- Home
- Learning Disability
- Inclusion in Classrooms
- Behaviour
- Educational Assistants
- Slow Learners
- Assessment and Evaluation
- Reflection
Learning Disability :
A learning disorder is a permanent disorder that affects individuals with normal or above normal intelligence and is evident in both academic and social situations that involves one or more of the processes necessary for the proper use of spoken language or the symbols of communications, and that is characterized by a condition that:
a) Is not the primary the result of: Impairment of vision, physical disability, developmental disability, primary emotional disturbances, cultural differences and
b) Results in the significant discrepancy between academic and assessed intellectual ability, with deficits in one or more of the following
1) Receptive language (listening, listening), language processing (thinking, conceptualizing, integrating), expressive language (talking, spelling, writing), mathematical computation
2) May be associated with one or more conditions diagnosed as : a perceptual handicap, a brain injury, minimal brain dysfunction, dyslexia and development aphasia
(from our Course work)
Learning Disability Association of Canada website states: Learning disabilities have been recognized as a medical problem for a long time. As early as 1891, medical researchers noted the association between neurological mechanisms and learning disabilities, such as dyslexia. Scientific opinion began to shift as it was recognized that some reading and learning problems in children was a result of biology and not poor upbringing. As knowledge of learning disabilities increased through research and experience, the definition of what learning disabilities are also evolved to encompass this new knowledge. This website defines Learning disability as: "Learning Disabilities" refer to a number of disorders which may affect the acquisition, organization, retention, understanding or use of verbal or nonverbal information. These disorders affect learning in individuals who otherwise demonstrate at least average abilities essential for thinking and/or reasoning. As such, learning disabilities are distinct from global intellectual deficiency. Learning disabilities result from impairments in one or more processes related to perceiving, thinking, remembering or learning. These include, but are not limited to: language processing; phonological processing; visual spatial processing; processing speed; memory and attention; and executive functions (e.g. planning and decision-making). Learning disabilities may also involve difficulties with organizational skills, social perception, social interaction and perspective taking. For success, individuals with learning disabilities require early identification and timely specialized assessments and interventions involving home, school, community and workplace settings. Learning disabilities range in severity and may interfere with the acquisition and use of one or more of the following:
* oral language (e.g. listening, speaking, understanding);
* reading (e.g. decoding, phonetic knowledge, word recognition, comprehension);
* written language (e.g. spelling and written expression); and
* mathematics (e.g. computation, problem solving).
My Experience: I have been teaching English as a second language this year. Children who come to Canada with no or little English learn generally very fast and ideally in 3-4 years do not need intensive support and are ready to go to their classrooms to learn in a large group setting. In my experience this is a typical pattern but there are students who do not show much progress or any progress. These are the students who may have a learning disability and they need to be tested for it. I have a few students who are here for 6- 7 years but do not show as much progress as a normal child would. Talking to their classroom teachers confirm that they do not show progress in other subject areas as well (sometimes language related subjects more). That is when teachers are concerned and would take help of the resource teacher. In my experiecne I have come across a few such children one of which is identified to have LD after he did not show much progress after being on a growth plan and program adaptations.
I would like to talk about another 11 year old child who used to come to me during his language block everyday for support and Math once a week. He has come from China and is in this country for 3 years now. He speaks English well now and can express his ideas very well orally. But he cannot read or write. This year he has learned to identify the beginning and ending sounds in a word. His academic history shows that he cannot read ot write in his first language either. At first he was put in an intensive support ESL classroom but as he was not showing any progress, he was put on a growth plan from where he was tested and now has been identified to have LD. Some of the symptoms that this student showed were (as I am reading the symptoms of LD now) of any LD symptoms. He had problems with peers and would run into problems every day during recess and other times. He is a very restless boy, gets distracted very easily and does not like to do any work independently. (He has been also identified with ADHD and is on medication). He likes to be a part of the group but has poor problem solving skills and shows behavioural problems. Academically, he is better in Math and has better computational skills and can do Math in his head (though takes more than usual time to process but comes up with the right answer). He has good objective memory. His organizational skills are poor and would often come to class without pencil or would lose books/notebooks etc. He would often forget to do his homework.
The strategies used by me were a lot of 'one on one' and working on organizational skills with him. When my other students would read independently (silent reading time) I would read to him in a quiet corner in the classroom and ask him to rewrite the story in his own words (which was a challenge for him but I would let a peer to help him spell words or scribe for him). Extrinsic motivation (which I am not generally in favour of) worked very well with him. If he would try and do all the flash cards (beginning and ending sounds) he would get a star and collecting 20 stars would give him a prize. His negative approach to doing independent work also improved with some motivation (He would lose stars with negative attitude he showed etc.). He loved to use sticky notes. I gave him spellings (word family) written on different coloured sticky notes, (every time he would finish one word family and get a perfect on his spellings, I would change the colour of the sticky note) and he remmebered the spellings better. He would draw a picture of difficult words in a book while I read to him and mark it with a sticky note on that chapter. Then he would copy the word and the picture to his personal dictionary. Lots of talking to him and including him in all the group activities (like group role plays, Monday meetings, sharing a book/book talk, all the language games played in the classroom etc.) encouraged him and he showed improvement in his behaviour. Learning did not improve much but repeating the lesson and one on one conferencing helped him to some extent. I had given him a personal schedule and a checklist to improve his organization (which worked in the beginning to some extent but not so much).
Both the students mentioned above are not same. The first child has good relationship with his peers and does not show any behavioural problems. He is poor in organization and keeps losing things like the other child.He forgets to do his homework. He is poor in computational skills but is better in language (can read and write with spelling errors, poor conventions and grammar) where as the other child shows severe Language Learning disability but not so much in Math skills. There are some similarities (academic and organizaional) but both the children are completely different in other matters.