| Reading is a neurological process and reading | | | | phenomenon is known as Word Blindness. It is |
| difficulties are always caused by an underlying | | | | usually a result of the child using a purely visual |
| problem with that process. For an overview of | | | | reading process, which does not engage the |
| the different possible causes of reading difficulty, | | | | auditory cortex. The conventional reader will pass |
| read my article "The 7 Causes Of Reading | | | | the visual information on the letters in a word to |
| Difficulty and Dyslexia". On the left hand side of | | | | the auditory cortex, where it is mapped to the |
| the brain, just in from the end of your left | | | | possible sounds in words. Those are then blended |
| eyebrow, is Broca's area of the linguistic cortex. | | | | to form the word and analyzed by Wernicke's |
| Broca's area is used to generate speech and | | | | area for meaning. |
| writing. It is not involved in comprehension. That is | | | | By contrast, the visual reader passes the visual |
| handled by Wernicke's area, which is slightly to the | | | | information on the word directly to the pre-frontal |
| back of the brain, in from your left temple. So, if | | | | cortex, where it is analysed just like an equivalent |
| a child is processing text using Broca's area and | | | | picture. That then allows the pre-frontal cortex to |
| not Wernicke's it is possible for the child to be | | | | pass the information to Broca's area for |
| able to read out text without having any | | | | production as speech. The key symptom of this |
| understanding of the meaning of that text. | | | | is some fluency in reading combined with an |
| Indeed, if you were to damage your Wernicke's | | | | inability to understand the meaning of even single |
| area (through a stroke for instance) you would | | | | words when reading them, even though they are |
| still be able to write, but you would be unable to | | | | very familiar. |
| read what you had just written down. This | | | | |