A Capable Learner, An Effortful Reader: What My Lifelong Profile Reveals About the Students We Mislabel -By Brian Butler
- bkbutler497
- 6 days ago
- 4 min read
Updated: 6 days ago
As an educator, author, and school leader, I’ve always been open about my early reading struggles. I’ve shared them with students, teachers, and families because I’ve long believed that transparency helps others feel seen. What I haven’t always done is articulate the full picture of what reading has felt like for me across my entire life, not just in childhood, but into adulthood, leadership, and authorship.
My earliest challenges began in elementary school, where I struggled enough that a teacher considered retaining me. I wasn’t retained, but the experience marked the beginning of a lifelong pattern. Even as I grew into a capable learner, athlete, and eventually an educator, reading remained something I had to work through, not something that flowed.
To this day, when I read, I must process every single word. My brain doesn’t skim or automatically take in phrases. I rely heavily on subvocalization, “saying the words in my head” — to make sense of the text. This helps me understand, but it slows me down and increases the cognitive effort required.
Highlighting and underlining have become essential tools. They keep my eyes anchored and my attention engaged. Without them, my focus drifts within minutes. My eyes slide off the text, my mind wanders, and comprehension fades. With them, reading becomes manageable, still effortful, but possible.
Reading aloud is especially challenging. Even though I’m a confident speaker, reading aloud requires my eyes, voice, and comprehension to sync perfectly. I can stumble, lose my place, or feel pressure because the process isn’t automatic. It’s not anxiety, it’s the mechanics of reading.
But here’s the contrast that educators will appreciate: when I listen to information, everything changes. If someone reads to me, or I listen to an audiobook, I understand immediately. I remember details. I stay engaged. I grasp complex ideas with ease. Listening is my most efficient learning channel.
This difference between reading and listening has shaped my entire learning life. I learn best through discussion, movement, interaction, and auditory input, strengths that served me well as an athlete and later as an educator and leader.
My strengths are verbal, relational, conceptual, and strategic. Reading is simply the least efficient way for my brain to take in information. This is also why contributing to, co‑authoring, and authoring four books makes perfect sense.
Writing is an active process…it draws on conceptual thinking, verbal reasoning, storytelling, and synthesis. Those are my strengths. Reading requires decoding and visual tracking; writing requires generating ideas, organizing meaning, and communicating clearly.
My brain thrives in that active space. So, while reading has always been effortful, writing has been a natural extension of the way I think and lead.
Another part of my story that educators should understand is how this reading profile affected my performance on timed standardized tests. I never finished the SATs, not because I didn’t understand the material, but because the pace of the test didn’t match the way my brain processes text. My scores, 790 and 730, reflected the unfinished sections more than my actual capability.
This is a reality for many students with similar profiles: they are highly capable and strong thinkers, yet timed reading-heavy assessments underestimate them.
Without understanding their reading profile, we risk mislabeling them as underperforming, unmotivated, or lacking ability, when in fact, their strengths simply lie outside the narrow structure of timed or high-pressure tests.
For educators, my story underscores a critical truth: A person can be highly capable and still find reading effortful. Reading difficulty does not signal low intelligence, lack of motivation, or limited potential. It signals a different cognitive pathway. Students who struggle with reading may thrive when information is spoken.
Tools like highlighting, audiobooks, and active engagement are not crutches; they are access points. And strengths in listening, speaking, and conceptual thinking are just as valuable as strengths in reading fluency. Not the dramatic, stereotypical version, but the subtle, high‑functioning kind that often goes unnoticed because the individual is highly capable in other areas.
While only a qualified professional can make a determination, the lifelong pattern I’ve described regarding my early reading difficulty, slow or effortful reading, stress reading aloud, reliance on highlighting, strong auditory comprehension, and strong verbal reasoning, aligns with what research describes in some adults who fall within the broad profile of mild dyslexia.
My reading journey is a reminder to educators that students bring diverse learning profiles into the classroom. Success doesn’t require reading to be easy. It requires understanding how each learner’s brain works, providing multiple pathways to access content, and honoring the strengths they already possess.
Selected Research and Sources for Educators
Reading Fluency & Decoding
• National Center on Improving Literacy — “What Is Reading Fluency?”
• Shaywitz, S. (Yale Center for Dyslexia & Creativity) — Overview of dyslexia and decoding challenges
Eye‑Tracking & Visual Attention in Reading
• Rayner, K. (2009). “Eye movements and attention in reading.” Psychological Science.
Subvocalization & Cognitive Load
• University of Michigan — “Subvocalization: Friend or Foe?”
Auditory Learning Strengths
• Fleming, N. & Mills, C. — VARK Learning Styles (Auditory Modality)
Compensatory Strategies in Adult Readers
• International Dyslexia Association — “Accommodations for Adults with Dyslexia”
Mild / High‑Functioning Dyslexia Profiles
• Snowling, M. (Oxford University) — Research on subtle dyslexia presentations
Brian Butler is the Author of Limitless Future and Every Student Deserves a Gifted Education , co-author of What About Us? The PLC at Work Process for Grades Pre‑K–2 Teams and a Contributing Author of It’s About Time
To find out more about Brian, go to brianbutler.info
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