Are Learning Disabilities Used as Excuses?

There seems to be no end to the number of learning disabilities students are labeled with. According to helpguide.org, Approximately one in every seven people in the U.S. has a learning disability. Learning disabilities involve four stages of processing information. They involve the way we input information, integrate information, remember information and communicate information orally or physically.

Learning disabilities can be academic, such as dyslexia causing problems with deciphering writing, dysgraphia, causing problems with writing legibly, or dyscalculia, causing problems calculating or understanding math concepts. Other learning disabilities include visual processing problems, developmental motor skill disorders, and nonverbal learning disorder (where students do not understand non-verbal cues, which are common in autism). Speech and language disorders are also considered learning disabilities.

Most learning disabilities are recognized once a child starts school. When children show difficulty reading, spelling, and writing or with early math, this will clue a teacher to the possibility that the child may have a learning disability.

While I would never argue that a learning disability is not real, I have seen evidence that when too much emphasis is put on the learning disability, the student is given an excuse to do poorly.

Let us take attention deficit disorder for example; it is a valid disorder for many. Even I have quite a few of the traits of ADD. However, once a child is labeled with the disorder to causes problems it seems that it is OK for the child to do less than excellent in his schoolwork. If Timmy disrupts the class, it is OK because he has ADHD. If he gets C's on his tests, it is Ok because he has ADHD. If he does not hand in his homework, it is OK because he has ADHD.