Strategies for trainee teachers with Dyslexia or other
Speech, Language and Communication difficulties such as
Autistic Spectrum Condition on School Experience
As a trainee teacher with dyslexia or other Speech, Language and Communication
difficulties (SLCD) such as Autistic Spectrum Conditions (ASC), you may not be sure how
your Specific Learning Difference (SpLD) might impact you as a teacher – this is something
you could discuss with Plymouth Disability Assist Team (DAS) and your Learning Support
Tutor. Disclosure is not compulsory by law but it is wise to consider the possible
consequences of not disclosing. There have been great advances in supporting individuals
with Dyslexia, SLDC and ASC in recent years and it is unlawful for any institution or
workplace to discriminate against anyone once they have disclosed a diagnosis.
It will be difficult for you to be supported on placement if the right people are not made
aware of your SpLD. By disclosing on placement and in future employment, you will have
a much greater chance of accessing any support you may need. However, it is important
that you feel confident in disclosing – no one else can do this on your behalf. Use it as
an opportunity to explain your diagnosis and how you experience it – both the positive
aspects and the challenges.
When considering disclosing, it is important for you to think about the advantages and
disadvantages. You should feel comfortable that your placement provider or employer will
be supportive and that the strengths of your SpLD are highlighted. It is useful to discuss the
positive strategies that you use as well as any adjustments that could be made in the
workplace.
Purpose of this document:
This document serves as a starting point for a disclosure or discussion about your SpLD
on placement and in future employment. Plymouth University will not disclose a trainee
teacher’s specific learning difference on their behalf. It is the trainee’s responsibility to
choose when, how and if they wish to disclose their diagnosis. This is your document, and
you are responsible for using it to facilitate positive discussion.
It is important that you understand the adjustments you can make to your practice, based
on a good understanding of your own profile of strengths and difficulties. Discussions
should be positive and show that you are able to take responsibility for your own working
practice. Following are examples of possible strategies a trainee teacher with dyslexia and
ASC may find useful and may choose to integrate into their teaching. This list is not
comprehensive, and trainee teachers are encouraged to discuss their individual
approaches to teaching with their placement provider directly.
Please contact Disability Assist or the Careers & Employability Service if you would like
further information or support with positive disclosure in the workplace:
Disability Assist
The Learning Gateway
011, Roland Levinsky Building
Reception: 01752 587676
E: das@plymouth.ac.uk
Successful trainee teachers with dyslexia, SLCD or ASC will:
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Understand their diagnosis to be a specific learning difference (SpLD)
Have a good understanding of their strengths and develop approaches to teaching to make
best use of these
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Be aware of the factors that challenge them on placement and develop individual strategies
to minimise these
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Be able to effectively communicate their strengths and challenges as part of positive
disclosure on placement and in future employment
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Spend time considering possible individual teaching and learning strategies well before
placement starts.
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Take responsibility for adapting their teaching approach to best suit their individual profile of
strengths and difficulties
Be aware of any reasonable adjustments that could be made for support on placement and
be able to discuss these with a placement provider or employer as relevant
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Be efficient in following up paperwork in regard to Disabled Students’ Allowances (DSA)
funding so that there is as little delay as possible in receiving support and / or equipment.
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Take advantage of support offered within the university (e.g. Disability Assist and the wider
Learning Support and Wellbeing department, e.g. the Writing Café run by Learning
Development), and externally (e.g. Assistive Technology training providers), and proactively
engage with these services as required.
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Communicate any difficulties experienced on placement with the School Experience team
and / or Disability Assist as soon as possible so that advice and additional support can be
offered.
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Understand that although reasonable adjustments may be implemented, teaching standards
must still be met in line with the placement requirements and programme outcomes.
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Understand the difference between university and the placement setting
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Understand that their needs may be different in different schools and different environments
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Remain engaged with Plymouth Institute of Education and Disability Assist for the duration
of their degree and deal with any challenges that may arise quickly and openly
Below are some of the strengths and difficulties you may experience as a trainee teacher with a
specific learning difference. Please tick any that you feel are relevant to you. It is important that
you really understand how you work best as both a student and a teacher – make sure that you
refer back to your diagnostic report to be sure that you really understand your profile of
strengths and areas of challenge.
Remember:
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No two trainee teachers with SpLDs are the same – your profile is individual to you.
