i have a cousin that is 14 years old and totally in puberty and doesn't care about anything but gaming, like most of us did at that age. In addition to that he struggling at school because he is dyslexic. As I have a good relationship with him and he sees me as a kind of role model, I want to help him do something with his life. As he's into gaming i thought it can't hurt to get him started with programming. But there's the problem with his dyslexia. Something like scratch could be a good start, as it's mostly graphic. If you have any tips how to get him started, if possible in a playful way, let me know, i appreciate it.
Also general dyslexia + programming discussion, as i assume a few of you deal with that combination.
From a productivity/assistance standpoint, I think the tooling in a lot of IDEs (e.g. Visual Studio's Intellisense) can help a TON with keying-in long type names and managing typos in general. For instance, for the type "LongTypeNameAbstractSingletonFaggotJavaClass", you can just type 'LTNASFJC' ctrl+.+enter and it will know what you intended. All of this shit can be customized to the user's specific needs as well. There are people who are 100% blind who can use visual studio professionally (I know there is one who works at Microsoft - youtube.com/watch?v=iWXebEeGwn0).
Nathaniel Barnes
Thanks, very interesting video. I'm not that much into programming myself, just some C# for unity, so I'm not too familiar with it, but I'll look into it.
Josiah Flores
chip in for his therapy
Lincoln Mitchell
that's not necessary, as his parents or health insurance/the state covers it. no doubt it helps him tremendously, and is indispensable, but I'm trying to get some interest or passion started that comes from within, so that he actually sticks to it and stays motivated. Also therapy is not something that a 14 year old loves.
Sebastian Young
Our devs do spelling mistakes. In reality, you will (should) have someone doing code review on the shit you submit to catch that.
He should be able to write his own stuff with consistent variable names. Spelling doesn't matter. As long as he can do that he'll be fine.
An issue may be communicating in written form, something me and my team do a lot. Skype, slack, trello etc. are invaluable tools that involve a decent amount of writing.
This kind of shit is a genuine disability that can definitely hold you back. That said, I have ADD and I'm (finally) working with this, so...
Adam Cox
Dyslexia is just bad teaching. Tell him to man the fuck up and learn to read.
Caleb Turner
>He should be able to write his own stuff with consistent variable names. Spelling doesn't matter. As long as he can do that he'll be fine. That's a good point
>An issue may be communicating in written form, something me and my team do a lot. Well if he is just dabbling around with some things of his own for now, he doesn't need to communicate with a team or anything. also, we usually talk instead of texting each other
Thomas Walker
I strongly feel this way too. I think dyslexia is best compared to drilling a student on playing a musical instrument the incorrect way for years. It would take a lot of work to un-fuck them, but it should always be possible with enough effort.
Parker Harris
One other factor to consider, is if you are developing in a strongly-typed language like C#, and you misspell a variable, keyword, etc, you will be immediately notified with the red squiggle line. In other languages like javascript, you wont know something is wrong until you actually run the thing.
Alexander Sanders
The only problem should be variables spelt wrong. The compiler/interpreter will tell him he fucked up
Chase Gutierrez
bait
retard, it's a cognitive disability with basis in physiology
but of course you of all people would know better than the entire psychoneurological community
Gabriel Bennett
that's good advice, thank you agree
Does anyone have some suggestions where to get him started? I think CS50 would be nice but it's too high of a level for him right now (also english is not his first language). Does anyone here have experience with swift playgrounds? it just comes to mind when i think of coding courses for kids, but i don't know if its aimed at a younger age group or whatever
thanks >Anna Bosman, a professor at Radboud University in Nijmegen Well, So it's Anna Bosmans word against the general consensus, trust who you will, but let's keep the discussion on the topic of dyslexia + programming, not on the reasons for dyslexia please
Isaiah Jenkins
I have dyslexia. First of all please ignore and as they need to learn that some people actually struggle with certain things and it is no one's fault and most people don't use it as an excuse. As someone who has taught programing to kids 14 is around the cutoff for starting with scratch(assuming he is at least on track with math in school). Teaching him something else because of dyslexia isn't really the best way to go. Instead makes sure he uses something that would help with spelling(I use emacs with a plug-in). This may just be for mean but I don't think so, but my dyslexia effects me very little in programing. It is actually so much better then say paper writing. I usually use my programing to procrastinate my other work. I can answer any more questions if you have them.
Sebastian Hughes
>Take my faith in scientific community at face value please >Disregards scientific journals that hurt feelings
Josiah Wright
I'm sorry to challenge your perception of reality but you really haven't posted even one
do you really believe you have?
