CHIPATA COLLEGE OF EDUCATION
SPECIAL EDUCATION
Specific Learning Disabilities
CHILDREN WITH LEARNING DISABILITIES
Learning disabilities are not a single condition but a wide variety of specific
disabilities
• The American National Association for Children with Learning Disabilities
(2000) defines specific learning disability as a disorder in one or more of the
psychological processes involved in understanding or using language, spoken
or written, which manifest itself in an imperfect ability to listen, think, speak,
read, write, spell or to do mathematical calculations.
• Hallahan and Kauffman (1998) stated that a child with a learning disability is
one who is not achieving up to potential.
The term does not include learning problems that are primarily the result of
visual, hearing, or motor disabilities, of mental retardation, of emotional
disturbance, or of environmental, cultural, or economic disadvantage
General characteristics of learning disabilities
• Disorders of attention and high distractibility
• Poor motor abilities
• Perceptual and information processing problems- Specific disorders of
memory, thinking or language
• Failure to develop and mobilize cognitive strategies for learning
• They have difficulties in oral language, reading, written language and
mathematical difficulties
basic reading, writing skills such as reversing letters, words, or numbers;
spelling skills:- omission of letters / confusing certain letters,
number concepts or arithmetic calculations
listening and comprehension skills
self-expression skills
Cont..
• Immature social skills / Inappropriate social behaviour
• Discrepancy between intelligence and performance
• Hyperactivity or impulsiveness
• Poor motor coordination and spatial relation ability
• Difficulty solving problems
• Difficulty with self-motivated, self-regulated activities
• Overreliance on the teachers or fellow learners for academic
activities
• Disorganized approach to learning and self wellbeing– they appear
distracted most of the time and continually move around.
Causes of learning disabilities
The exact cause of SLD is not known but it is linked to some of the
following factors
Educational factors which include inadequate and inappropriate
teaching, or placing too high or low expectations on the child
Environmental factors such extreme poverty leading to poor
nutrition, poor health, accidents, lack of sensory stimulation,
emotional instability and poor social development, child abuse,
violence or neglect, disruption in the family i.e. divorce, death or
disease, chronic ill health of the child. Other factors such as head
injuries, meningitis / encephalitis, anoxia etc.
Pre-natal factors such as smoking, alcohol
Cont.
• Deficiencies in diet in early age (malnutrition), severe disease
• Pre-maturity and low birth weight
• Inadequate stimulation of learning acquisition based on defective education
setup and environment
• Poor utilization of teaching methods that stimulate learning and child
development.
• Emotional disturbance of parents, teachers and children
• Inadequate and improper development of language skills
• Social and cultural deprivation
• Drug abuse- alcohol etc.
Types of Specific Learning Disabilities
1. Dyslexia (reading disorder)
• It is a specific learning disability characterized by inability to read.
Associated characteristics may include:
Difficulty organizing written and spoken language
Poor self-expression
Difficulty learning new vocabulary, either through reading or hearing
Slowness in learning songs and rhymes
Slow in reading as well as giving up on longer reading tasks
Difficulty understanding questions and following directions
Difficulty recalling numbers in sequence (for example, mobile numbers and addresses)
Trouble distinguishing left from right
2. Dysgraphia (writing disorder)
• A specific learning disability characterized
by difficulties to write coherently.
• Dysgraphia is characterized by problems
with writing.
Other signs of this condition may include
A strong dislike of writing and/or drawing
Trouble writing down ideas
A quick loss of energy and interest while
writing
Trouble writing down thoughts in a logical
sequence
Saying words out loud while writing
Leaving words unfinished or omitting them
when writing sentences
3. Dyscalculia (Arithmetic Disorder)
• A specific learning disability characterized by inability
to perform mathematical functions / computation
Associated characteristics may include:
Difficulty with math-related word problems
Trouble making change in cash transactions
Messiness in putting math problems on paper
Trouble recognizing logical information sequences
(for example, steps in math problems)
Trouble with understanding the time sequence of
events
Difficulty with verbally describing math processes
Dysorthographia (Spelling Disorders)
• Dysorthographia is the learning disability
associated with spelling
Characteristics may include
Addition of unneeded letters
Omission of needed letters
Reversals of vowels
Reversals of syllables
Phonemic spelling of non-phonemic words
Difficulty in understanding the correspondence
between sounds and letters
Intervention measures of learners with specific learning disabilities
The teacher can use the following intervention measures to assist children with
SLD
• Emphasis on prevention – many of the learning deficits that cause a child to
be categorized as having disabilities can be prevented. E.g. High quality early
childhood programs and primary – grades teaching significantly reduce LD
• Employ early reading and writing strategies
• Provide additional activities to remediate challenges encountered by the
learners
• Teach learning – to – learn skills; - many learners with LD lack good strategies
for studying, test-taking and so on. These skills can be taught
• Give frequent feedback
• Advice parents not allow their learners who perform very well to skip grades
Cont..
• Use teaching strategies that engage learners actively in lessons
• Make special physical arrangement in the classroom for the highly destructive
/ distracting and hyperactive children
• Create a supportive school environment by providing proper nutrition and a
stimulating environment
• Give the children a variety of activities that require the use their senses
• Organize remedial programmes
• Give activities in simple, small and manageable units (Task analysis)
• Plan the activities from the simplest to the most complex and provide clear
instructions
• Use a variety of teaching and learning aids, preferably from the child
environment.