Dysgraphia.

Hi I have been researching all things to do with dyslexia as a great deal of misconception exists regarding just how it presents,

Much the same as it is when people think they know what autism looks like!

Below is my attempt to show how we are all different and how misconception shouldn’t stop anyone from succeeding, given understanding and support we can learn new ways and work around that enable us to succeed .

A great deal of things vary considerably with each person who may be dyslexic,

A common idea of how it presents is that the letters are sometimes back to front. Or that the letters float about on the page.

Although this can be true in some cases with dyslexia it is not the main thing that always presents.

It is also important to understand that dyslexia can be  part of another underlying diversity. For instance having autism or ADHD or Dysgraphia can be part of the big picture.

Just one thing that can present as dyslexia is Dysgraphia, it is specific and may or may not be a symptom of dyslexia.

The ability to actually write down what is in the mind can give  results that are jumbled,difficult to read, have whole letters missing variability in letter size etc.

I have Autism/ Aspergers,ADHD,Dyslexia and probably traits of various other diversities.

I have great difficulty in the path between seeing the text wether it be on a page or in my mind, then controlling my hand,

My hand coordination doesn’t always give me what I expect, I write with capital letters as each letter is in my mind a single fixed structure that doesn’t vary depending on wether it is next to any particular other letter,

Often I miss whole letters but only notice after looking back, and quite often after many years of knowing this I automatically go back without hesitation and squeeze the missing letter in,or scribble it all out and rewrite the whole word,

The letters do vary in size and shape, often starting off leaning to the left then upright as I near the middle of the page and leaning to the right as I finally reach the right hand side of the page, 

I often add punctuation after I have written it down, I take a guess as to where it should go, a full stop at the end and a comma when I need to stop for breath,

My eyes see one thing,My brain then stores that information in many places depending on it’s importance,will it be needed straight away or not needed at all.

my brain then tells my hand what to do, my eyes also play a part in this as they see what the hand is doing and feed back information to the brain,

As my hand then  tries to write down what it has been told it doesn’t always move fast enough or takes a short cut missing letters out, Just to add to all that my memory ability is small, being able to recall words or letters takes time, it isn’t at the front where it is needed straight away, the delay quite often means skipping past until the relevant word or letter does eventually get found.

So plenty to think about!

My daughter who has been formerly tested does have profound dyslexia but is way ahead of her supposed abilities, 

That shows that with correct support and techniques a dyslexic individual can achieve anything they put their mind to.

So a section about Dysgraphia for you to read.

Identifying dysgraphia

The first step to identifying dysgraphia is by comparing your handwriting with other people's handwriting.

The second is to identify what it is exactly that is making your handwriting appear to be of poor quality.
Does your handwriting contain oversized letters and punctuation?
Are there inconsistencies in the size of consecutive letter?
Are letters and words written at an inconsistent angle (straight, then slanting left, then slanting right)?
Are the letters, words, sentences, lines, paragraphs and margins spaced inconsistently (even when margins and lines are provided)?
Are letters and words written in the wrong order?
Does your handwriting contain proper use of uppercase letters, lowercase letters and punctuation?
Does your handwriting contain more spelling mistakes than you would expect?
Has some of your handwriting been crossed out and rewritten?
But just because you might have poor quality handwriting, dysgraphia can still not be assumed.
The third step to identifying dysgraphia is to identify why the handwriting is of poor quality - what causes dysgraphia?
(See, What causes dysgraphia? if you haven’t already.)
For a person with dysgraphia will very often have problems with language processing, fine motor skills, memory recall, pen/pencil grip, handwriting posture and/or visual spacing.
And so the fourth, and final step to identifying dysgraphia is to investigate whether you do indeed have problems in any of the above areas.
An educational psychologist will be able to determine whether or not you have dysgraphia through a face-to-face assessment which will entail a number of testing strategies.
But in getting assessed by an educational psychologist, it usually comes at a cost (sometimes up to £800) and there can sometimes be a lengthy waiting list.

Take care all and always remember having any kind of diversity doesn’t necessarily stop any one from succeeding,with understanding and techniques anything is achievable.

Information taken from this website,www.dysgraphiahelp.co.uk/.../

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edited to add a link to further information.