IT is good to note that North Yorkshire County Council has put together a handbook to help teachers recognise and help dyslexic students (October 11).

I do hope that primary schools in particular are included in the distribution.

Could County Councillor Metcalfe please give an assurance that pupils will, following recognition of the condition, be given the help and appropriate specialist teaching that they require in order that they can achieve good results in their education?

I speak from experience. Recognition of dyslexia, particularly at primary level, will be a bonus to pupils, frustrated and concerned parents and teachers alike.

In the 1980s one or two members of staff at Hambleton Primary School believed I was a neurotic mother when my youngest daughter, Jude, was having problems.

She left primary school barely able to read and we paid for lessons with the Dyslexia Institute over a period of two to three years.

From then on, with hard work, she became an achiever. Selby High School, Selby College, Leeds Tech and, finally, Leeds University could not have been more helpful or supportive.

Right through her education, following assessments, she was allowed 25 per cent extra time to work through examination papers.

Jude has, at the age of 26, just been awarded a part-time Batchelor of Health Sciences (Hons) degree at Leeds University and works as a senior cardio-respiratory technician in a hospital.

Dyslexic students can, with the right kind of help and support, study right through to university level if they so wish.

Maureen Metcalf,

Garth Lane,

Hambleton, Selby.

Updated: 09:49 Friday, October 15, 2004