Does My Child Have a Learning Disability?

Although many kids may struggle with schoolwork throughout their academic careers, it’s often hard to know if your child has a learning disability. There is no one behavior or learning difficulty that equals a diagnosis and learning disabilities can affect nonacademic areas of your child’s life, too. So, what happens when you suspect your child might have a disability? Educators and experts have shared their thoughts on how to get your child evaluated for a learning disability and how you can support her academically and in everyday efforts.
 

Symptoms of a Learning Disability

A learning disability can present in many different ways, says Colin Montgomery, a family educator at INCLUDEnyc and a former special education teacher. A learning disability is simply a disorder in one or more of the processes kids use in understanding and using language, and can express itself in reading, writing, or math, according to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. It can also be nonverbal or look like an attention issue because your child has an auditory processing difficulty. 

The many issues that might arise because of a learning disability make it difficult to figure out if your child has one. After all, it’s common for kids have trouble with certain units in science class or resist doing their homework. Sometimes, you need to puzzle it out to see if a learning disability is to blame.

“Inside the classroom you can see kids struggling. Then you can see them come home and be unhappy to do their homework,” says Cassie Reilly, the transition coordinator at Northport High School. “Homework gives parents a chance to see if kids are able to apply the skills they’re learning at school, at home independently. And if they’re not able to, that’s a sign to reach out to the teacher.”

Another sign of a learning disability, Reilly says, can be that your child is trying so hard to get something right but is making no progress. When you hear “needs to be working more toward potential” or “not trying hard enough” from your child’s teacher, that’s a warning. 

Unlike children with intellectual disabilities, kids with learning disabilities often have average or above-average IQs that their grades don’t reflect. When your child’s intellectual abilities do not match up with his ability to do schoolwork, that’s a red flag, says Erica Maltz, founder and CEO of WhizKidz Tutoring LLC in Westchester and a former educator. Poor executive functioning can also come into play with learning disabilities. 

“If you hear from a teacher that your child is disorganized, disengaged, not completing assignments…it might be a sign of learning troubles,” Maltz says.

Could it be Something Other Than a Learning Disability?

“With some students, you might think it’s a learning disability, but they could be moving from another school or district in New York, or another state, and they just didn’t have good instruction [before],” Montgomery says. “[Learning issues] might be a function of being a multilingual learner, or the student wasn’t given appropriate instruction in the past.”

Transitioning between grades can pose challenges for some students, Reilly says, and sometimes anxiety is just anxiety. Parents and educators need to consider the big picture of the child and evaluate her educational strengths and weaknesses against each other.

Harold Levinson, M.D., director of the Levinson Medical Center for Learning Disabilities in Great Neck, points out that some symptoms of learning disabilities can be attributed to inner ear and cerebellum problems—issues that can be fixed with medication. If your child is finding learning difficult but also has memory and speech problems, uncoordinated balance, poor concentration, high activity levels and impulsivity, and was late to walk and talk, he might have an inner ear issue.

What Should I Do?

If you’ve exhausted alternative explanations and still suspect a learning disability, you should begin the process of getting help. While many parents proceed directly to getting their child evaluated for an Individualized Education Program, there are some other options to consider first. For example, many schools offer intervention programs such as extra help in certain subjects that kids can participate in without an IEP. Completing a year of extra programming in areas where she’s struggling might be enough to get your kid up to speed. 

"The [New York City] DOE is supposed to provide at-risk services [called Response to Intervention] for students who are behind academically,” Montgomery says. “There should be opportunities to get that foundational instruction, repeated instruction, without needing to automatically get an IEP.” In fact, the New York State Department of Education mandates all schools offer RTI, though districts have the freedom to design their own programs as long as they meet basic state criteria.

Schools also generally screen students’ math and reading levels at the beginning of the year. If you’ve previously been concerned about your child, now is a good time to check with her teacher and see if she has progressed from last year. The City, a nonprofit news outlet, recently reported that two Brooklyn elementary schools will implement a basic screening for dyslexia that will hopefully help diagnose more kids, earlier.