mildly.

However, this doesn’t mean that there is anything ‘wrong’ with you—and it is important to remember this.

If anything, the ‘wrong’ is with an education system that still seems to be rooted in the 19th century, and has not caught up with either how we learn, or the way that we access and use information in the internet age. Clearly none of us can do much about that—so instead those with specific learning difficulties like dyslexia have to find ways to cope.



Support for Dyslexia

Schools, colleges and other educational establishments have been teaching people with dyslexia for many years. There is also plenty of research about the types of support that may be helpful.

However, everyone’s presentation and issues are slightly different.

You therefore have to work out—usually with the help of your school or college—what is best for you. The person who is responsible for doing this with you is likely to be the Special Educational Needs Coordinator or possibly a Learning Support Assistant.

The types of support that are typically available include:

  • Access to coloured overlays. Research has shown that overlaying white pages with a coloured overlay can often help with reading difficulties. Similarly, when you are reading on screen, changing the screen background and font colour can be helpful. White font on a black background is easier to read than black on white.

  • Other physical aids and assistance. Many people with dyslexia have extremely poor handwriting, and may therefore benefit from using a computer to take notes, complete assignments and do exams. Computers and laptops can often be provided by the school or college. Co-occurring difficulties often include organisational issues, so many people use other technology such as smartwatches and phones to remind them of deadlines and appointments.

  • Use of fidget toys and gadgets. People with dyslexia often have co-occurring conditions that mean that they may benefit from the use of fidget toys. Indeed, it is probably fair to say that many children would benefit from having a fidget toy, but schools are often resistant to this approach.

  • Additional support for exams and assessments. People with dyslexia are typically given 25% more time in exams and assessments. It may also be possible to do your exams in a separate room, so that you can get up and walk about during the exam, or take a break. These kinds of accommodations are generally worked out with your school, and agreed with the examining body. Younger children may be allowed a reader and scribe for tests.

Public exams vs. in-school tests


Schools often draw a distinction between public exams and in-school tests and assessments. Teachers may therefore expect children with dyslexia to sit in-school tests with everyone else in their class, and without any extra time.

Clearly this will have an impact on the results—and that, in turn, can have a huge impact on confidence.

If this is an issue for you, it may be worth discussing with the SENCo, because there is usually somewhere that you can go to do a test quietly with a little additional time. Even if you are only able to do this occasionally, it will help to show you that under the right conditions, you can manage a test.

  • Additional support in school. Children with dyslexia are often given additional help and support at school. When they are younger, this help might include one-on-one support from a learning assistant to give them extra reading or writing support. As children get older, they may benefit from regular meetings with a learning mentor on specific issues such as managing revision, or developing exam technique. There are also some particular techniques that may be worth pursuing (see box), and schools may be able to help you to develop these techniques.

Tips and tricks for people with dyslexia


  • Building working memory

    Working memory is the ability to hold onto information for a short time, useful for processing questions and lists of instructions. There are various programmes available to help with this, and schools often have access to one or more.

  • Getting the calculator to do the work

    People with dyslexia often find maths a particular challenge. Teachers with expertise in dyslexia suggest that an important tip is to know what you can do on a calculator, and make it ‘do the heavy lifting’. Take a bit of time to get to grips with your calculator. It may be worth asking your teacher to show you how to do each new operation using the calculator.

  • Use highlighters to show the important words

    Many exam questions—particularly in maths—use a lot of words to ‘hide’ the meaning. This is difficult for everyone, but especially people with a processing difficulty. It is therefore a good idea to practise using highlighter pens to pick out the key words that will enable you to understand what is being asked. Focus on the words that set out the assignment, and explain what you need to do.

  • Little and often is better than trying to spend hours

    A period of 10 minutes’ concentrated work is often better than an hour of staring at your books. This is especially true for revision. However, it also means that you probably need to start revising earlier than many of your peers.

  • Don’t miss out steps

    When we first start at school, everything is spelled out, step by step. In maths, for example, you work through each step of a mathematical operation. However, as you move up through the school, you may be encouraged to take shortcuts. The thinking behind these may be obvious to others—but they can often cause problems for people with dyslexia. If in doubt, just keep spelling out all the steps. An extra line of writing is better than getting the answer wrong.

  • An alternative approach to assessments. At universities and colleges, people with dyslexia may be allowed to use an alternative approach to assessments. This is something that will need to be discussed with your college authorities, but there may be a considerable amount of flexibility. For example, instead of submitting a written assignment, it may be possible to prepare a video presentation. This is because universities do their own marking, and set their own assessment criteria, and can therefore accommodate neurodivergence more easily.

  • Fewer subjects. One accommodation that may make a big difference to people with dyslexia is simply studying fewer subjects, and picking your subjects carefully. For example, learning new languages is often particularly challenging for people with dyslexia. Many schools encourage language learning, but may be prepared to adapt their expectations for people with dyslexia to provide more time for other subjects. Reducing your extra-curricular commitments can also help, especially if they use a lot of processing power. Learning a musical instrument, for example, may simply require too much brain power. However, you may feel that it is worth it.


A Final Thought

Generally, it is fair to say that technology has made many aspects of managing dyslexia much easier.

Spell-checks and grammar checks can help you to get round many of the obvious problems. Speech-to-text technology can also be used if you find it easier to think that way. The ability to edit and review text before submitting makes it simpler to manage essay-writing. Automatic reminders and updates can improve your organisation.

However, none of this technology can eliminate the fact that people with dyslexia simply think differently—and the education system is not really set up for them. You might have it easier than your predecessors with dyslexia, but we are still a long way from a level playing field.


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