Learning Disabilities

What “ah-ha” moments did you have as a result of completing the reading? What makes sense to you now that didn’t before?

What I did not know about learning disabilities was how often they are found in schools. I was not aware that, “one-third of all children who receive special education have a learning disability.” This article says that 1 in 5 people in the United States has a learning disability and that was really surprising to me at first. After reading further on in the article, it made sense to me that the statistics are so high because learning disability is a big category and includes many different abilities and disabilities.

At the bottom of the article mentioned above, the IDEA’s definition of Specific Learning Disability surprised me. What surprised me was not the definition of what it is but what it is NOT. It states, “Specific learning disability 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.” Reading what it is not made it clear to me that specific learning disability has to be a disorder affecting a psychological process in understanding or using their spoken or written abilities. This includes math!

What (specific) strategies might you want to use with students with learning disabilities in the classroom?  (hint: you could use this list in your Accommodations and Modifications project)

• Let these students use a computer to check spelling, grammar, and even reorganizes sentence and speech
• Giving extra time
• Breaking larger projects/tasks into smaller pieces
• Audiobooks
• Provide sentence starters
• Use signals to engage students when they seem to be drifting off
• Speak slow and clear
• Text to speech software
• Daily schedules
• Repeat key phrases during instruction

*Is a child with a Learning Disability always going to have an IEP? What if they do not?