If you've ever thought that John Lennon wore his bright red lenses just for effect or that Elton John wears his yellow ones because he likes the look of them, maybe you're right.

On the other hand, it is more than likely that the colour in the lenses actually make the world feel more "comfortable", makes the environment feel less glaring or makes it easier to concentrate on reading the music. That's because different colours can affect the way you see the world, and for some people, rose coloured glasses are the way to go.

Surprisingly 12% of the general population without any reading problem and up to 50% of individuals with learning difficulties suffer from a condition called Irlen Syndrome. This is a perceptual problem that affects learning, reading, accurate measurement, and any work requiring close visual attention, like computers.

Irlen lenses may stop text from shifting, shaping, blurring, move or even disappearing.

If you have Irlen Syndrome you have to put more than four times more effort into carrying out tasks. You have to keep making adaptations and compensation for things such as contrast in text and bright light. Irlen Syndrome can also affect attention span, listening, energy level, motivation, work production and mental health.

Until now, it has baffled educators and the scientific community because it remains undetected by standard educational, visual and medical tests.

Individuals with Irlen Syndrome can often be misdiagnosed, because even though it's been a recognised concern since 1985 in Australia, relatively few educators, health professionals or medical practitioners know about it.

How do you know if you have Irlen Syndrome?

You are likely to be suffering with Irlen Syndrome….

• If you are light-sensitive, bothered by glare, bright lights or have problems driving at night and if you find it hard to deal with high contrast such as black on white, for example black text on white paper
• When you are looking at the printed page, text may shift, shape, blur, move or even disappear
• You may have difficulty with reading words, numbers, musical notes, tracking across the line when reading or skimming and comprehension.
• After reading for even a short time, you may start to feel distracted or restless and find it hard to stay on task
• You find yourself bumping into things, having trouble with escalators, stairs, ball sports or driving.

Most people just accept this as a sign of being interested in something else, being overworked, getting old or having a late night. However, Ireln Syndrome should be ruled out if these symptoms happen often.

Can this be fixed?

Your local Irlen screener/diagnostician can check to see whether colour is the problem. If so, the next step is to have an intensive diagnostic assessment to determine what colour from an almost limitless number of colour combinations, to be made into precision tinted Irlen Spectral Filters, will reduce or completely eliminate perception difficulties and light sensitivity.

Looking through colour corrects the perceptual difficulty by altering the timing by which the visual information is received and processed. Hundreds of thousands of people worldwide have been helped by the Irlen Method.

What will change?

With the Irlen filters you can expect

• Increased comfort when reading
• Improved reading accuracy
• Better reading comprehension
• Increased reading speed
• Reduced strain & fatigue while reading
• Improved school performance
• Easier work performance
• Improved self-esteem
• Reduced absenteeism
• Increased satisfaction
• Improved behaviour and mood
• Better concentration and attention
• Improved sports skills
• More effective use of time

There are Irlen diagnosticians in every state in Australia. If you are in South Australia and the Northern Territory visit www.irlensant.com.au For more extensive information about Irlen visit www.irlen.com

About the author

Tony Franklin screens and conducts diagnostic assessments from Dyslexia and Reading Solutions clinic. Tony has significant experience lecturing in Education Psychology and Special Education and has been involved with technologies that provide rapid results, since developing a biofeedback machine in the 1970’s. Tony provides free training for teachers to help them identify Irlen Syndrome in all students, but especially for young children, so they do not miss out on the essential early learning. He is especially interested in spreading the availability of this simple, powerful and almost instantaneous remediation for visual dyslexia in South Australia and the Northern Territory. If you are fascinated by this technology and keen to provide this kind of help, please contact Tony on 08 71274938, Dyslexia & Reading Solutions.

Publisher's note: I found the Irlen test very interesting as I tried the range of coloured lenses on a test sheet of x's. Quite fascinating how they merged together to start forming the letter o. In the very near future you will soon have the opportunity of being able to change the background colour to the pages you are reading in schooldaysmagazine.com to suit people who have Irlen syndrome.