Being a teacher with learning difficulties is one thing, but being an English teacher with dyslexia, dyspraxia and dyscalculia, well, that is quite another.

It’s difficult for me not to find it funny that I ended up in this career, especially when I reflect on my experiences within the classroom from both the teachers’ and students’ perspective. Having been labelled with severe learning difficulties from a young age, I feel that I have insight into my students’ everyday experiences, frustrations and feelings towards education and educators.

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Need to know: How to help pupils with dyslexia

The day I became a teacher, I promised myself that I would not continue to regurgitate the same ridiculous clichés that were said to me, while I spent many afternoons in the exclusion room of my high school, being taught phonics.

What teachers shouldn’t say to dyslexic students

So, here they are, the three things I was told as a dyslexic student that I refuse to say to my learners.

‘Did you know Einstein had dyslexia?’

I cannot even begin to tell you how many teachers, support workers, classroom assistants, admin and mentoring staff said these words to me. Now, I know what you’re thinking: surely, it’s a good thing to explain to students with learning difficulties that they, too, have the opportunity to progress and become excellent within whatever employment path they decide to take. Yet there is something extremely annoying about being continually told this.

Maybe it was the robotic way it was said, as if the teacher were reading from some pre-prepared statement on “how to talk to your dyslexic student”. After all, dyslexia affects one in five people. Literally, billions of people worldwide, most of whom have successful careers, vibrant personalities, devoted friends and family and wonderful lives. I could not understand why people kept telling me about this one person, as if he is the only other person in the world with learning difficulties worth mentioning.

As a teenager, I can remember rolling my eyes every time someone said this sentence to me. As a teacher, I still find the annoyance bubble up from deep within me when I hear other practitioners spouting this ludicrous and meaningless sentiment that perpetuates the otherness of having learning difficulties. So instead, when a student tells me they have dyslexia, I say, “Cool. Let’s figure out how your brain like its information to be delivered and go from there.”

‘Academia is not for you: maybe try a vocational course’

Of all the comments and misguided advice I received as a teenager growing up with severe learning difficulties, I think this one took the biscuit. Although I may not have been breaking any exam records, I was always keen to learn: I loved my classes and actively sought out every audiobook I could get my hands on (ask my poor sister, with whom I shared a bedroom growing up).

My love of learning was not the problem: it was how the information was presented that resulted in barriers to my educational journey. I must be clear that vocational courses are a fantastic route into employment, but, just like traditional education, they’re not for everyone. Yet, as a student, I was continually pushed towards a vocational path, something that would not require academic skills like literacy and numeracy.

The thing I love most about being a teacher is the individual personalities of my students. They are diverse, brilliant, often rage-inducing and exactly themselves. Nothing about being dyslexic or having learning difficulties will stop anyone from progressing into any role they choose to take. Not to mention that there is more than one route into higher education. The only thing standing in their way is the social and often educational narrative that they are less able because they do not access information in the same way as many of their peers.

Since becoming a teacher, I’ve realised that when people say, “Academia is not for you,” what they mean is, “You will not perform well on our league tables.” As teachers, we are defined, elevated, celebrated and vilified based on our success rates. However, the problem with this mindset is that a student is worth more than a score on a test. In reality, there are millions of different coping strategies and ever-evolving technologies closing the gap; for example, read/write software, Grammarly (which is free), and even the latest version of Word has speech-to-text software. That is why I try to be clear with my students about the skills they need for their exam and the skills I am teaching them in order to better manage their learning in the real world.

‘You can’t sit with your friends because you are at a lower level’

From the offset, it was made clear to me that my disabilities both separated me from, and made me lesser than, my peers. And, for me, assigned seating became a physical representation of this divide. After all, you can call the table/groups what you like: it doesn’t matter because every student in that class knows what that means. Separate, assigned seating, in my opinion, perpetuates discrimination and, more importantly, it reinforces the negative connotations of those with learning difficulties as stupid, separate and other. This is something that children are quick to pick up on.

As a teacher, I know that assigned seating has its place, particularly in further education, where romance, break-ups, and fallings out are the norm (that’s teenagers for you). However, by employing differentiated questions and tasks that increased in difficulty but were all based on the same topic/group work, assigned seating became utterly unnecessary. It also allowed for a free flow of collaboration across levels that help to scaffold students into the next technological skill.

I wish I could say that the things I experienced as a student are now problems of the past, that we understand learning difficulties better now, and that is no longer a barrier to education. Yet, I am afraid I cannot. 

The truth is we need more teachers with learning difficulties sharing their stories, experiences and professional practice. Only by doing this can we dispel the myths, stop the meaningless clichés and instead prepare our students for their futures, not just a test.

Jennifer Wilkinson is a functional skills English lecturer at a college in England