What is a Learning Disability

Disability is an educational term whereas disorder is a medical term. In education we are bound by the Diagnostic Statistical Manual of Mental Illness (DSM-V) which is a medical manual, used in education in order to provide special education services for students. Learning disabilities is a term for a number of disorders which may affect the acquisition, organization, retention, understanding and/or use of verbal or nonverbal information. These disorders affect learning in individuals who otherwise demonstrate average abilities essential for thinking and/or reasoning.

Learning disabilities are due to genetic and/or neurobiological factors or injury that alters brain functioning in one or more processes related to language-based learning (and may coexist with various conditions including attention, behaviour or emotion based disorders, sensory impairments or other medical conditions).

Signs of a Learning Disability

Learning disabilities range in severity and may interfere with the acquisition and use of one or more of the following:

• Verbal skills (e.g. listening, speaking, understanding)
• Reading skills (e.g. decoding, phonetic knowledge, word recognition, comprehension)
• Written language (e.g. spelling, written expression)
• Mathematics (e.g. computation, problem solving)
• Organizational skills (eg. ability to focus and plan to achieve desired outcome)
• Social skills (eg. understanding social interactions, body language, expression)
• Executive functions (e.g. planning and decision-making)

These disabilities are not due primarily to hearing and/or vision problems, socio-economic factors, cultural or linguistic differences, lack of motivation or ineffective teaching, although these factors may further complicate the challenges faced by individuals with learning disabilities.