In 1967 I was diagnosed with dyslexia, today there are not hurdels or boundries which are in my path of learning.
The following are some truths which have taken place in my life and thought I would share them with you.
Three programs which have enabled me are www.readplease.com, www.rfbd.org and www.bookshare.org . Bookshare for the student and adult population is an excellent resource, you must qualify with a print disability in order to become a member. Newspapers from all over the country are available and Bookshare provide two text to speech software programs, Victor Soft reader and a Beta for Bookshare made by Read:Outloud.
Being able to read the newspaper is a character builder, I know what is going on in the world because I read it in a newspaper, I had never been able to say this before, I can read my trade journals now, where in the past they ended up in the garbage because I could not face the daunting task of reading them. Now it is a simple clip and paste or have Read:Outloud read it to me via the web. When I read I have to follow along for 90%+ comprehension, but on the other hand I'm working a lot on spreadsheets with numbers and listening does not detour from my number crunching.
Although I can't read and type at the same time if I was able to, I would can it and sell this ability. I'm pretty sure my processing numbers and hearing the paper read to me do not use the same part of the brain.
Readplease enables me to read my letters and emails before they go out and is generally the one I use the most, Readplease should be made available to all populations in schools and libraries. If made available to all then it would not cause the much dreaded stigmatism. Readplease is a Microsoft only program, but in today's environment there are parallel operating systems software, so you can have MAC or Windows running at the same time.
As for public access, again it is us (advocates) pushing with concerted effort in the same direction.
Once I was lost now I am found, once was blind to the written word, now I read.
Tools to build your confidence.
Posted by Davis at 10:44 AM 0 comments
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Talking Books article
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My name is Davis Graham. I have dyslexia which was diagnosed in 1967 at the University of Miami. I earned my BA degree in Psychology from the University of South Florida, class of 1985.
The road to my degree was not easy. I learned a lot about the battles with pride, how achievements come from hard work, and know today to accept dyslexia as a gift and not as a disability.
Today I am the Executive Director / CFO of Manatee Diagnostic Center, Ltd. and there is a program online which has changed my life. The program is called Readplease which I found on the Internet after receiving a contract which was 30 pages and needed to be read within 24 hours. The contract inspired me to ask the Lord for some guidance and I went to Google.com and typed in Text reading software, number two on the list was readplease.com, and in quotes was "free download", I had the contract read in 1 hour and have not hesitated to read since.
About one and half years later I bought Readplease 2003 Plus and continue to use Readplease to read the Bible, daily devotions, contracts, reading for pleasure, reading email, trade articles, Smithsonian magazine, and then proof read my letters and e-mail. It literally has changed my life.
After contacting Pat Schubert via e-mail at Talking Books which I used quite often, she gave me a library of electronic books, and for the first time I'm reading Melville's Moby Dick, next will be Albert Einstein's Theory of Relativity, then on to Robinson Crusoe. When reading with Readplease, I read between 300 words per minute to close to 500 words per minute. The ability to listen at such a high rate came from my experience in college when I would receive my text books on tape while following along in the text book. I received the text books through the Learning Disability Programs I was enrolled in during college. The books would come from Reading for the Blind and Dyslexic and sometime the school would have them read from students who were studying the same course I was taking. My ability to comprehend has come from the years of listening to books on tape with the variable speed play back records which RFBD and Talking Books so generously provide.
It is my hope somebody is out there who can use my story to inspire them to reconsider reading as an adventure. It is quite the experience to hear the words of Melville roll into an image which paints a picture of life on the sea. My life of reading has been renewed and I hope your view of reading is changed, for it is a gift from our Creator.
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