Frequently Asked Questions

What is LD?
Learning disabilities (LD) refers to a neurological disorder that affects how the brain works. LD is not a lack of mental ability. In fact, in order to be classified as having a learning disability, the individual must have average or better intelligence. Difficulties may exist in how the individual speaks, listens, reads, writes, spells, reasons, organizes information, or does mathematics. If provided with the right support and intervention, children with learning disabilities can succeed in school and have successful careers later in life.

Some common characteristics of learning disabilities:
• Attention difficulties: Some children who are LD struggle with a lack of focus, short attention span, are easily distracted, and have poor concentration.
• Poor motor abilities: Some children with LD have difficulty with gross and fine motor skills, may be awkward or clumsy, and may have spatial problems.
• Psychological process deficits and information-processing problems: LD children often struggle with processing auditory and visual information.
• Failure to develop and use learning strategies: Many LD children struggle with learning and studying. They lack the skills and strategies needed to develop an appropriate learning style.
• Oral language difficulties: Many children with LD have problems listening, speaking, language development, vocabulary development, and linguistic competencies.
• Reading difficulties: A large percent of LD children struggle with reading disabilities. Specifically, they struggle with letter-sound association, sequencing letters, decoding words, and word recognition. Many of these children read slowly, thus creating difficulties with comprehension and memory.
• Written language difficulties: Writing and thinking simultaneously is extremely challenging for many LD students. Letter formation and sequencing letters interferes with thinking skills and tends to slow the writing process down tremendously.
• Mathematics difficulties: Mathematical difficulties include calculation of facts, quantitative thinking, arithmetic, time, and space.
• Nonverbal learning disabilities (NVLD): Children with NVLD struggle with problems with social skills which make establishing relationships difficult.

How do I know if my child has a learning disability?
There are many characteristics of LD. Only a professional can diagnose your child with a learning disability. Many normally developing children will demonstrate some or all of these characteristics at some time. However, if you see your child demonstrating several of these characteristics over a long period of time, consider seeking professional assistance.

Preschool
• Speaks later than most children, struggles with speech, pronunciation is difficult, has slow vocabulary growth, and demonstrates difficulty with expressive vocabulary, please consult a speech therapist and make note that other learning difficulties may accompany speech difficulties
• Slowly developing fine motor skills, taking special note of grasping a fork, spoon, crayon, and pencil
• Difficulty following directions (one and two step directions)
• Struggles with learning sequences (numbers, alphabet, days of the week)
• Trouble learning colors or shapes
• Demonstrates trouble interacting with peers
• Difficulty rhyming words
• Extremely restless, fidgety, easily distracted, cannot focus very long

Grades K-8
• Difficulty with sequences (alphabet, numbers, days of the week, months of the year, spelling, etc.)
• Trouble with sound and symbol recognition in the alphabet
• Consistently makes reading and spelling errors including letter reversals (b/d), inversions (m/w), transpositions (act/cat) and substitutions (dad/father)
• Confuses sight words and high frequency words
• Struggles with learning word parts (root words, prefixes, and suffixes) and spelling
• Avoids reading, especially reading aloud
• Difficulty performing math word problems
• Struggles with unstable, awkward, or tense pencil grip
• Poor handwriting, cannot write on a line, does not stop at margins, does not form letters correctly
• Tends to procrastinate or avoid writing assignments
• Difficulty learning math facts and often confuses math signs (+, -, x, /, =)
• Poor recall of facts even if much studying has been done
• Depends heavily on one skill such as listening or memorizing, but does not function well in other areas such as reading
• Unaware of personal space, struggles with poor coordination, prone to accidents, unaware of personal surroundings, and has difficulty interpreting body language and facial expressions
• Tends to have difficulty making friends
• Difficulty asking questions
• Poor organizational skills

High School Students and Adults
• Avoids reading and writing
• Challenged by spelling, use of spelling rules and strategies is minimal, misspells same word differently in a single piece of writing, struggles with representing all sounds in a word
• Difficulty with memory
• Difficulty with abstract concepts, if not beyond capabilities
• Works slowly and may have difficulty organizing work space
• Struggles with communication (written or oral) with peers and associates
• Difficulty summarizing information, may tend to copy or leave out pertinent information
• Greatly challenged by change; may display difficulty adjusting to new environments and routines
• Difficulty working with others
• Tends to pay too much or too little attention to details

How does LD impact my child’s life?
Frequently parents will be concerned about how long homework takes, how much effort their child seems to invest into studying, and how defeated their child feels when they are not successful at school. These concerns are common amongst parents of an LD child. Other concerns that are mentioned are socialization, handwriting, written expression, thinking, and nonverbal learning. An LD child may take much longer to complete a task or may rush through it from frustration. Some children will tune out the information as it is presented to them by playing with other things or simply daydreaming. Others may struggle and try but feel completely lost because they lack the tools necessary to complete the task. LD children are impacted not only at school, but also in social settings and at home. LD is not limited only to the school day. In fact, LD can be a barrier when dealing with family and friends.

My child is smart. Why doesn't s/he perform well at school?
There is a formula referred to as the Discrepancy Formula that helps to illustrate a learning disability for parents and teachers. When a child is suspected of having a learning disability, it is recommended the child receive psycho-educational testing. With this testing, a gap between what the student is potentially capable of learning and what the student has in fact learned or achieved is identified. Of course, the desirable result would be for the potential to be equal or close to what has actually been achieved. However, for many LD children there is a large discrepancy. Often the potential is much greater than the actual performance

What do I do if I believe my child needs help with learning?
Parents often struggle with this question because it is so hard to determine when to get help. Talking to a professional who has experience working with learning disabilities can help you make up your mind. Some people to speak with include your child’s teacher(s), your pediatrician, and a professional educational therapist.

How do I find a program for my child?
Once you have decided to find a program for your child, you need to have your child tested with a complete psycho-educational battery of tests. These tests identify your child’s areas of cognitive strengths and weaknesses and the pattern of the weaknesses. It can be determined if your child needs educational therapy because of a learning disability or if your child needs resource help because of other cognitive difficulties.

Won’t my child look different or stand out in class with help or accommodations?
Often parents are concerned about how different their child may appear to his/her peers if help is received. However, the child may already appear different because they learn differently. The learning disabled child may already stand out to his peers because he fidgets, talks, wiggles, does not complete homework/class work, does not volunteer, or any number of possibilities. Receiving help can offer the child an opportunity to change these differences and learn how to function differently, in the classroom and socially.