Background questionnaires for dyslexia: what’s with all the questions?

Why do we ask such in depth questions before we even begin the assessment?

To me the background questionnaires are so important, they provide so many important clues as to what is going on for the person being assessed. There are a number of reasons why I think they are really important, firstly the background questionnaires help me build a rapport with the person I’m assessing, helping them to feel comfortable and relaxed during the assessment process. Making the decision to have an assessment isn’t easy and anything that I can do to make my clients feel supported and safe is really crucial to me.

Secondly, without really getting to know the people I am assessing I can’t give the in-depth and personalised recommendations that I want to give. For the recommendations to be really impactful they need to be based on the strengths and challenges people face, where they are at now and where they hope to go. Diagnostic assessments are life long and the report needs to reflect that in a realistic way.

The final why the background questionnaires are really important to me are that they help me to decide which tests to use. That’s right there isn’t just one test or set of tests for assessing dyslexia. There are certain key areas that have to be covered, but a number of different tests that help you to assess them. Depending on a clients needs I might select to do certain tests and not others.