More Dyslexia?

More dodgy studies?

The spokeswoman for one of the dyslexia charities/pressure groups said on BBC news at One today.

"55% of children who fail their SATs are at risk of Dyslexia"

How can you be "at risk" from it? Is it something you can catch? Or can you get a "touch of dyslexia" in the way some people get a "touch of asthma"?

Or, is this just another case of a pressure group plugging their cause, keeping themselves in the limelight and trying to get extra funding? The media, as always, fails to fact check and takes them at their word. Cue breathless copy in various newspapers and a one-sided interview on the BBC.

The research was commissioned by Xtraordinary People, a dyslexia pressure-group.(Note the spelling, isn't the lack of an "E" amusing? Surely that spelling is just going to confuse their target audience?)So,we can obviously take it at face value, right? Well, it's hardly research, is it? It does not seem to have been published anywhere and no other data are provided. It's like the surveys that clog the newspapers on slow news days. Always along the lines of "Disease X"Charity warn that "Disease X" is underdiagnosed, underfunded, undertreated, etc.) They hardly ever point out that all the jobs created in their organisation rely on keeping Disease X in the limelight.

In conclusion- Children who cannot read very well do not do well at exams. Well, there's a shocker. We've all learned something today. Plus, never to believe surveys you read in newspapers.