Dyslexic Children in Malaysia

[opaqa]

Read the following article:
http://www.utusan.com.my/utusan/archive.asp?y=2004&dt=0922&pub=Utusan_Malaysia&sec=Pendidikan&pg=pe_01.htm

What do you think? Does Malaysia lack educational facilities for children with special needs? Do we need to educate teachers about children with dyslexia?

I still remember back in primary school. One of my classmates is really slow in learning and a lot of teachers labelled him a dumb person, which IMO is really mean and does not help the boy become any better.

What think you?

[Schye]

I am not sure but I found that there are only orpahnage setup by volunteers in my hometown. Is there any public, i mean government support orphanage in Malaysia? I have been doing volunteer works in Japan orphanage and old folks home and they are alll fully supported by government while what I see in Malaysia, there are still a lot which depends on publics doantion.

I know this is a bit off topic but I think its related. Any statistic on this ?

[digimushu]

'dumbness' is relative, similiar to 'smartness'. I have to agree, dyslexic students are harder to spot as opposed to autistic children. There is no 'good' measure for such cases. Somehow, in m'sia, if you cant read, you are 'dumb' or branded as 'slow'.

ADD is another thing to watch out for. So, is there any formal system in place in M'sia to look out for these kids?

[budakkerek]

well...if you guys wanna know, dyslexia, ADD/ADHD etc is considered as a learning disability. It doesnt mean that they are handicapped, but that they are incapable of learning due to some restrictions.
I dont think our system of edu gv much emphasis on this issue. Like, dyslexia. It's hard to detect and most teachers would just assume that the student is just slow, or dumb or just plain stupid for not being able to write properly.

A friend of mine, suspects her bf as being a dyslexic but he himself is not sure. he only knows that he possess some of the traits of adyslexic.
Which made me think...i dont think we hv an assessment system for this...like he's already 20 and he doesnt know? wow...
anyway, we still hv a long way to go in terms of special ed. Not all schools hv it..and we dont hv enough teachers for this. teachers who specialise in this field, that is.
i wanna go into special ed - looks interesting

[pandaboy]

How do we detect someone has dyslexia?

[DecentMerson]

How do we detect someone has dyslexia?

when in doubt, google... hahaha... i think googling solves a million questions...

http://www.jennyburm.com/detect/detect.html

if it is possible, homeschooling is one of the best solution...

i'm not sure if this is proven scientifically... but it is said to be very effective... as dyslexic children are able to catch up with their normal peers...

[pandaboy]

Thanks.

Ages 12 and adult

* Have difficulty taking notes or copying;
* Difficulty with planning and writing essays, letters, and reports;
* Tendency to read inaccurately, or without comprehension;
* Inconsistent spelling;
* Tendency to confuse verbal instructions;
* Confuse phone numbers;
* Severe difficulty with learning a foreign language;
* Difficulty with perception of spoken language, e.g. following instructions, listening comprehension;
* Low self-esteem.


I have at least 5 of the above points... 8O

[balderdash]

I was browsing through random pages and found this thread.....

Special education always has a special spot in my heart because my brother is a special kid. He was diagnosed as ADD/ADHD when he was about 20 months old and has been on speech and occupational therapy since then until about 2 years ago (he is 11 now) when his speech and social skills started improving. FYI, he is on par or even surpassing his peers in terms of academic work - fantastic memory and he picks up things very quickly- but because we were too concerned about him catching up with schoolwork, we sort of neglected the social aspect. So about 2-3 years ago, we decided to cut slack on his schoolwork, changed him from normal stream to special stream. His school is good in the sense that they really take care of the special kids.

However, if you were to ask me whether the Education Ministry has facilities good enough for special education, my answer is a big fat no. It all begins when they just dump kids of different disabilities together in one classroom (as with my brother's previous school) and drill them with ABCs every day. It's madness, to expect children with autism, ADD, ADHD, Asperger's, slow-learning, Down's Syndrome, physical disabilities to learn together. All of them have different learning capacities and to do that is simply a waste of their capabilities. My brother is lucky that his school (a national type school) makes special education a priority, has small classes and he gets one-to-one attention. But what about other kids?

For one, kids with autism won't be able to communicate properly with the teacher. And the kid is force-fed with ABCs and what-nots. ADD/ADHD kids will be running around or just being forgetful and all that. And they are doing the same thing though with proper training, they will be able to sit still. Dyslexic kids are known to be exceptionally smart, just that they cannot adapt to the way we read or write. And the list goes on.

However, IMO, risking generalisation, national type schools care more for special kids. I taught in a chinese SRJK and cos of my experience with my brother and with his other friends, I sorta can tell which are the kids who might have some form of learning disability. What the other teachers did was just to dismiss the kids as 'stupid' or 'crazy'. My heart broke a little to hear that. I was too young then to know how to stand up for the kids. I think it's just the general Chinese school mentality to focus on academic results - and the different ones are shunned.

I definitely agree that Malaysia has a long long way to go before our special education can even reach somewhere. Because of financial and logistics reasons, my brother is unable to be educated somewhere else. We discussed home-schooling but it's difficult and expensive to get a programme and to even find a tutor. So right now he has tutoring 3 times a week and his teacher finds him a joy to teach. He knows every single car model by sight, has been surfing the Internet for car websites using search engines and referrals from his car magazines for the past 3 years, learnt Mandarin via, erm, Astro, learning to speak Cantonese (with an annoying angmoh twang to it) and a lot of amazing things - and still risks getting people calling him 'crazy boy' when he is the most well behaved boy around amongst other kids.

My dream is to actually go into special education eventually and help more kids as such. It's heart wrenching to see how uninformed a lot of parents are - locking the kids up at home, not wanting others to know that they have a special child, ignoring the kids and dumping them with a domestic helper, expecting overnight miracles with 'doctors'- I think what we lack most in Malaysia (in terms of help for special kids) is support for parents and siblings with special kids. My brother's pediatrician actually refers other parents to my mom for help and advice but my mom is only one person. We'd need more people.

This is a very long entry but yea, you guys should know by now that I am passionate about this. A lot of times I think that the general education system is made for 'normal' people like us and special kids are just DIFFERENT. It's not their fault that they can't fit into the system. By labeling and shunning them, we are just conforming more and more to a cookie cutter world.

[escalion]

Thanks.

Ages 12 and adult

* Have difficulty taking notes or copying;
* Difficulty with planning and writing essays, letters, and reports;
* Tendency to read inaccurately, or without comprehension;(yes)
* Inconsistent spelling;
* Tendency to confuse verbal instructions;(sometimes)
* Confuse phone numbers;(yes!)
* Severe difficulty with learning a foreign language;(yes, own mothertounge, mandarin and hakka)
* Difficulty with perception of spoken language, e.g. following instructions, listening comprehension;(sometimes slow)
* Low self-esteem.(yes!!!)


I have at least 5 of the above points... 8O

Haha. I think I have about 6! :P

[wawa]

balderdash, I'm really touched by your post. Hope that all of us would think twice before simply dismissing or labelling somebody with 'no hope'.

I think the problem in Chiense schools is also the lack of funding too, its just not enough resources to cater to these children's needs.