1. Psychology in Educational Management
(EM 713) Report
LEARNING
DISORDER/
LEARNING
DISABILITY

2. “The disabilities
you can see may
be easier to deal
with than the
ones you can’t”

3. Definition
Learning disorders in a child or
adolescent are characterized
by academic underachievement
in reading, written expression,
or mathematics in comparison
with the overall intellectual
ability of the child.

4. Definition
Learning Disabilities- a type of
Cognitive Disabilities
-A disorder in one or more of the basic
psychological process involved in
understanding or using language,
spoken or written, which may manifest
itself in an imperfect ability to listen,
think, speak, read, write, spell or to do
mathematical calculations.

5. History
• Rutter and Yule (1975)
– Poor readers with low IQ had more
global neurodevelopmental
abnormalities, but better
acquisition of reading and spelling
than children with average ability
language but with delays in
language and speech

6. Prevalence
• The overall prevalence of LD
is estimated to be between 2
and 10%
– Approximately 5% of children
have identified LD in public
schools

7. Gender Differences
• Boys>Girls
• Among those with LD:
– Females generally have a lower
IQ, and perform more poorly in
math and reading, better in
writing
– Males tend to perform better
in math

8. Two Specific Conditions to be
considered Learning Disabled
1. When provided with appropriate learning
experiences, the student fails to achieve at a
level commensurate with his/her age or ability
level in one or more of the following: oral
expression, listening comprehension, written
expression, basic reading skill, reading
comprehension, mathematics calculation, or
mathematics reasoning.
2. The student has a severe discrepancy between
achievement and intellectual ability in the
stated areas that is not due to visual, hearing
or motor handicap, mental retardation,
emotional disturbance or environmental,
cultural or economic disadvantage.

9. Associated Features
• Social skills, demoralization, low
self-esteem
• Dropout rate as high as 40%
• Conduct
• Attention
• Internalizing symptoms
• Important predictors of
classroom failure

10. Associated Features
• More likely to be rejected, on-
task behavior, off-task behavior,
conduct disorders,
distractibility, and
shy/withdrawn behavior
• 8-39% comorbidity with ADHD

11. Genetics
•Pennington, 1995
–40% of LD children
have LD parents
–40% of their siblings
are LD

12. The most recent revised version of
the DSM-IV (DSM-IV-TR) includes
four diagnostic categories
• reading disorder,
• mathematics disorder,
• disorder of written expression,
• learning disorder not otherwise
specified.

13. Reading Disorder
• 75 percent of children and adolescents
with learning disorders have reading
disorders
• Defined as reading achievement below the
expected level for a child's age, education,
and intelligence, with the impairment
interfering significantly with academic
success or the daily activities that involve
reading.

14. Characteristics
• an impaired ability to recognize
words,
• slow and inaccurate reading,
• poor comprehension
• children with ADHD are at high risk
for reading disorder

15. • The term Developmental alexia
was accepted and defined as a
developmental deficit in the
recognition of printed symbols.
• Dyslexia was used extensively for
many years to describe a reading
disability syndrome that often
included speech and language
deficits and right-left confusion.

16. Epidemiology (Pattern of
Disease Development)
• 4 percent of school-age children in
the United States have reading
disorder
• Three to four times as many boys as
girls are reported to have reading
disability

17. Comorbidity (Appearance
of Multiple Illnesses)
• 25 percent of children with reading
disorder also have ADHD.
• Family studies indicate, ADHD and
reading disorder may be genetically
transmitted together.
• Children with reading disorders have
higher than average rates of
depression on self-report measures
and experience higher levels of
anxiety symptoms than children
without learning disorders.

18. Etiology (Study of Causes)
• most accurately described as a
neurobiological disorder with a
genetic origin.
• Children with reading disorders are
slower than average in naming
letters and numbers, even when
controlling for IQ.
• Given that reading disorder is
essentially a language deficit, the
left brain has been hypothesized to
be the anatomical site of the
dysfunction.

19. Etiology (Study of Causes)
• the ability to identify single words has been
linked to chromosome 15.
• Impairment in reading spelling has now been
linked to chromosomes 1, 2, 3, 6, 15, and 18.
• The first myth is that reading disorders are
primarily caused by visual-motor problems, or
what has been termed scotopic sensitivity
syndrome.

20. Etiology (Study of Causes)
• Complications during pregnancy and prenatal
and perinatal difficulties are common in the
histories of children with reading disorder.
• Extremely low birthweight and severely
premature children are at higher risk.
• Recent evidence suggests that certain peptides,
such as those derived from activity-dependent
neurotrophic factor-12, may mitigate alcohol-
induced fetal death and developmental learning
disabilities.

21. Clinical Features
• identified by the age of 7 years (second
grade).
• Children with reading disorder make many
errors in their oral reading.
• The errors are characterized by omissions,
additions, and distortions of words.
• Children have difficulty in distinguishing
between printed letter characters and sizes,
especially those that differ only in spatial
orientation and length of line.

22. Clinical Features
• Associated problems include language
difficulties, exhibited often as
impaired sound discrimination and
difficulty in sequencing words
properly.
• Older children tend to be angry and
depressed and exhibit poor self-
esteem.

