Information For Parents Of Children With Learning Disabilities

What Parents And Teachers Should Know About Children With Learning Disabilities

Parents and teachers must remain sensitive to the needs and feelings of learning disabled children, as children with learning disabilities often experience feelings of low self-esteem, frustration and other negative emotions ...

Children with learning disabilities often experience feelings of low self-esteem. Before the learning disability is diagnosed, these children may feel frustrated and stupid as they see their peers easily accomplish tasks that to them seem impossible.

Children can be cruel, and these feelings may be exacerbated by teasing and taunting from classmates. After a diagnosis is made, parents may feel relief at understanding what is going on with their child. However, for the child, a diagnosis may be quite scary and lead to enhanced feelings of isolation and low self-esteem.

The child may also choose to use the learning disability as a shield, excusing poor performance or even behavior issues by blaming them on the learning disability.

Parents and teachers must remain sensitive to the needs and feelings of learning disabled children. The possibility of sending learning disabled children to special learning disability schools does exist, and for extremely sensitive children or those with a severe learning disability this may be the best option. However, learning disability schools carry their own stigma and are generally not appropriate for mildly learning disabled children. Most often, mainstreaming is the best choice for children with learning disabilities that are mild or moderate in severity.

The question of how best to treat a learning disability is not easily answered. Usually the answer is as individual as the student is. Assistive technology products may be helpful in allowing the child to work around the learning disability. High-tech solutions such as optical character readers and voice-activated calculators can be expensive but worthwhile as learning disabled children advance in school. For smaller children, low-tech assistive technology products will often suffice. Assistive technology products should not, however, be considered the be-all end-all solution for students with learning disabilities.

Remediation is often the treatment of choice for students with learning disabilities. Methodical teaching processes can gradually re-train the brain to some extent, as well as teaching the student strategies to use to work around the learning disability. An individual treatment plan should be developed with input from the teacher, student, parents, and school psychologist or other expert.

It is important that children with learning disabilities be permitted to become advocates in their own care. Students with learning disabilities will eventually become part of the adult world, and the learning disability is something that they will have to live with forever. The younger children with a learning disability are when they learns about the disability, the easier it will be to integrate the learning disability as a regular part of life.

Parents and teachers should remember that children with learning disabilities are not slow. Usually the IQ of a learning disabled child is at or above normal, and some are extremely intelligent. When remediating the learning disability it is important to continue to challenge the child intellectually. Intellectual stimulation can be the catalyst that sparks a learning disabled child to continue working through the disability.

Children with learning disabilities should be handled with tact and respect. These children often experience taunting and mean spiritedness from their classmates and may struggle with issues related to self-esteem. Parents and teachers should strive to understand and respect the emotional issues involved and manage the learning disability in a way that empowers and strengthens the child. Learning disabilities are not curable but are highly manageable, and allowing the child to take the lead in disability management will bring the best results.

Next article: Some Specific Learning Disabilities You Should Know About

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