Enhancing Reading Comprehension in Students with Dyslexia through Visualisation (creating mental images)

A dyslexia assessment can help identify how you learn best. People with dyslexia often struggle to comprehend text because of working memory difficulties. They are focusing so much on reading the words, they can lose sense of what they have read. Visualisation is just one method that can be used alongside other strategies to help understand what you read.

People with dyslexia are characterised as having reading difficulties. They struggle to recognize and manipulate the sounds of language. This makes it harder for them to identify the sounds, blend them together to form words, recognize words (even those frequently used words), sound them out and decode them. They spend time decoding words which means they read at a slower pace and by the time they have reached the end of the sentence, they have worked so hard to read it, they have lost track of what the sentence or paragraph is about.

A poor working memory is also an indicator of dyslexia. Working memory is the ability to hold and manipulate a limited amount of information in your mind while actively reading and processing text. This allows you to link current words and ideas to previously read information, building a coherent understanding of the text.

People with dyslexia often have a good imagination and process information more effectively through visual cues. I have been using visualisation with dyslexic students as one method of comprehending what they read. By pausing at the end of each sentence or every few sentences, they can imagine the scenario, verbally describing it or drawing it, associating the mental images with the text. This can deepen their understanding of the text, leading onto other essential aspects of reading comprehension such as asking questions, prediction and developing inference skills. Using the five senses will help build a detailed mental image; imagine the sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and textures described in the text.  I have found it to be a very effective method of developing comprehension as well as developing their engagement and enjoyment of reading.

Use the 5 senses to describe the scene and create a mental image of it to help understanding.

Begin with shorter paragraphs until students develop the idea of visualisation. Using picture books can help students develop their skill at describing what they see.

Try out visualisation skills using the following extract.

It was late one winter night,

long past my bedtime,

when Pa and I went owling.

There was no wind.

The trees stood still

as giant statues.

And the moon was so bright

the sky seemed to shine.

Somewhere behind us

a train whistle blew,

long and low,

like a sad, sad song.

From Owl Moon by Jane Yolen (author) and John Schoenherr (illustrator)

Ask questions such as:

• What time of day is it?

• What can be seen? heard? felt? smelt?

• What do you think it feels like to be there? Why do you think that?

• How did you know that?

• Where do you think it’s set?

• What do you need to ask to find out more?

At the end of the process, compare their visualisations against the text to check their understanding of the text and to discuss or clear up any misinterpretations. Ask them questions to help develop their understanding of how they learn best:

What did you draw and why?

Did visualisation helped you understand the story or text better? How did it help?