Alistair's Story — 11 Sep 2009

Alistair* is in his 50s and a retired welder from Govan Shipbuilding where he worked before ill health forced him to leave.  Alistair is intelligent and articulate, but he has dyslexia which makes spelling and reading difficult.

Alistair has been attending CSG's literacy services at Lourdes School and later Ibrox Library for just over a year.   He has been using a variety of resources and activities linked to his interests to improve his spelling and reading.

Alistair says he called the Big Plus because "My course at Cardonald College finished and my fee waiver got rescinded and I was still needing help with my spelling."  Since he started the programme, Alistair has been reading books, learning spelling rules, writing his memoirs and even doing cross word puzzles.

Alistair feels the learning is helping him and said, "It makes you more confident and not so afraid of filling out forms. My reading is improving because I am reading out loud". Alistair has quickly moved from short quick reads to reading substantial works like  ‘Lords of the Bow' by Conn Iggulden.  Alistair hopes the literacy learning will make him confident enough to write a letter without any spelling mistakes.

 *name has been changed.