Category Archives: Dyscalculia Overview

Dyslexia more than 100 times more likely to be diagnosed than maths-learning disorder

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Researchers in Northern Ireland have found that many children are suffering from an undiagnosed developmental condition which affects their ability to learn maths.

A team of academics at Queen’s University Belfast who examined the performance of more than 2,400 primary schoolchildren found that some 112 children had a specific learning disorder in maths.

However, just one of these children was diagnosed with a specific maths-learning disorder, also known as dyscalculia.

The prevalence of the condition is thought to be similar to dyslexia, though there is far less awareness of it.

Read all about it HERE

the importance of getting an assessment

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See the comment from someone on REDDIT who is very happy that they got their diagnosis.

Got my official diagnosis!

Had my evaluation about a month ago and just saw I was emailed my report yesterday! I’m reading through it and feeling so many different emotions. I was diagnosed with moderate-severe dyscalculia, as well as math anxiety. I’ve struggled my whole life with math and numbers generally, so to finally know why and have that confirmed means everything to me. I feel like I can have a little more compassion for myself and younger me who had no clue what was going on and why everything was so tough. This also means I can officially get accommodations for work and if I decide I want to go back to school eventually (I’m 24 and dropped out of college after one semester due to overwhelming math anxiety). It’s amazing to feel like I can actually consider pursuing a degree now if I get the help I need. I know not everyone is able to access or afford an evaluation, but if you can and want to, please take this as your sign to go for it.

Information about assessments is HERE

Essential Tools for Dyscalculia Support

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If your child struggles with math or writing, you’re not alone. Dyscalculia (math learning difficulties) and dysgraphia (writing challenges) can make everyday tasks frustrating-but with the right support, every child can thrive! This parent-friendly guide, written by top educators and learning specialists, provides research-backed strategies to help children build confidence and succeed in school and beyond.

Read more HERE

Teaching reasoning strategies to dyscalculic students with low working memory level

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Dyscalculic students believe they need to memorize mathematical facts. This is due to their inability to think flexibly and their lack of knowledge about the possibility of performing operations by structuring numbers. So, the aim of this study is to teach dyscalculic students to use reasoning strategies. The study employed an instructional experiment, a research design that enables the investigation of how mental processes evolve in student-friendly learning environments. Six fifth-grade middle school dyscalculic students participated. Before the implementation, we observed that none of the students employed reasoning strategies. Over a six-week period, the application included activities aimed at teaching reasoning strategies for dyscalculic students. The implementation resulted in students’ ability to understand the relationships between numbers in addition and subtraction operations and employ various strategies during these operations. This result suggests that applying appropriate interventions to dyscalculic students can lead to significant progress and the acquisition of reasoning strategies.

Read all about it HERE

The Mental Number Line in Dyscalculia: Impaired Number Sense or Access from Symbolic Numbers?

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Numbers may be manipulated and represented mentally over a compressible number line oriented from left to right. According to numerous studies, one of the primary reasons for dyscalculia is related to improper understanding of the mental number line. Children with dyscalculia usually show difficulty when they have to place Arabic numbers on a physical number line. However, it remains unclear whether they have a deficit with the mental number line per se or a deficit with accessing it from nonsymbolic and/or symbolic numbers. Quebec French-speaking 8- to 9-year-old children with (24) and without (37) dyscalculia were assessed with transcoding tasks (“number-to-position” and “position-to-number”) designed to assess the acuity of the mental number line with Arabic and spoken numbers as well as with analogic numerosities. Results showed that children with dyscalculia produced a larger percentage absolute error than children without mathematics difficulties in every task except the number-to-position transcoding task with analogic numerosities. Hence, these results suggested that children with dyscalculia do not have a general deficit of the mental number line but rather a deficit with accessing it from symbolic numbers.

See more about it HERE