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The strategies that you implement to minimise your difficulties are based on your own
preferences – only you know what works for you.
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This list is not exhaustive – you may use strategies that are not indicated. Please add your
own in the space provided.
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The Disabled Students Allowance is available to support you to better understand your
profile as a trainee teacher with an SpLD
Strengths you may have as a trainee teacher with an SpLD:
Strengths
☐ Visual and Spatial
Awareness
Benefits to teaching
Making use of images, diagrams, and visualisation to support teaching;
being able to teach holistically rather than just focusing on the parts.
☐ Auditory Awareness
Teaching and explaining through discussion; listening to points raised
by children in class.
☐ Creative Skills
Teaching by finding similarities and differences in information and
comparing; supporting children to connect dots to compare new
information with old; creatively finding solutions
Being able to look at the whole picture and find the best solution by
comparing the options; outweighing possibilities through trial and error.
☐ Problem Solving
☐ Multi-sensory
Techniques
Involving two or more senses in the teaching and learning process
(e.g. speaking out loud combined with writing things down); Awareness
of multisensory teaching techniques
☐ Sensitivity
Understanding where others are coming from; empathetic
attunement to others; particular empathy with dyslexic pupils
☐ Reasoning
Looking at the bigger picture and coming to a solution by analysing
possibilities
☐Ingenuity
Originality and creativity; well-rounded sense of learning and teaching
Other strengths
you’ve identified
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Benefits to you as a teacher
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Difficulties often associated with SpLDs and possible strategies for
managing them:
General difficulties
☐ Information Processing:
Difficulties taking information
efficiently; slowed speed of
information processing (delay
between hearing something +
understanding something +
responding to it)
☐ Short-term Memory:
Poor short-term memory for facts,
events, times, and dates. If
interrupted, information will not be
remembered.
☐ Sequencing:
Difficulty presenting a sequence of
events in a logical, structured way;
difficulties with organisation and time
management; incorrect sequencing of
numbers or letters
Strategies I can use as a teacher
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Ask questions for clarification
Write down instructions and check to be sure you have
understood. Keep a notebook with you. Have a contact
book between you and the teacher in a central place.
Find time & space to do work quietly without distraction.
Take notes during meetings
Use a digital recorder
Request written notes as follow-up to meetings
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Use a digital recorder
Organise information into themes
Repeat information out loud
Highlight notes using different colours
Close book or notes and recall information or
summarise
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Break instructions down into steps
Write very detailed lesson plans with clear timings and
stick to them.
Practice lesson introductions beforehand.
Ask for instructions to be given in writing, by email
Use visual prompts in the classroom – days of the
week; numbers; alphabet; class timetables with
clear timings
Have bullet points for introductions, key words and
topic related spellings displayed by board for
children and you
Use the file document examples on the portal for
reference
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General difficulties
Strategies I can use as a teacher
☐ Time Management:
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Difficulties estimating time taken to
complete tasks; multitasking; meeting
deadlines
☐ Visual Processing:
Reduced ability to make sense of
information taken through eyes;
difficulties affect how visual
information is interpreted or
processed
☐ Visual stress
Text can appear distorted and
words/letters appear to move or
become blurred
Create a weekly planner for the wall.
Put a year planner on the notice-board. Mark deadlines
and meetings in a bright colour
Use a diary with a large page for each day and lots of
blank pages for notes.
 Use a kitchen timer, so that you can time lessons
effectively
 Use your mobile phone if you have one. You may be able
to set an alarm, or add reminder notes for yourself
 Post-it notes can be useful, for example to place on your
desk to remind you what you need to do each day
 Negotiate a space in the classroom large enough to
keep your resources organised ready for the day.
 In negotiation with the mentor, focussed
observations and weekly reviews may be voice
recorded.
 Manage personal organisation by using equipment
Such as:
 A set of stacking trays for papers.
 A concertina filing system.
 Colour-coded ring binders for each section of your
course.
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☐ Working memory:
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Difficulty holding onto several
pieces of information while
undertaking a task (e.g.: taking
notes as listening); difficulty with
mental maths; difficulties
remembering instructions, facts,
numbers; problems with amount of
information that can be held and
processed; difficulties copying from the
board,
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Block out extraneous visual stimuli.
Use a blank sheet of paper to cover sections of the
page not being worked on at the time.
