A two-hour experience that will change the way your community sees struggling learners

I almost said no.

When a friend in my monthly women’s group suggested I share what I know about dyslexia and learning differences at our next gathering, I hesitated. We usually do art projects, cooking nights, hikes. How was I going to make a topic like dyslexia fun for a Friday evening with twelve women who were expecting snacks and laughter?

What happened instead surprised even me. By the end of the night, women were rethinking things they had believed for decades. I had no idea how powerful the evening would be.

If you’re a homeschool parent, a classroom teacher, a tutor, or just someone who loves a child with dyslexia, this post is for you. You don’t need to be an expert to host this experience. You just need two hours, a few printed pages, and a willingness to let people feel something before you explain it.

Here’s exactly how to do it.

Experience First, Explain Second

When planning for the evening, I knew that I wanted to build empathy around dyslexia and that leading with information, facts, and statistics would likely bounce off of my friends. I knew from my own Orton-Gillingham dyslexia training, how impacting it would be for my friends to experience dyslexia before learning the facts.

What You’ll Need

• Printed copies of the Phoneme Decoding Challenge
• A blank sheet of paper or two for each person
• The “Who Am I?” guessing game cards (Print and cut apart before meeting)
• Download and print the Difference ≠ Deficit cards
• Download and print the “Rank These” intelligence cards (Print and cut apart before meeting)
• Download and Print Quote Cards to strew around the table. (I set the paper size on my printer to 4×6 to get smaller cards).
• Index cards and pens for reflection activities
• Snacks (more on that below)

Total prep time: about 45 minutes.

Find an option to download the entire simulation below

Part 1: Dyslexia Experience Activities

Before you explain anything about dyslexia, let your group live in it for a few minutes. These four activities build on each other and take about 30–40 minutes total.

Activity 1: The Phoneme Decoding Challenge

This dyslexia experience activity is one I did during my dyslexia tutor training. I’ll never forget the impact it had on me – a natural born reader. It’s surprising, a little humbling, and immediately immerses everyone into the world of struggle that people with dyslexia experience everyday.

Hand every participant a copy of the Phoneme Decoding Challenge sheet with the following phoneme translation key and give everyone a minute to study it:

Then ask everyone to read this passage aloud (or silently, then compare notes):

We pegin our qrib eq a faziliar blace, a poqy like yours enq zine. Iq conqains a hunqraq qrillion calls qheq work qogaqhys py qasign. Enq wiqhin each one of qhese zany calls, each one qheq hes QNA, Qhe QNA coqe is axecqly qhe saze, a zess-broquceq rasuze. So qhe coqe in each call is iqanqical, a razarkaple puq veliq claiz. Qhis zeans qheq qhe calls are nearly alike, puq noq axecqly qhe saze. Qake, for insqence, qhe calls of qhe inqasqines; qheq qhey’re viqal is cysqainly blain. Now qhink apouq qhe way you woulq qhink if qhose calls wyse qhe calls in your prain.

The translation, for reference:

We begin our trip at a familiar place, a body like yours and mine. It contains a hundred trillion cells that work together by design. And within each one of these many cells, each one that has DNA, The DNA code is exactly the same, a mass-produced resume. So the code in each cell is identical, a remarkable but valid claim. This means that the cells are nearly alike, but not exactly the same. Take, for instance, the cells of the intestines; that they’re vital is certainly plain. Now think about the way you would think if those cells were the cells in your brain.

(Excerpt from “Journey into DNA,” NOVA Online)

Debrief: How did that feel? Notice that we only changed 8 of the 44 known phonemes in the English language. What happened emotionally?

Explain: The concept of phonological awareness and decoding:

Phonemes are the individual sound units that make up spoken words. The word “goat,” for example, contains three phonemes: “g,” “oh,” and “t.” Most people process these sounds automatically and instantly. Reading requires the brain to connect those sounds to written letters and symbols, a skill called decoding.

For children with dyslexia, this automatic mapping doesn’t come naturally. The phonological processing pathway in their brain works differently, which means every single word requires deliberate, effortful decoding. They aren’t skipping this step. They’re doing it manually, every time, while everyone around them appears to read effortlessly. The frustration and shame you felt in that 60-second activity? That’s how reading feels for a dyslexic child.

Activity 2: The Speed Dictation

Have everyone pull out the sheet of paper you provided. Read the following list of words aloud pretty quickly – too fast for anyone to comfortably keep up. Don’t pause, don’t repeat, and don’t slow down.

Alphabet. Bacon. Napkin. Orange. Sailboat. Composition. Lawyer. Dolphin. Purple. Climate.

Watch what happens. Some people will stop trying. Some will laugh nervously. Some will look frustrated. Some will look embarrassed.

Then say: Now imagine this is every single day of third grade.

