Dyslexia — The Revolution. Watch The Recording

Many conscientious dyslexic learners suffer from test anxiety. Sometimes the emotional force is so strong that it produces physical symptoms such as stomach ache, headaches or diarrhoea. A major test can evoke anxiety days before it occurs.

Anxiety can have a variety of origins. For bright but struggling dyslexic learners, the most frequent cause is a mismatch between how an individual naturally learns, and how they have been taught to learn. This mismatch causes a vicious circle: studying hard for a test, trying hard to remember the material, but forgetting nearly all of it in the test environment. As a tragic result, these bright but struggling learners stop trusting their own minds.

Yet the vicious circle can be broken. When a person acquires study techniques that match how they naturally think and learn, being tested become easier, and success becomes predictable. The resulting self-trust builds emotional resilience.

This recorded presentation showcases a simple range of techniques, based around the pioneering "Gift of Dyslexia" Davis methods, that have proven effective at combating test anxiety and concludes with a Q&A session in real time.

The Session Presenter

Richard Whitehead is a Davis Dyslexia Programme Specialist and Director of Davis Learning Foundation. In addition to twenty years working professionally with the Davis methods, Richard worked for six years as a Special Educational Needs Coordinator in the secondary sector and for over a decade as a classroom teacher. In his book, "Why Tyrannosaurus But Not If? — The Dyslexic Blueprint for the Future of Education", he brings together his many strands of experience in special educational needs support to provide key insights and strategies, based on the Davis methods, for teachers and proactive parents of bright but struggling learners.