Jonathan Learns to Speak with his Eyes

Chantal Bryan was in a horrific car crash over ten years ago whilst pregnant with baby Jonathan. Diagnosed with severe cerebral palsy, leaving him unable to walk and speak his family were told he had ‘profound and multiple learning disabilities ‘ and his tutors did not teach him to read and write. But his determined mother, Chantal refused to give up and taught him how to use his eyes to pick pre-chosen words.

Locked in

Jonathan was born at 36 weeks after his mother suffered a placental abruption when she was involved in a car crash. He has severe cerebral palsy, kidney failure and supplemental oxygen dependency, leading to him have a limited life expectancy. Doctors said he had suffered a lot of brain damage and one remarked he had “the worst MRI scan he had ever seen”.

He attended a specialist school for disabled children but was never taught to read and write.  The family were visited by an expert who suggested that Jonathan may be able to communicate through his eyes.  Chantal started to home-school him at aged seven and began by teaching him to spell, until he was able to choose pre-selected words. But fast-learner Jonathan got bored of his mum’s chosen words when he was writing stories by age nine.

Home School Success

Jonathan went from being totally silent to saying whatever he wanted via his spelling boards in just over a year – and now can write poems and stories and now he has a reading age higher than an average ten year old. He is using his new-found voice to campaign for better education of disabled youngsters.

So much so that Jonathan has written a letter the Education Minister, Nicky Morgan, calling for more to be done to help non-verbal children in schools. He has also submitted an entry to the BBC Radio 2, 500 word story competition, taking 30 hours to write the piece using his eye movements and a spelling board.

Speaking via his spelling board, Jonathan said: “If more people had believed in me I would have learnt to read and write at the same time as my peers in the mainstream class.”

He continues “What brings me incredible sorrow is watching my non-verbal friends in wheelchairs miss out on the fullness of life because no-one believes that they are worth teaching literacy to. They are waiting locked in for someone to give them a chance to have a voice.”

Chantel expressed “I asked him a whole load of questions, and in some ways it was quite reassuring to realise that we did know Jonathan all along.”

Hope for the Future

My dream is that children like me are taught to read write and spell using the best access method for them

She asked him what the most frustrating thing was for him, and she expected him to say not being able to speak. He said it was “having his face washed.”  Jonathan uses three boards – letters, numbers and punctuation – which are held up in front of him, so he can make a selection with his eyes. He now attends a mainstream school in the afternoons and writes a blog about his experiences along with poems and short stories.

Johnathan added “My dream is that children like me are taught to read write and spell using the best access method for them.”

Johnathan’s blog can be followed online at www.eyecantalk.net