Dyslexia shouldn’t hold you back, says Paddington writer

Dyslexia should not hold you back, the co-screenwriter of the latest Paddington film has said.

James Lamont, who co-wrote Paddington In Peru, the newly-released third film in the franchise, has dyslexia and said with the right support, children with the learning difficulty could achieve whatever they wanted.

“It’s a different way of learning and once you have those tools, you can learn just as well as anybody else,” he told BBC London.

“Once that difference is recognised and supported, they can do anything – they can write movies if they want.”

Mr Lamont, from Essex, added: “When I was a kid, I had lots of trouble reading, I had lots of trouble spelling very simple words.

“And that was something that I dealt with at the time.

“But as I went on, you realise that those skills don’t stop you being creative or stop you being able to get your ideas across on a page.

“That is something that I say to a lot of the kids at my children’s school – ‘does a writer need to know how to spell?’

“Dyslexia – it shouldn’t hold you back if you have the correct support.

“It’s a different way of learning and once you have those tools, you can learn just as well as anybody else.”

Mr Lamont encouraged parents who think their child might have dyslexia to get them assessed and support them in their learning.

“I would give them confidence that it is not going to hold them back and it is not going to affect their life in a negative way,” he said.

Mr Lamont said he received a lot of help as a child, including one-to-one tuition, which helped him approach learning in a different way.

“Thankfully I have a very helpful writing partner who does most of the proof reading,” he added.

Dyslexia is a learning difficulty that affects about one in 10 people in the UK, including adults as well as children, according to the British Dyslexia Association (BDA).

If someone has dyslexia, they may have difficulties with their reading, writing or spelling.

It doesn’t affect intelligence and it is not a disease or an illness – it is a condition that someone is born with.

Charities such as the BDA can offer advice for people who want to find out whether they may have dyslexia.