Signs In Infancy

• Trouble with nursing, sucking or digesting
• Resistance to cuddling and body contact
• Lack of, or excessive response to sounds or other stimulus
• Trouble following movements with eyes
• Unusual sleep patterns
• Delays in sitting, standing, walking
• Absence of creeping and crawling
• Little or no vocalization
• Irritability

Tomorrow we will look at the signs of Preschool aged children

What Are Some Common Signs Of Learning Disabilities

Over then next number of days we will be taking a look at some of the common signs of Learning Disabilities.

It is estimated that 10% of Canadians have learning disabilities.  Because of the very nature of the disability and because most children spend at least ten years of their lives in school, the most frequently noted signs are related to school performance.  However, it is important to remember that the disability is not confined to school hours and may be identified during the preschool years.

In most cases, parents rarely realize that anything is amiss until the child enters school.  In the case of children with more severe learning disabilities, the parents may have suspected for some time that something was different about this child.  If parents, teachers, and other professionals discover a child's learning disability early and provide the right kind of help, it can give the child a chance to develop skills needed to lead a successful and productive life.  A recent US Nation Institutes of Health study showed that 67% of young students who were at risk for reading difficulties became average or above average readers after receiving help in the early grades.  All children exhibit some of the following behaviours at times. 

The presence of one or two of these signs may not be significant, but a cluster of these behaviours requires further assessment.

We will look at the signs in separate blogs daily.  Keep Posted.

Should people with dysgraphia use cursive writing instead of printing?

For many children with dysgraphia, cursive writing has several advantages.  It eleminates the necessity of picking up a pencil and deciding where to replace it after each letter.  Each letter starts on the line, thus eliminating anther potencially confusing decision for the writer.  Cursive also has very few reversible letters, a typical source of trouble for people with dysgraphia.  It eliminates word-spacing problems and gives words a flow and rhythm that enhances learning.  For children who find it difficult to remember the motor patterns of letter forms, starting with cursive eliminates the traumatic transition from manuscript to cursive writing.  Writers in cursive also have more opportunity to distinguish b, d, p, and q because the cursive letter formations for writing each of these letters is so different.

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What is the treatment for dysgraphia?

Prevention, remediation and accommodation are all important elements in the treatment of dysgraphia.  Many problems can be prevented by early training.  Young children in kindergarten and grade one should learn to form letters correctly; kinesthetic memory is powerful and incorrect habits are very difficult to eradicate.

Muscle training and over-learning good techniques are both critical for the remediation of dysgraphia.  Specifically designed exercises are needed to increase strength and dexterity.  A specialist can recommend the most appropriate plan of exercises.  For all students, kinesthetic writing, that is writing with eyes closed or averted, is a powerful reinforcer.  Work needs always to begin with the formation of individual letters written in isolation.  Alphabets need to be practiced daily, often for months.

Finally, individuals can benefit from a variety of modifications and accommodations.  One effective method is to teach the use of a word processor, by passing the complex motor demands of handwriting.  Many students may find learning the keyboard by the alphabet method easier than beginning with the home keys.  For many, touch typing offers a whole new opportunity to learn to spell through a different kinesthetic mode.  Students should also experiment with different writing tools; some people with dysgraphia may find pencil grips helpful.  Other bypass methods include allowing a student to answer questions orally or into a tape recorder instead of writing, modifying written assignments so that less writing is required, and allowing extended time to complete tests and assignments.  Copying from the board is an especially difficult task.  Teachers need to provide notes.  Photocopying the notes of anther student is one possibility.  Providing an outline, with spaces left for the student to fill in information, is another.  Writing on a slightly inclined plane may be helpful.

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Who is qualified to diagnose dysgraphia

Dysgraphia cannot be diagnosed solely by looking at a handwriting sample.  A qualified clinician must directly test the individual.  Such a test includes writing self-generated sentences and paragraphs and copying age-appropriate text.  The examiner assesses not only the finished product, but also the process, including posture, position, pencil grip, fatigue, cramping or tremor of the writing hand, eyedness and handedness, and other factors.  The examiner may assess fine-motor speed with finger-tapping and wrist turning.

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What are the different types of dysgraphia?

While dysgraphia may be broadly classified as follows, there are many individual variations that affect both treatment and prognosis:

1. In dyslexic dysgraphia, spontaneously written text is illegible, espceially when the text is complex.  Oral spelling is poor, but drawing and copying of written text are relatively normal.  Finger-tapping speed (a measure of fine motor speed) is normal.
2. In motor dysgraphia, both spontaneously written and copied text may be illegible, oral spelling is normal, and drawing is usually problematic.  Finger-tapping speed is abnormal.
3. In spatial dysgraphia, people display illegible writing, whether spontaneously produced or prepared.  Oral spelling is normal.  Finger-tapping speed is normal, but drawing is very problematic.

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What Causes Dysgraphia?

A few people with dysgraphia lack only the fine-motor coordination to produce legible handwriting, but some may have a physical tremor that interferes with writing.  In most cases, however, several brain systems interact to produce dysgraphia.  Some experts believe that dysgraphia involves a dysfunction in the interaction between the two main brain systems that allows a person to translate mental into written langauge (phoneme-to-grapheme translation, i.e. Sound to symbol, and lexicon-to-grapheme translation, i.e. mental to written word).  Other studies have shown that split attention, memory load, and familiarity of graphic material affect writing ability.  Typically, a person with illegible handwriting has a combination of fine-motor difficulty, inability to revisulize letters, and inability to remember the motor patterns of letter forms

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