Explain: Processing Speed

Many children with dyslexia also experience slower processing speed, the speed that the brain takes in, interprets, and responds to incoming information. When a teacher moves at a standard pace, a child with slower processing speed is constantly struggling to keep up, constantly behind, and rarely has the luxury of feeling successful.

It isn’t that they can’t learn the information. I’s that the delivery speed doesn’t match their processing abilities. Imagine the stress and frustration this would cause! Over time, some children will stop trying or begin acting out in class.

Activity 3: The Working Memory Challenge

Have everybody flip over the sheet of paper you provided them. Read the following set of instructions aloud. Do not repeat yourself. Do not slow down.

“Draw a circle in the upper left corner of your paper. Write the third letter of your middle name inside the circle. Fold your paper in half. Write today’s date backward in the lower right corner. Underline the date twice.”

Watch the reactions in the room. Almost no one will have followed all five steps correctly. Responses range from laughter, to nervousness, to embarrassment.

Then connect: “This is what happens when a teacher says: ‘Get your math book, turn to page 64, do the odd problems only, show your work, and put it in your Friday folder.'”

Explain: Working Memory

Working memory is the brain’s ability to hold and use information in the short term while doing something else at the same time. Think of it as mental scratch paper.

Many children with dyslexia struggle with weak working memory capacity. Because so much of their mental bandwidth is already being used to decode words, control their pencil, and monitor their performance., they can struggle with multi-step directions,

When a parent or teacher gives five-step directions, a child with limited working memory may genuinely lose step two before they’ve finished step one.

This isn’t laziness or poor listening. It’s just how their brains are wired. Weak working memory is one of the most misunderstood and most punished characteristics of dyslexic learners. The good news: when adults write down multi-step instructions rather than just saying them aloud, it’s a simple accommodation that supports working memory weakness.

Activity 4: The Dysgraphia Experience

Ask everyone to pick up their pen with their non-dominant hand. Then ask them to write the following quote while at the same time answering this question out loud:

Write: “The more that you read, the more things you will know.” — Dr. Seuss

Answer aloud: What did you eat for dinner last night?

More frustration! People will lose their train of thought mid-sentence. Their handwriting will be nearly illegible. Most won’t be able to do both things at once.

Debrief: Did you suddenly lose intelligence? Or did the output method get in the way?

Explain: Dysgraphia and the Difference Between Knowing and Showing

Dysgraphia is a learning difference that affects handwriting, spelling, and written expression. It frequently co-occurs with dyslexia. For a child with dysgraphia, the physical act of forming letters on a page requires so much conscious effort and attention that it actively competes with thinking.

The result: a child who can discuss a topic brilliantly in conversation produces written work that looks fragmented, disorganized, or incomplete. Parents and teachers often interpret this as laziness or a lack of effort when in reality, the child is working twice as hard as everyone else just to get words on the page.

The non-dominant hand exercise experience is a perfect illustration of this. Kids with dysgraphia are intelligent The output tool is simply working against them.

Part 2: The “Who Am I?” Game

Print and cut the 18 “Who Am I?” cards. Each card has three clues about a famous person with dyslexia, starting with their struggles and ending with their achievements. Read them aloud one clue at a time and let the group guess who it might be.

The cards feature a wide range of people — actors, entrepreneurs, athletes, musicians, politicians — so everyone in the room will have moments of recognition and surprise. Here are a few examples from the cards:

• Henry Winkler, whose parents called him “dumb dog” in German, who later wrote a beloved children’s book series about a boy with learning differences just like him.
• Keira Knightley, who at age six begged her parents to get her tested because she knew something was different, and used acting lessons as her reward for working on her reading.
• Charles Schwab, who couldn’t read fluently until his 20s and went on to manage trillions of dollars in investments.

This activity will hopefully be the beginning of a big mindset shift for your group. It sure was for mine!

The key takeaway: People with dyslexia have a wide variety of valuable gifts and talents and often experience amazing successes outside the classroom.

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Part 3: The Mindset Reframe

Now we teach the mindset reframe, moving people from the ‘dyslexia is a disability’ mindset to the ‘dyslexia is a difference’ mindset. You’ll move your group through three layers, each one deeper than the last.

Layer 1: Difference ≠ Deficit

Download, print, and cut apart the Difference ≠ Deficit cards and ask the group to sort them into two piles: either strength or weakness:

• Thinks in pictures rather than words
• Struggles to decode written text quickly
• Exceptional at “big picture” thinking
• Loses their place while reading
• Highly creative and imaginative
• Difficulty with sequences and rote memorization
• Strong ability to see patterns others miss
• Confuses similar-looking words

After they have worked on this for a while, explain that every single trait on that list is commonly associated with dyslexia. The “strengths” and the “weaknesses” are two sides of the same coin. The same brain wiring that makes reading hard also tends to produce creative, visionary thinkers.

Then share a few of the core mindset shifts that guide how you think about learning differences:

Strengths aren’t just interesting — they often lead to success. Ideally, with the right kinds of support for their weaknesses and opportunity to work in their strengths, people with dyslexia gain confidence and find success.

