first draft

Steven Bennett

Professor Kerr

En101-23

9/13/11

Learning disabilities

If you do any studies on how children are learning in elementary school rite now you will most likely come up with a link that has something to do with learning disabilities. A learning disability is a neurological disorder that affects the brain's ability to receive, process, store, and respond to information (learning disability basics). Although many people think that a learning disability is just when someone has difficulty learning things that others can grasp easily.  People that have this misconception of the disease have a hard time believing in and often just refer to the person with the learning disability as dumb. If you hear someone say “that person has a LD” they are saying that they have a learning disability. Learning disabilities affect 2.6 million students in the United States i will cover how to diagnose LD’s, common LD's, and how to treat LD's.

LD is not one disorder it is more a blanket term that covers many disorders (learning disability basics). Diagnosing a LD can be difficult because there is no pre-birth testing like there is for other mental disabilities.  The parents of the child have to wait until they start some sort of schooling. They have to wait and see if there child is having trouble learning things that the majority of kids are grasping rather easily. At this point the child has already started falling behind the class. Testing for a LD is not as easy as going to get a CAT scan or blood test. To determine if a child suffers from a LD the parents have to take the child to a specialist.  Once they arrive the specialist they will run through tests that are proven to show whether a child is suffering from a LD or not. There are many different LD’s that a child could be suffering from.

LD’s can be more or less savior depending on the person, there is not a set amount someone can be affected by these disorders. There are lots of learning disabilities for example short term memory loss is considered a learning disability. Short term memory loss could effect a child in school or a working adult. Short term memory loss would be if someone had just learned something new and had fully gained knowledge of a concept and then a time later they have completely forgotten the concept or has even forgotten ever even learning about it. More of the common LD’s are known and well documented. One of the most common LD’s is dyslexia. Dyslexia is when a person has “difficulty processing language, problems reading, writing, spelling, and speaking” (Learning Disabilities in Children).  Many people think dyslexia is just when a person reads or writes backwards but there is more to it than that.  Although it can make a person mix up the order that they see or write the letters, there is more to the disorder then just that. Another common disorder is dyscalculia; it has more to do with everyday life. Dyscalculia affects a person’s use with math, understanding time, using money (learning disabilities in children). This is a disorder that could cause someone to get taken advantage of.  For example, if someone was purchasing an item at a store and the gave the cashier more money than required and the person at the cash register  did not give the money back then the person who purchased the item would be taken advantage of.

            LD’s are often hereditary which an advantage to a parent is if they know that someone in their family has or had suffered from a LD. If they notice that their child is falling behind or having difficulty in school the parent can easily begin to tie the child’s difficulty and family history together. This is when the parent should contact a professional and see what the next correct step is in helping the child. LD is a lifelong disorder there is no permanent fix for a disorder. Like other disorders there are no easy fixes. For example ADHD has medicine that can help someone cope with the disorder. ADHD is not a learning disability; they are two separate disorders (Learning Disabilities Basics).  So ADHD and a LD can co-occur in someone which would make it very difficult for that person. Since there are no easy fixes for LD’s the person that is suffering from the disorder has to do a lot of extra work to diminish the effect of their disorder. The person suffering will most likely meet with a specialist at least once a week and go over strategies that will help them cope. Most of their training will be repetition so there brain becomes used to processing the information in a new and correct way.

LD’s are disorders that will affect someone’s mind for the rest of their life. The disorders can make what should be easy tasks more difficult for those who suffer from them. As the disorder will make some situations more challenging but, they do not make them impossible. There are a lot of specialists that have been thought the correct way to help people that suffer from these disorders. The specialists are not just for children, it is never too late for someone to get help. A LD can put speed bumps in someone’s life, but it cannot stop them from doing what they want.