Learning disabilities and attention disorders: When do we go for diagnosis?

 Learning disabilities and attention disorders: When do we go for diagnosis?

Does your child suffer from dyslexia? How do you know if his condition requires a diagnosis? What is the difference between attention and concentration disorders and learning disabilities? Which diagnostic tests are appropriate for your child's condition?

Do you suspect that your child suffers from dyslexia? How do you know if there is a need to go to diagnose his condition? What is the difference between attention and concentration disorders and learning disabilities? Which diagnostic tests are appropriate for your child's condition? Who has the authority to diagnose such cases, and to which authorities should you go to diagnose attention and concentration disorders and learning disabilities?

When is it preferable to go for diagnosis?

Tests for diagnosing attention and concentration disorders and learning disabilities aim to diagnose the child’s ability and the difficulties he faces, while presenting a picture of his educational abilities with the aim of tailoring an educational program that suits his needs. It is recommended to seek diagnosis in the following cases:

* When a child’s performance in various educational subjects, or in a particular subject (such as arithmetic, or reading) does not match his mental ability that appears in his daily life, or when the effort he puts into studying is not reflected in his academic achievement.

* When the teaching/educational staff at the school - who communicates daily with the student and is aware of how he adapts to the various study requirements - notices an abnormality and recommends a diagnosis for the student, his recommendations must be taken into account.

* When a student complains a lot about the difficulty of understanding and applying the material he is learning.

* When a student at school shows psychological or behavioral difficulties, such as: disturbances, refusal or attempt to escape from school, evasion of participation in educational activities, fear or nervousness.

These difficulties stem from many different factors, but in some cases they are a reflection of the suffering and difficulties that the student faces as a result of his failure to achieve, which stems from educational difficulty.

Diagnosis of Learning Disorders:

Learning disability is an umbrella name for a group of learning difficulties that harm a student's learning ability or performance as a student. This group includes attention and concentration disorders and learning impairments such as dyslexia and dyscalculia. Diagnosing each of these conditions requires different diagnostic tests.

Didactic Diagnosis

Educational diagnosis is directed at tracking learning disabilities and diagnosing the student's needs, and enables the student to integrate into educational settings. To the extent required by the child's condition, the education specialist makes recommendations to allow certain educational and examination accommodations. Educational diagnosis includes a wide range of tasks that examine the different thinking abilities required for proper academic performance, such as quantitative and visual perception, long-term and short-term memory, attention, physical motor ability, reading, writing, arithmetic, and linguistic and visual (visual) skills.

Educational diagnosis does not allow for formal recognition of the presence of attention and concentration disorders or psychological difficulties that harm the student's educational ability, but it may help in assessing the need for in-depth diagnosis in these areas. Such a diagnosis can be made by an educational diagnostician or a psychologist (educational or therapeutic) who has undergone training that qualifies him to work in this field.

Psycho-educational diagnosis

This type of diagnosis is used when it is suspected that there is a mixture of psychological and thinking factors that lead to manifestations of learning disability. Psychoeducational diagnosis includes “standard” educational diagnostic test components, as well as tasks directed to detecting the presence of psychological difficulties in the student. Based on the results of the diagnosis, the specialist can distinguish between the different difficulties that lead to manifestations of learning disability and then provide advice and recommendations to build an educational/treatment program consistent with the results of the diagnosis.

For example, the diagnostician may discover that in addition to the presence of dyslexia, there are features of depression that reduce the student's enthusiasm or drive. As is the case with educational diagnosis, educational/psychological diagnosis does not enable the detection of attention and concentration disorders, but rather indicates or estimates the need for more in-depth testing in this area.

The specialist qualified to conduct psycho-educational diagnostic tests is a psychologist (educational or therapeutic) who has undergone training that qualifies him to work in this field.

In some cases, a joint diagnostic test is performed by an educational specialist and a psychologist, each in his field.

Diagnosis of attention and concentration disorders:

Attention and concentration disorders can be diagnosed based on various diagnostic criteria, the most important of which is therapeutic diagnosis, which is based on collecting information from the student himself, his family, and those close to him. By conducting interviews and, sometimes, observing the student, the diagnostician collects information regarding the student's behaviors and the difficulties that characterize his attention and concentration disorders.

The interview does not provide a direct test of the student's ability to pay attention and focus, but rather focuses on the behaviors that result from this (for example, difficulty completing tasks), so the diagnostic test is, in some cases, accompanied by a thinking-executive test, during which the student's performance is examined when he Carrying out a task that requires attention and concentration capabilities.

Attention and concentration disorders are neurological disorders, so only a psychologist or neurologist is allowed to diagnose these disorders. Psychologists who carry out educational diagnosis or educational-psychological diagnosis can identify cases that require carrying out a specific diagnostic test to detect disturbances of concentration and attention, without formally diagnosing it.