Dislexia and effecient learning

B

Bliman

Junior Member
Joined
Jul 6, 2020
Messages
52
Hi all,
I have a nephew that has just begun to go for a bachelor's degree in digital arts and entertainment (https://www.howest.be/en/programmes/bachelor/digital-arts-and-entertainment) and he likes to be a programmer.
Now he is someone who is Dyslexic and his writing is horrible (so that he doesn't know what he wrote afterward sometimes). Now he is struggling with math.
Now when I teach myself math I do many exercises too and use pen and paper. He has basically never done that. He does more things in his head. But that is not workable anymore. When he was little he didn't even like the feeling of paper and held his pen awkwardly.
Now he is someone that thinks out of the box too, much more than others.
But math seems to be his downfall it seems. The way he learns is by looking at the answers to the problem and then figuring out how it applies to the problem (basically backward it seems).
Now I really don't know how to help him (strangely he writes numbers and equations with the program paint to come further but that is just not structured enough).
He now is in the phase of Vectors and trigonometry.
Can someone give me a suggestion on how I can help him or has experienced similar things?
Thank you very much
 
Bliman said:
Hi all,
I have a nephew that has just begun to go for a bachelor's degree in digital arts and entertainment (https://www.howest.be/en/programmes/bachelor/digital-arts-and-entertainment) and he likes to be a programmer.
Now he is someone who is Dyslexic and his writing is horrible (so that he doesn't know what he wrote afterward sometimes). Now he is struggling with math.
Now when I teach myself math I do many exercises too and use pen and paper. He has basically never done that. He does more things in his head. But that is not workable anymore. When he was little he didn't even like the feeling of paper and held his pen awkwardly.
Now he is someone that thinks out of the box too, much more than others.
But math seems to be his downfall it seems. The way he learns is by looking at the answers to the problem and then figuring out how it applies to the problem (basically backward it seems).
Now I really don't know how to help him (strangely he writes numbers and equations with the program paint to come further but that is just not structured enough).
He now is in the phase of Vectors and trigonometry.
Can someone give me a suggestion on how I can help him or has experienced similar things?
Thank you very much
Click to expand...
I can't offer much (meaningful) help except, perhaps, to suggest that he might be able to switch to MS Word™ (instead of MS Paint™) for some of his work.

If you go to Insert and then hit the Equation button (Red-arrowed in the pic) then, as soon as you start to type something, the top ribbon should change to; Design and you then have access to lots of mathematical symbols that would take an age to recreate in MS Paint™.

(The stuff in my pic is just rubbish, for illustration purposes only)

Dyslexia.png​
 
The Highlander said:
I can't offer much (meaningful) help except, perhaps, to suggest that he might be able to switch to MS Word™ (instead of MS Paint™) for some of his work.

If you go to Insert and then hit the Equation button (Red-arrowed in the pic) then, as soon as you start to type something, the top ribbon should change to; Design and you then have access to lots of mathematical symbols that would take an age to recreate in MS Paint™.

(The stuff in my pic is just rubbish, for illustration purposes only)

Click to expand...
Thanks for that tip already.
I also know they can use the program GeoGebra.
But he basically is doing no steps on paper and all in his head and writes very crudely with MS Paint and then erases it again (which imo is not structured enough). I think he is also more of a visual learner. And I have tried looking for that on the internet but all I find is very basic stuff.
 
Bliman said:
Thanks for that tip already.
I also know they can use the program GeoGebra.
But he basically is doing no steps on paper and all in his head and writes very crudely with MS Paint and then erases it again (which imo is not structured enough). I think he is also more of a visual learner. And I have tried looking for that on the internet but all I find is very basic stuff.
Click to expand...
Sounds like a Herculean task you've undertaken. I can only applaud your commitment but I have no expertise in this area so I can't help you any further but maybe someone else can. Give it a day or so to see if anyone else 'contributes'.
 
blamocur said:
Using MS Word for typesetting math? This sounds like a rather cruel advice :)

I find LaTeX and its derivatives (like the formatting used by this forum) much easier and more elegant.
Click to expand...
Wow! “cruel”? That seems rather harsh! o_O

Of course LaTeX is much more elegant (and versatile) but “easier”? I’m sorry but I don’t think so. :unsure:

In particular, given the scenario presented, ie: someone dyslexic who had been using MS Paint™ to “write” mathematical sentences (instead of on paper) but now has a need to write more complex expressions (that would be more difficult to produce in MS Paint™), eg:-

\(\displaystyle \text { In Trig: } \cos \left(30^{\circ}\right)=\sin \left(60^{\circ}\right)=\frac{\sqrt{3}}{2} \text { or in Vectors: } \overrightarrow{A B}+\overrightarrow{B C}=\overrightarrow{A C}\)​

Then, IMHO, it would be cruel to ask them to learn how to use LaTeX to create such expressions when MS Word™ displays all the necessary components in its Equation Tools and you only need click on the one(s) you want!

I ‘composed’ this response in MS Word™ and then Copy/Pasted it into the forum but, of course, the expression above simply wouldn’t ‘transfer’ correctly because, as you rightly say, it needs to be inserted as LaTeX in the forum so I used Mathpix to produce the appropriate LaTeX script for it to display correctly.

But that’s not the aim of the OP’s original question (as far as I understood it); the OP simply wanted a way for the individual concerned to be able to “write” more complex expressions pertaining to the subject matter being studied in a quick & simple way.

Here is the LaTeX script used for the above expression:-

\text { In Trig: } \cos \left(30^{\circ}\right)=\sin \left(60^{\circ}\right)=\frac{\sqrt{3}}{2} \text { or in vector addition: } \overrightarrow{A B}+\overrightarrow{B C}=\overrightarrow{A C}

It would have taken (me, at least) quite a bit of time (and trial & error) to get that right if I hadn’t used Mathpix! (And Note that it (Mathpix) failed to reproduce exactly what I put in my original; it ignored my bold emphasis and kept the vector letters italicised; see pic below!)

I wasn’t trying to suggest that MS Word™ is in some way better than LaTeX (which, I agree, is considerably more ‘powerful’), just that it might be the simplest solution to (a part of) the problem(s) posed by the OP. ?‍♂️

Screenshot of my MS Word™ composition:-

Capture.JPG​
 
blamocur said:
Using MS Word for typesetting math? This sounds like a rather cruel advice :)

I find LaTeX and its derivatives (like the formatting used by this forum) much easier and more elegant.
Click to expand...
Did you perhaps just look at my post (#2), in isolation, without first reading the OP?
I can see then how you might think I was suggesting MS Word™ as a "better" option for "typesetting math". ;)
 
As an alternative I suggest MathType It is used by many working mathematicians.
It interfaces nicely with WolframAlpha and MSWord.
 
Thanks for the suggestions. Yeah he basically never did any steps not on a computer or on paper. And I am trying to think how I could help him.
I maybe thought if he could do the exercises but not go for writing crude things at the side of the problem with MS paint to something more structured but as close to pen and paper but clear.
It is pretty hard to give him some help also because he basically never learned to study right and he always could get away with it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top