Understanding Learning Disabilities: Types, Causes & Impact - Research Paper

Introduction

Learning Disabilities is an umbrella term that is used to describe a wide variety of problems associated with learning. LD's are described as neurological conditions that end up interfering with the ability of a person to process, store, or produce any given information (Kranzler, Gilbert, Robert, Floyd & Benson, 2019). The learning disability manifests themselves differently in different people. For instance, some people are affected in reading capabilities, writing, speaking, spelling, computing, reasoning, coordination, social skills, emotional maturity, memory, and attention. Most people confuse learning disabilities with other conditions such as deafness, autism, behavioral disorders, blindness, and intellectual disabilities.

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Child Communication Delays

Communication delays are considered one of the early signs of learning disabilities. Some children experienced delays in communication, which later leads to the emergence of learning disabilities. Children's communication is considered as having delayed if they surpass the age of five and a half years while having social difficulties and incidences of attention. Speech and language impairment at the age of seven and a half to 13 years of age contribute to impaired writing skills, deficits in spelling and punctuation, and impaired. The delays in language development lead to a range of impaired language functions, which is a factor that negatively affects the educational achievement of a child (Owens, 2016).

Stages

The stages of language and communication development are classified as being seven. The first stage commences at the age of 0-3 months. The form of communication exhibited by a child at this time is reflexive communication. The second phase of communication development normally occurs between the ages of 3-8 months, where a child exhibits reflexive communication and starts showing interest in others. The third stage occurs at the age of 8-13 months, whereby they start showing intentional communication and showing some aspects of sociability. At the fourth stage, which occurs at the age of 12-18 months, a child starts mincing the first words. The fifth stage of language development is at the age of 18 to 24, whereby a child can convey simple sentences of about two words. The sixth stage in communication development is at the age of 2 to 3 years, whereby the child can covey sentences that are of three or more words. The final phase of communication development occurs at the age of 3 to 5 years, whereby a child is capable of speaking complex sentences and having a conversation (Owens, 2016).

Speech Disorders

Speech disorders or impairment are regarded as communication disorders that have an impact on how a child reads, writes, talks, and understands. Speech impairment is three, and they include articulation disorders, fluency, and voice disorders. The articulation disorders are regarded as errors that occur during the production of speech sound and may be related to anatomical or physiological limitations in the muscular, skeletal, and neuromuscular, which offer immense support during the production of a speech. The articulation disorders are three, which include omission, substitution, and distortions. The fluency disorders are usually characterized by various difficulties in the rhythm and timing of the given speech. The fluency disorders are characterized by prolongation of sounds, hesitations, syllables, words, and phrases. The common form of fluency disorders is cluttering, which is the use of excessively jerky and fast speech. The second form of fluency disorder is stuttering, which is a rapid-fire repetition of vowel sounds or consonants, hesitations, interjections, and having complete verbal blocks. Finally, the voice disorder results from the problems arising at the Larynx. They are usually depicted by the absence of loudness, pitch, duration, resonance, and abnormal production of voice/sound (Dodd, 2011).

Language Disorders

Language disorders are defines as communication disorders that a person has difficulties in learning as well as using various forms of languages such as written, spoken, and sign language. Children with language disorders have language capabilities that are below what is expected for their age, a factor that limits their ability to communicate well and engage in an academic, social, and professional environment.

Language disorders, in most cases, occurs in five major areas that include semantics disorders, pragmatic difficulties, phonological disorders, morphological, and syntactical deficits. Phonological disorders are characterized by a significant deficit in speech perception or production, whereby some words are hard to understand, and some of the sounds are not said correctly. Morphological disorders occur when an individual has difficulties in morphological inflections on verbs, nouns, and adjectives. Semantic disorders are whereby a person demonstrates poor vocabulary and use of words inappropriately. Syntactic deficits are whereby the speaker has difficulties in applying rules that govern word order and other aspects of grammar. Pragmatic difficulties are problems that occur when someone has difficulties in understanding or even using language in a varied social context (Smith, 2015).

Language disorders affect language development and education such that delay in communication affects oral motor function. Socialization and the ability to use language plays an important role in learning. However, with these difficulties, students are usually disturbed, and it becomes difficult for them to learn. Understanding language is a fundamental part of learning communication skills as well as the development of a child.

Speech/Language Pathologists

Speech-language pathologists are responsible for helping children with communication disorders. First, they provide children with individual therapy. In some cases, they work collaboratively with the teacher to find an effective solution to facilitating the communication of a child in the class. Further, they also work with parents to ascertain the best-suited therapy for the children. The speech-language pathologists use assistive technology to assist children with language or speech difficulties to learn more. The technology applied includes multiple sets of applications of reacquiring and developing language functions (Shipley & McAfee, 2015).

References

Dodd, B. (2011). Differentiating speech delay from disorder: does it matter?. Topics in Language disorders, 31(2), 96-111. doi: 10.1097/TLD.0b013e318217b66a

Kranzler, J. H., Gilbert, K., Robert, C. R., Floyd, R. G., & Benson, N. F. (2019). Further Examination of a Critical Assumption Underlying the Dual-Discrepancy/Consistency Approach to Specific Learning Disability Identification. School Psychology Review, 48(3), 207-221. DOI: 10.17105/SPR-2018-0008.V48-3

Owens, R. E. (2016). Language Development: An Introduction 9e.

Shipley, K. G., & McAfee, J. G. (2015). Assessment in speech-language pathology: A resource manual. Nelson Education.

Smith, M. M. (2015). Language development of individuals who require aided communication: Reflections on state of the science and future research directions. Augmentative and Alternative Communication, 31(3), 215-233. https://doi.org/10.3109/07434618.2015.1062553