"Imagine a talented footballer forced to take the deciding penalty kick of a match wearing a tight skirt and high heels! With confidence dashed and skills overwhelmed he would probably feel great frustration. How might he express this? Clown around, lash out, feel sick or refuse to play? What if that had been David Beckham?

These are akin to the feelings experienced by people with dyslexia when forced to function in a way that does not suit their thinking style. Their talents are demeaned and their thinking style crushed hour after hour, day after day, term after term and throughout their working life. Many become depressed and ill. Officially about 6% of the population has dyslexia. You may be surprised to hear that over 40% of millionaires (think of Richard Branson) have dyslexia.

But so do over 60% of prisoners and over 80% of young offenders. The percentage of people with dyslexia who suffer from stress-related health problems is unknown. The number who have to change work patterns because of a family member's need for support is also not known. I would put the figure of those affected by dyslexia and associated conditions closer to 25% of the population.

How do I know how it feels? Because I am dyslexic, and so are my children and many members of my family. I founded Dyslexia Wales because my children were having trouble in school. Try as they might they could not seem to 'get it'. I knew they were not stupid and yet their school results told me they were. My daughter became chronically ill with a stress related condition known as ME aged 7½. My son became disruptive and refused to attend school aged 8. Although kindly teachers tried to help, neither child was able to access the National Curriculum successfully or function in accordance with their mental ability.

After many psychologists' reports and unhelpful attempts to 'correct' their dyslexia, I realised I needed to research the subject myself. It took me many years of studying to understand that dyslexia and its associated conditions such as dyspraxia, attention deficit disorder, hyperactivity, dyscalculia and even such things as bedwetting or travel sickness all have, at their root, a single cause.

And what is that cause? The tendency to think primarily in pictures. Associated with this is the capacity to confuse the boundary between reality and imagination and become disoriented; and a tendency to be overwhelmed by the options offered by the ability to think visually at lightning speed.

Dyslexia is a Greek word meaning 'word blindness', which doesn't explain why otherwise intelligent people cannot access the written word effectively. Some scientific researchers assert that people with dyslexia have a rogue gene that needs to be eliminated. Some physicians prescribe a 'medical cosh' in the form of the drug Ritalin and its derivatives. The educational establishment insists that pupils must learn in the way that it teaches.

The way pupils are taught today is counterproductive for people with a creative, visual and multidimensional thinking style. Like the sportsman who needs the right clothing to reach peak performance, pupils with dyslexia need to be taught in a way that suits their learning style. A way far removed from that prevailing in the education system today. When people with dyslexia are taught to harness their visual thinking style, they make rapid progress and learning becomes fun again".