Difference ≠ deficit. A brain that works differently doesn’t necessarily mean it is faulty.

Smart doesn’t always look like school smart. School measures a narrow slice of human capability.

Accommodations create access, not shortcuts. Giving a child extra time or allowing them to use assistive technology is no more “unfair” than allowing a person who has weak vision to wear glasses.

Layer 2: What Is Intelligence?

This activity almost is sure to spark some great conversations.

Give each person (or work in groups) a set of the “What is Intelligence” cards (with the following descriptions and ask them to rank them from most to least intelligent:

1. A person who memorizes information easily
2. A person who invents things
3. A person who notices patterns others miss
4. A person who tells amazing stories
5. A person who fixes anything mechanical
6. A person who deeply understands others’ emotions
7. A person who can visualize and rotate objects in 3D
8. A person who learns new languages quickly

Allow time to share their thoughts and experience.

Then introduce this idea: for a long time, schools have rewarded primarily two types of intelligence:

Linguistic (reading and writing) and logical (mathematical).

Psychologist Howard Gardner proposed that there are actually multiple forms of intelligence, including spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and more. Children with dyslexia often score remarkably high in visual-spatial, interpersonal, and creative intelligences. The very skills that are rarely measured on a report card.

Ask: If we only measure fish by their ability to climb trees, what are we missing?

Layer 3: Things I Used to Believe / Things I Know Now

Now is a good time to share your own dyslexia journey. This is the emotional center of the evening.

Here’s a framework you can use or adapt:

I used to think…

• Faster meant smarter
• Behind meant failing
• Accommodations were shortcuts
• Reading struggles predicted future success

Now I know…

• Intelligence has many expressions
• Struggle often builds remarkable self-awareness and perseverance
• The goal isn’t to become a traditional learner, it is to operate in your strengths
• Some of the most capable people I’ve ever known learned to read with great difficulty

The more specific and honest you are, the more permission you give everyone else in the room to rethink their own assumptions.

Part 4: Personal Reflection

Close the formal activities with something quiet and personal.

Give each person an index card. Ask them to write at the top:

“A label I believed about myself…”

Examples to share to get them started:

• I’m not creative.
• I’m bad with numbers.
• I’m too emotional.
• I’m disorganized.
• I’m not athletic.

Then, on the back:

“A different way to see that trait…”

After a few minutes of writing, invite anyone who wants to share.

Part 5: Closing Discussion

End the evening in conversation. These questions work whether you’re in a women’s group, a parent meetup, or a teacher training:

Opening questions:

• What is something that came easily to you that you assumed came easily to everyone?
• What is something you thought you “weren’t good at” because of one bad early experience?
• Who in your life have you learned to see differently after tonight?

Or try the card pull: Write these on slips of paper, fold them, and let each person pull one:

• When was a time you felt underestimated?
• What strength do you have now that wasn’t valued when you were younger?
• What is something you used to see as a weakness that you now see differently?
• Who saw something in you before you saw it in yourself?
• Where in your life have you had to redefine what success looks like?

A Note on Snacks

My women’s group always has some kind of snacks. For our dyslexia simulation evening, I chose to serve brain-boosting foods like omega-3 rich trail mix, dark chocolate, and a variety of fresh, organic berries.

If you want to lean into the theme, consider a “Think Differently” snack spread:

• Foods that look like one thing but are another: dessert “sushi,” savory cheesecake, mini quiches that look like cookies
• An “outside the box” charcuterie board
• Brain-boosting foods: blueberries, walnuts, dark chocolate

It’s a small touch, but it sets the tone before the evening even begins and it gives you a natural conversation opener.

Quotes to Display or Share

I printed these Quote Cards in different colors and laid them around the snack table.

“Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” — Albert Einstein

“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” — Thomas Edison

“You don’t learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing, and by falling over.” — Richard Branson

“Logic will get you from A to Z. Imagination will get you everywhere.” — Albert Einstein

“All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.” — Walt Disney

“Normal is just a cycle on a washing machine.” — Whoopi Goldberg

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” — Winston Churchill

“I dream for a living.” — Steven Spielberg

“Only those who are asleep make no mistakes.” — Ingvar Kamprad, Founder of IKEA

Making Dyslexia Understandable Through Experience

When I was preparing this evening for my friends, I honestly wasn’t sure it would land. Dyslexia can feel like a clinical topic something for specialists and school meetings, not a Friday night with good conversation.

What I forgot is that almost everyone in any room has a personal connection to this. A sibling who was labeled “lazy.” A child who cried every morning before school. A parent who never learned to read fluently and hid it their whole life.

This evening doesn’t require expertise. It requires a little structure, a willingness to sit with some uncomfortable feelings for a few minutes, and the belief that understanding someone’s brain differently might change how you treat them.

Have you hosted a dyslexia awareness evening? Share in the comments below.