The Dyslexia Day Centre are a Guernsey based Charity organisation which was set up in 1987 to offer specialist tuition, assessments, support and advice to islanders who are affected by dyslexia.

We work with schoolchildren from the age of 7 who are referred to us through the States Education Department from the island’s primary schools. Whilst we do continue to offer support throughout secondary education, our main focus is on the primary years.

The Centre is given a grant by the Education Department but, as this does not cover the running expenses, we also rely heavily on volunteers and fundraising in order to meet the needs of the island community. We are proud to have raised funds over the years to train 14 full-time teachers, 7 of whom now specialise in teaching dyslexic children and who work both in schools and in our new home in the old St Andrew’s School.
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We also continually raise funds to ensure that we have the latest equipment that is required both for assessments and for teaching.

Whilst monitoring the children’s improvement in reading, writing and spelling, we are also delighted to see their self-confidence and happiness grow. Some of the children we teach come to us feeling very negative about themselves and this can manifest itself through difficult behaviour in class or at home, and indeed, in a few cases, with us too.  It makes our job all the more worthwhile to see these children blossom as their reading improves and they become more confident.

How we can help

It is important to seek help if you believe your child is dyslexic. With the right help and support, strategies to overcome difficulties associated with dyslexia can be learnt and dyslexia need no longer be seen as a barrier to achievement.

Assessments

We offer a diagnostic dyslexia assessment service for children and adults. Assessing a child to see if they are dyslexic involves a series of so-called psychometric tests to measure spatial, verbal, memory, reading and spelling abilities in a standardised way to compare with the normal range of these abilities in children of that age. Someone with dyslexia shows a characteristic pattern of weaknesses and strengths in these abilities that can easily be recognised with experience.