Lincoln Roberts
Is dyslexia mostly a problem when reading, or does it apply to writing as well? Obviously a good color scheme helps reading code, but this is something that should be explicitly taught (i.e red always mean variable, yellow means function etc)
it was Jow Forums tier posting and it was on Jow Forums
Cameron Allen
I think people want to believe these lies so they can cope with being lazy fucks. It's so much easier to believe you or someone you know has an unfixable problem, than to know that they have a fixable problem which would imply that now everyone has to do the hard thing of fixing it. No one has time to fix problems anymore. The age old example: >le 350lb man >"Why don't you try diet and exercise" >"nah, its genetics I cant lose the weight" >Fin
Andrew Foster
I see this shit all the time. When I mention having ADHD they all feel the urge to educate me
Andrew Richardson
you didn't answer the question. is this difficult for you?
you're only coming off as mentally challenged. I'm holding your hand here, you can do this if this is your genuine opinion.
Chase Morgan
In general it very much effects both reading and writing. but you are correct the colors really help if you know what they mean. Code is also more structured the normal English writing which makes it much easier to read.
Jason Rivera
This is real interesting user. Obviously you possess some literary ability. What's the most patrician novel you have read? Please describe in some detail what dyslexia is like? You have trouble distinguishing between types of letters? What happens when you try and skim read? Very cool how for most people when you skim a page the brain takes in the first and last letter of a word and then kind of guesses the word and you can keep skimming as long as your brain is sort of guessing a word that makes sense.
Grayson Perry
When I learned about it we were taught that it was a mostly visual thing, and I assumed the difficulty they have with spelling was mostly a lack of feedback thing, but that might not be the case. Im not sure if Id start with a visual system or not, but I know I would focus a lot on visualizing how a program works.
Do you think you can be trained to color coded letters? Like let's say every typed letter on the screen had its own color, A is red, B is green, and so on. Would that help because you can remember "YOU" is "red-white-magenta" instead of all those complicated lines and strokes of the letters?
Jacob Rodriguez
soooooooooooooooooo... there are dyslexic fonts Are there dyslexic programming fonts as well? Is OpenDyslexic really crap (yet)?
Eli Roberts
Thanks, very useful info. Did you type that post out like it is or do you use tools to correct anything you type? So you suggest getting started with scratch and then moving on to something like C# (which would be useful in Unity, something he might be interested in)? what about visual structure like is saying, do you use similar concepts? on paper or on the computer?
this is really useful, i do the same, but on paper. Do you do it only on screen or on paper too? why? it's much easier to write down the program when you have it in front of you already.
that's a very interesting question, i would love to hear some dyslexics opinion on this
Camden Brown
ligatures might make code easier to read too
I use paper, whiteboard and my ReMarkable tablet (last pic). pic rel is an overview from my phd project
Lol dyslexia is a fucking meme. The teachers and shitty parents ruined you guys. Find yourselves someone who understands this and get help fixing it. >Dyslexia == "I am too lazy to force billy to drill his spelling rules, so i guess the school system and society will deal with it now" Everything mental can be fixed. If you dont believe this you are never going to be saved, and those around you are worse off for it.
Brayden Hughes
the dataflow is color coded, red is from 'reservoir' to 'RC computer', green is other way around.
Just because the system obviously failed you does not mean you need to disrupt some guy trying to help out his cousin.
Logan Hall
>pls dont shit up this meaningful thread >unironically posted in context of Jow Forums
Adrian Baker
>Everything mental can be fixed. While not true, your mental disability can be fixed. pic related
egads, youre right. Its american comedy you see, I say one thing then do the other, cue the laugh track
Hunter Walker
Dislexyc don't have problems with numbers so thats a good start.
He can memorize the keywords in a programming language and recognise them without actually "reading" them (depends on what kind of dislexia he has).
The problem would be things like variables names but i think it's possible.
Aiden Murphy
you're never gonna get anywhere in life if you don't change the way you think, i pity you.
thanks
Xavier Gray
My way of thinking has allowed me to see that you should always try because all things are possible, even if they are not guaranteed. No one ever said you can fix 100% of everyone's dyslexia, just like you couldn't teach a 2nd language to every person on earth. Just because you cant save 100% of everyone, doesnt mean you shouldnt at least try for the other 99%. By believing that this condition is something beyond your control, you take away even the notion of making an attempt to fix the problem. You admit defeat and walk away. You are the monster here for not helping.
