The Dore Centre (then known as the DDAT Centre) was featured on The Tonight Programme with Trevor McDonald in the UK in 2002.
If you’ve not yet got your free DVD, get it from www.dore.co.uk and on there is a copy of The Tonight Programme.
The research was referred to as a ‘revolutionary breakthrough’ for dyslexia. And that’s all the researchers were trying to do at first. But as I said earlier they found that development of the cerebellar function helped with a lot more problems too. Almost everything we do involves balance or co-ordination.
The programme features Wynford Dore and his daughter Susie, who was a guinea-pig for the treatment. Initially participants are assessed to see what they can and can’t do. They are asked to spell and remember lists, among other things.
They are strapped onto a balance machine, that was developed by NASA, to test their balance disorder. (I know I’ll fall when I get on there!)
We are shown some of the balance and co-ordination exercises that need to be repeated for ten minutes, twice a day. They include throwing and catching beanbags and walking in a circle around a chair, and we are told about how eye tracking is important, as people with dyslexia don’t read easily from left to right; their eyes wander all over the place.
The cameras followed three sufferers of dyslexia over a six month period, and watched them benefit from the programme. I was interested to learn that the (then) ‘Last Government Report’ found that 1 in 5 school children, and 70% of all offenders have a learning difficulty. Wow - That’s an awful lot!
Professor David Reynolds (then of Exeter University) is former Head of the Government’s Numeracy Taskforce.
He studied the effects of 50 dyslexic children and over six months their reading performances improved three times as much as 50 average children. Their writing and spelling also improved.
The programme concluded with the founder, Wynford Dore expressing his next ambition;
“We should not consider denying this type of help from every child and every adult that would benefit from it.”
And two of the children whose spelling, reading and writing improved imensely, express their astonishment at finding the repetition of what seemed to be ‘fun’ exercises, was responsible for their improvement in academic areas.
For years, children have been pumped full of drugs that at the least have stripped them of any personality. This still goes on today, and it is due to total ignorance.
I often wonder what my life would have been like if my family knew I had ADHD and dyspraxia. I guess I have to remain thankful that things happened as they did, as I too could have been one of those poor zombified creatures.
At the presentation last week in Cardiff I met several people who had come to know about the Dore Centre after watching The Tonight Programme. I may be mistaken, but there is a good chance I saw it too. More and more things are falling into place. If I did see it at the time, I would have simply thought that it was a great idea for people with dyslexia – not me!
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