Generally Learning Disability

Generally learning disability means having a disorder in either one or more of the fundamental psychological processes associated with using or understanding written or spoken language. This condition manifests itself in various ways including: an unsatisfactory ability to write, listen, think, read, speak, spell or carry out mathematical calculations. This includes conditions like brain injury, dyslexia, minimal brain dysfunction, developmental aphasia and perpetual disabilities (Teaching LD, 2008).

Currently, there are many ways of determining if a student has a learning disability. One of them is through Response to Intervention (RTI) method. This is a new approach that has been adopted and it entails documentation demonstrating that a student is not able to respond precise interventions offered in the classroom (Logsdon, 2010). If they show consistent underachieving, then they are eligible for learning disability’s special education. There are various forms of this including standard protocol approach and problem solving approach. It is done differently from the discrepancy model that is exercised basically by a combination of academic testing and intellectual (cognitive) achievement.

Litt (2008) observes that it should be noted that different states employ different practices and standards and public and private schools also engage different ways of determine learning disabilities. For instance public systems usually combine formal evaluation; where they use aptitude achievement discrepancy to establish the sternness of the disability and RTI to know whether the academic problems are due to a learning disability. On the other hand, evaluators in private sector employ the use of either International Statistical Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) or Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-IV) to establish the learning disability. These approaches, both DSM and ICD heavily depend on the professional judgment of evaluators. The judgments usually vary form one evaluator to another. All these are exercised after carefully examine the problems that the student is experiencing and identifying the source of the problem.