Levi Morris
i'm impressed, didn't expect that to come from someone who wrote a retarded shitpost. You are right, you should never give up trying to improve on anything, but saying dyslexia is something people made up to stop improving their reading and orthographic skills is just utter bullshit. Dyslexia is a condition, rooted somehwere in the brain, which we don't fully understand, and it can be fought but it can also severly inhibit the developent of a child. And that inhibition is hard to understand and easy to deny from an outside perspective, like kafka says:
And if I were to cast myself down before you and weep and tell you, what more would you know about me than you know about Hell when someone tells you it is hot and dreadful?
>what more would you know about anyone than you know about Hell when someone tells you it is hot and dreadful?
John Sullivan
First off both of those people are me. In my case deyslexia mostly doesn't effect reading individual letters(that is mostly seen when people are younger and goes away for the most part as people get older). my problem is one of phonics. I am very lucky to have a good memory so every word I know I have memorised. when writing I have most a word memorized and spell check fixes it up all the way. When reading I use something called whole word reading. It is worth noting that I am currently in college studying to be an engineering teacher so I do know what I am talking about (I am one of these people). There are many prominent langue arts teachers/experts that say where reading is better and believe it should be taught almost exclusively. I learned this myself because I read books a lot as a kid with my parents and as they read I followed along and memorized each of the words. It wasn't until first grade did everyone realize I could not read for shit and I was just memorizing words and in some cases whole books. I had the entire lorax memorized for a very long time and would just pretend to read it. I can now sort of do phonics but it is still just me having all of the sounds and there letters memorized. Back on topic I recommend, if your cousin hasn't all ready, trying to learn whole word reading. It is one of the best things a dyslexic can do and it is a huge putty most elementary teachers don't recognize and teach this to students who need it. Secondly I recommend teaching your cousin flow charts and logic that way then specific it into straight up code. Most dyslexics think big picture to details so teaching the logic and way of thinking is the most important, the syntax is easy then. Finally, I am being a phone poster right now as I am not able to get on my desktop so I am just typing this ass in and it is fixing my spelling as I go. On desktop I often use libre office to type things out for better spell check and read allowed then copy paste.
Parker Martin
>effect affect*
Kevin Barnes
dyslexia is codeword for stupid, don't bother
Benjamin King
flat earth shit going on in this thread, lmao, no wonder any of you amounted to anything and project
Juan Wright
Can you disclose the plugin you use with emacs to cope with your dyslexia, user?
Jaxson Jones
I don't ever use text mode but in org mode I use hunspell with flyspell on. For programming what I use depends on what I am doing. When I use Java (for classes, not personal use. I hate Java) I just use netbeans because of the drag and drop GUI builder. For c and c++ I use irony and flyspell again. For lisp work I don't use anything special, same for the rare times I use Python and Ruby. For me while programming it is more about showing me I fucked up rather then the correction because I can usually see that right away, mainly because the words are pretty short. Also a color scheme with big color differences helps me but that is a bit different. that depends on whether or not you are correcting me because I was wrong or because I am dyslexic.
Gavin Gonzalez
Do him a big favor and set his system font to a dyslexic-designed one.
Benjamin Carter
Dyslectic student here. I am currently finishing my master degree in electrical engineering and doing a master thesis in Norway as an exchange student.
I can speak and write English, Dutch, French and Russian. I can program in C, C++, Java, Python, VHDL, php, JavaScript, HTML, CSS. Being dyslectic sucks but it is not the end of the world. As a dyslectic it is completely possible to live a "normal life". You can read, write and program just fine, it's just a bit harder. A doctor said that dyslectic people tend to be more creative, which is a good skill to have if you are an engineer.
Pic related is given to me by my University to show to the professors so that I can get some accommodation for it. If you go to a decent university they give you extra time to complete the exams. Somewhere around 20% to 30% extra time.
Some other less known symptoms of dyslexia are: >trouble with analogue clock reading >bad short term memory >bad at simple math like 2*5 -7*6 =... I always take my calculator for that. >reading aloud is much more difficult then reading in silence.
>I learned this myself because I read books a lot as a kid with my parents and as they read I followed along and memorized each of the words. Yes, it is something dyslectic people often do. To test for dyslexia they make you read words aloud made up of random characters that sound English but have no meaning at all. What then ends up happening is that you read it letter for letter and it takes at leas a second to read and pronounce the whole word and even then pronouncing it is difficult.