Use a reading ruler to focus attention on section being
read
Print your own paperwork on coloured paper
Follow up getting tinted lenses and wear your glasses
in class
Get a coloured overlay or A4 pocket for reading
documents
Take a photograph of the board when finished writing on
it
Use post-it notes
Use your digital recorder or the recording function on
your ‘phone
Ask teacher to write in contact book if there are
instructions whilst you are teaching.
When given instructions ‘on the go’ ensure you write
them in a notebook.
Other difficulties you’ve
identified
Strategies that work for me as a teacher
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Strategies for managing possible difficulties in the classroom:
Possible difficulty
Suggested strategies
Spelling
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Put key words onto lesson plans and refer to them
Get the pupils to help you to spell
Get a non-dyslexic colleague to check spelling
Get students to correct spelling (reward stickers)
Use mobile device or electronic spellchecker to check spelling
Keep dictionaries to hand
Have a word wall on display with commonly misspelt words
Write all difficult words in corner of the board
Use the Ace Spelling Dictionary
Have your commonly misspelt words and vocabulary for marking in
your notebook to refer to quickly
Writing on a whiteboard
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Use PowerPoint presentations to minimise writing on board
Get pupils to be scribes to write on board
Display key vocabulary by the board for quick reference.
Report writing
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Make sure you are able to write reports electronically
Make use of templates wherever possible
Seek assistance initially until you are more confident
Make use of 1:1 support at the university to develop writing skills
Develop own or use an online comments bank
Start writing reports early
Ask a colleague to proof read
Spend longer proof reading reports
Use text to speech software to help with proofreading eg to hear any
errors such as an incomplete sentence or a mistyped word
Use text to speech software such as Claroread & Texthelp (these
have inbuilt homophone checkers to detect possible mistakes with
words like their/there/they’re)
Use voice recognition software such as Dragon Naturally Speaking
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Possible difficulty
Suggested strategies
Remembering names
of pupils / staff /
parents
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When taking register, put a photo or a phonetic spelling by the
name
Have a seating plan file so that names can be learnt
Play name games
Ask pupils to create name stickers
Use a seating plan
Write distinguishing features next to the names on the register
Organisation and time
management
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Use your lap top where possible; keep everything electronically
Write to-do lists
Use a diary – paper or electronic
Use post-it notes
Read reports and paper before meetings
Have one place for everything
Write everything in one book
Use different coloured files
Ensure 25% time is in large blocks.
Lesson planning
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Use lesson plan templates available in schools
Use mind mapping software such as Inspiration, particularly
useful for visual learners. Create visual mind maps containing
key information and pictures, and showing connections.
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Identify one key idea to keep focused
Make lessons practical where applicable
Checking written work
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Get children to peer assess their work
Reading
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Prepare in advance
Break up text into chunks
Use coloured pens, fonts and paper
Take pauses when reading out loud
Highlight important sentences
Make use of a Quicktionary Reading Pen with OCR software to
help with the occasional word (also has a dictionary for meaning)
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Make use of text to speech software for reading longer
documents and to support proofreading of emails etc. e.g.
ClaroRead, TextHelp
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Observations
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Use a scanner to scan pages of a textbook to use with screen
reading software
Make use of a digital recorder to note observations verbally at the
time to ensure you don’t forget.
Other possible
difficulties
Adjustments I will make to my teaching
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Are there any other reasonable adjustments you would like to discuss with the school?
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To summarise, my personal disclosure statement is:
As a trainee teacher with a specific learning difference, I have strengths in the following areas:
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These strengths are a benefit to my teaching, in that they allow me to:
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I experience some difficulties, including:
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And I use the following strategies to manage these difficulties:
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In the classroom I find it really useful to teach by:
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Adapted from Roehampton University’s document for trainee teachers on placement,
‘Strategies for dyslexic trainee teachers on Block School Experience’
The following resources may also be useful to you:
University of Southampton – Supporting dyslexic PGCE trainees and teachers:
http://www.southampton.ac.uk/assets/imported/transforms/peripheralblock/UsefulDownloads_Download/718F25F4FB4346CE876C54422C233E67/suppo
rting_dyslexic_trainees_and_teachers.pdf
Teacher strategies:
http://www.visd.com/depart/specialprograms/dyslexia/dyslexia_handbook_teacherstr ategies.pdf
BrainHE – resource website for students in Higher Education, outlining useful learning
strategies.
http://www.brainhe.com/