Learning Disabilities
Characteristics
Students with learning disabilities might exhibit one or more of the following characteristics:
Reading
- Remembering or comprehending what was read
- Difficulty finding important points or main ideas
- Slow reading rate
Writing
- Difficulty with sentence structure, poor grammar, spelling errors
- Difficulty organizing thoughts onto paper
- Poor penmanship
- Slow writing
Listening
- Difficulty listening to a lecture and taking notes at the same time
- Easily distracted by background noise or visual stimulation
Oral Language
- Difficulty expressing ideas orally
- Difficulty describing events or stories in proper sequence
- Difficulty with grammar
- Using a similar sounding word in place of the appropriate one
Math
- Incomplete mastery of basic facts such as multiplication tables
- Reversal of numbers, number sequences or symbols
- Difficulty copying problems, aligning columns
- Difficulty comprehending word problems and understanding key concepts
- Recalling steps or sequences
Suggestions
Reviews and Previews - Review major points of the previous lecture or class and highlight main points to be covered that day. Try to present reviews and previews both visually and orally.
Study Aids - Use study aids such as study questions for exams or pretests with immediate feedback before the final exam.
Multi-sensory Teaching - Students with learning disabilities learn more readily if material is presented in as many modalities as possible (seeing, speaking, doing.)
Use color - For example in a complex mathematical sequence, use color to follow transformations and to highlight relationships.
Announcements - Whenever possible, announcements should be in oral and written form. This is especially important for changes in assignments or exams.
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