Years ago I did dyslexia correction with the Davis method. “Time-winding” is the same as what they call “the Dial” - a visualization that lets dyslexic people control their perceived rate of time passing.
Natalia’s “slipping performance” in school (bottom of page 84) results from what they call “disorientation” - her perceptions shift and distort, her skills change, and symbols get much harder to use correctly.
You can see the same thing in reverse:
on this page:
I have no commercial interest in this. I just think it’s incredibly cool to see a dyslexic character well-represented, and the perceptual distortion (“disorientation”) presented as useful and double-edged (which it is in real life too!) My daughter is dyslexic and she’s very excited by this story.
In real life, time-winding is usually discovered by dyslexic kids at just a few years old. It often mimics ADHD.
Also, dyslexic perceptual distortion is not quite the same thing as time-winding. It can happen in response to confusion, boredom, frustration, excitement, or other strong emotion. Or it can be invoked deliberately to make one’s perceptions more flexible, which can be very useful in art and sports and engineering and architecture and… Just as long as you’re not trying to use symbols while your perceptions are flopping around!
Like time-winding, perceptual distortion can be consciously controlled, which means dyslexic people can learn to use symbols reliably, and can unlearn whatever confusions they’ve learned that are triggering unwanted distortion episodes.
There’s a whole lot more I can say about this if anyone is interested.