Dyslexia and academic life

Abstract

This chapter intends to discuss the experiences of university students with dyslexia and academic learning and assessment. It intends to challenge the traditional access to and production of examinations and to separate the ability to retrieve and produce verbal visual print from academic learning and performance in order to propose a model where educational systems join the fourth revolution. The intention is to address the brain drain that communities experience when students with Dyslexia are not able to show what they really know, due to possibly archaic access to and production of academic learning and assessment. The use of technology and independent access to printed material will also be discussed. The framework of this chapter is the Kannangara model of dyslexia: from Languishing to Thriving with Dyslexia. When reading this chapter, one also needs to remember that, whilst I refer to dyslexia, this profile more often than not co-occurs with other learning challenges and is often grouped with populations of Specific Learning Difficulties or Learning Disabilities in research and national data.