23. Treatment
• focus a child's attention to the
connections between speech sounds and
spelling.
• Improvements were noted on measures of
reading accuracy, reading comprehension,
reading efficiency, passage reading
fluency, and spelling.
• After individual letter-sound associations
have been mastered, remediation can
target larger components of reading such
as syllables and words.
• individual education program (IEP)

24. Mathematics Disorder
• have difficulty learning and remembering
numerals, cannot remember basic facts about
numbers, and are slow and inaccurate in
computation.
• Poor achievement in four groups of skills have
been identified in mathematics disorder:
1) linguistic skills
2) perceptual skills
3) mathematical skills
4) attentional skills

25. • A variety of terms over the years,
including dyscalculia, congenital
arithmetic disorder, acalculia,
Gerstmann syndrome, and
developmental arithmetic disorder
have been used to denote the
difficulties present in mathematics
disorder.

26. Epidemiology
• 1 of every 5 children with learning
disorder have mathematics disorders
• 6 percent of school-age children have
some difficulty with mathematics
• Mathematics disorder may occur with
greater frequency in girls

27. Comorbidity
• commonly found comorbid with
reading disorder and disorder of
written expression.
• mathematics disorder may also be at
higher risk for expressive language
disorder, mixed receptive-expressive
language disorder, and developmental
coordination disorder.

28. Etiology
• partly caused by genetic factors.
• neurological deficit in the right
cerebral hemisphere, particularly in
the occipital lobe areas.
• the cause is thought to be
• multifactorial,
• maturational,
• cognitive,
• emotional,
• educational, and
• socioeconomic factors

29. Diagnosis
• a child's skills in mathematics fall
significantly below what is expected.
• Conceptual skills involve recognition of
mathematical symbols and being able to
use mathematical signs and line up numbers
correctly
• A definitive diagnosis can be made only
after a child takes an individually
administered standardized arithmetic test
and scores markedly below the level
expected

30. Treatment
• teaching mathematics concepts with
continuous practice in solving math
problems.
• Flash cards, workbooks, and
computer games can be a viable part
of this treatment.
• Project MATH, a multimedia self-
instructional or group-instructional
in-service training program, has been
successful

31. Disorder of Written
Expression
• the most complex skill acquired to
convey an understanding of language
and to express thoughts and ideas.
• the most complex skill acquired to
convey an understanding of language
and to express thoughts and ideas.
• Spelling mistakes are most often
phonetic errors

32. Disorder of Written
Expression
• Historically, dysgraphia (i.e., poor
writing skills) was considered to be a
form of reading disorder.
• Evidence indicates that disorder of
written expression can occur.

33. Comorbidity
• Children with writing disorder are at
higher risk.
• mathematics disorder, and
expressive and receptive language
disorders can occur.
• ADHD occurs with greater frequency
in children with writing disorders
than in the general population.

34. Etiology
• a deficit in the use of the
components of language related to
letter sounds.
• the combined effects of one or more
of the following:
»expressive language disorder,
»mixed receptive-expressive
language disorder,
»reading disorder.

35. Diagnosis
• based on a child's poor performance on
composing written text
• addition to spelling mistakes, a child
with writing disorder may have serious
grammatical mistakes, such as using
incorrect tenses, forgetting words in
sentences, and placing words in the
wrong order.
• child may have poor ability to
remember which words begin with
capital letters.

36. Treatment
• direct practice in spelling and
sentence writing.
• review of grammatical rules.
• Intensive and continuous
administration of individually
tailored.
• one-on-one expressive and creative
writing therapy.

37. Learning Disorder Not Otherwise
Specified
• This category is for disorders in learning
that do not meet criteria for any specific
learning disorder.
• This category might include problems in all
three areas (reading, mathematics, written
expression) that together significantly
interfere with academic achievement even
though performance on tests measuring
each individual skill is not substantially
below that expected given the person's
chronological age, measured intelligence,
and age-appropriate education.

38. SUMMARY
Learning Disability/Learning Disorder refers
to…..
- "a neurobiological disorder in which a
person's brain works or is structured
differently.“ (CCLD)
- “disorders in reading, mathematics,
and written expression” (DSM-IV)
- " a disorder in one or more of the
basic psychological processes involved
in understanding or using spoken or
written language.“ (IDEA)

39. SUMMARY
What a Learning Disability is not…..
• attention deficit hyperactivity disorder
(ADHD) and learning disabilities often occur
at the same time, but they're not the same.
•mental retardation, autism, hearing or visual
impairment, physical disabilities, emotional
disorders, or the normal process of learning a
second language.
•caused by lack of educational opportunities,
such as frequent changes of schools, poor
school attendance, or lack of instruction in
basic skills.

40. SUMMARY
What should you look for?
Most kids struggle with a specific subject
while others have trouble relating to a
certain style of teaching. Sometimes learning
disabilities are blamed on lack of motivation,
immaturity, or behavior problems. But if your
child has significant ongoing problems with
the "3 R's" — basic skills of reading, writing,
and arithmetic — then he/she may have a
learning disability.

41. “The disabilities
you can see may
be easier to deal
with than the
ones you can’t”

42. Suggestions on Dealing with
Persons with Learning Disabilities
1.Always remember the major
purpose or objective of the
learning disabled's effort.
2.Be sure to you don’t expect the
individual to perform beyond his
capacity.
3.Realize that working in the area
of disability is frustrating.

43. Suggestions on Dealing with
Persons with Learning Disabilities
4. Try another way. See if you can
find a different method of
teaching the skill, one that
might be simpler or easier for
the learning disabled individual.
5. Try to figure out what
strategies the learning disabled
individual is using to learn or
perform.

44. Thank you!!!