Because Not All Great Minds Think Alike

I want to continue to share some things I learned last week.

• 15% of the U.S. population has some type of significant learning challenge. In other words, 15% qualify for special ed. 85% of kids are in special ed because they can't read. The problem is, most of the special ed teachers are trained for medical needs. They are NOT reading teachers!
• Difficulty with basic reading and language skills are the most common learning challenges.
• With early identification and intervention, children with learning difficulties can learn strategies to achieve like other children. Unfortunately, this "shuts off" by 3rd - 4th grade! You've got to get them in intervention early.
• Learning difficulties should not be confused with other disabilities such as mental retardation, autism, deafness, and behavior disorders.

Sally Shaywitz, M.D., from the Yale Center for Dyslexia and Creativity describes a learning challenge as "A weakness in a sea of strengths". I love this quote. This is her definition: "People with learning difficulties generally have average or above average intelligence, but their learning challenges cause an unexpected gap between their perceived potential and their performance in some academic area or areas."

And, finally, here are some things that I learned about Jared and his challenges... present and future:
These kids have difficulty spelling and writing.
They cannot memorize very well.
They don't think, a lot of the time, before they do things.
They don't do flashcards very well.
They absolutely cannot visualize a word!!!
They don't use big words in writing. You will usually see this in 6th grade and higher grades.
They are not big risk takers, because of it. {enter my sadness, as folks who know me know I have taken HUGE risks in my life, traveling the world and even being thrown in prison in a 3rd world country.} 
Their best friends are calculators, as they get older, as it's not as easy to flip numbers around.
They have a hard time with math. The words subtracTION, multiplicaTION, addiTION, & diviSION sound very similar to kids like Jared. They hear the "TION" sound and are still processing that and it can be confusing.

And the list goes on and on. I'm so thankful to have learned some things about my son I would never have imagined. This is all so wonderful in helping him find various ways to cope in the future.

Whatever you do, do it wholeheartedly as though you were working for your real master and not merely for humans. Colossians 3:23 (TLB)