Pssst! I have a secret to share. I'm a librarian who doesn't like to read.
I mean, I love to read, for pleasure. But it pains me to read anything that doesn't fascinate me. Instructions. Guides. Textbooks. Nonfiction: unless it's about something salacious or it otherwise piques my interest. I'm one of those people where, when I'm forced to read something I don't want to read, I finish a paragraph and realize I have no idea what's going on. So I re-read the paragraph. Same. No idea. It takes me forever to read through anything that is not absolutely fascinating.
It's not the end of the world. I love audiobooks, for instance. But not everything is available in audio format, and sometimes my fourteen-year-old is not in the mood to read to me. (Ungrateful! Think of all the years I spent reading to her! Although, I admit, I never read her things like income tax form instructions like I have asked her to read to me.)
All this is to say, I'm extremely excited to have discovered something new today that might help me focus on my "required reading." Johnson County Library's eBook service, Baker and Taylor's Axis 360, has a "dyslexia font." Right now this font is only available by reading on the website itself, which I can still access from my iPhone, just through the Safari browser instead of the Axis 360 app. Just change the font in the browser reader. It works with many titles, although not quite all. The dyslexia font is coming to the app in early 2021 in the next update.
I don't know if I have dyslexia. I've never been tested. And when I do find something to read that excites me, I generally plow through it and remember it for years, if not decades. However, I probably do have ADHD, so maybe the dyslexia font works for all sorts of neurodiverse readers. I've tried it out today and I love it so far.
If you know someone who struggles with "required reading" let them know about this feature. And let us know if you have any questions. We'd love to hear how it works for you!