Pattern of specific learning disability and awareness among care providers in children between 8-12 years

Abstract

Background: Specific learning disability (SLD) is known to cause great amount of psychological stress to the children and their parents. Current study was aimed to find out the prevalence, profile of errors in Specific learning disability among school students studying in 3rd to 6th standard and their perception by teachers and parents.Methods: A Cross-sectional study was conducted at two Government and two Private Schools in Gwalior. 800 students studying 3rd to 6th standard. The details of every student were filled in a proforma which included their academic performance, teacher’s opinion and parents concern for them. Based on this from each class 10 percent of low performing students were selected and they were subjected to Visual, Hearing, IQ assessment and NIMHANS index for specific learning disability.Results: A total of 23 students were identified as having Specific learning disability, with a prevalence of 2.87%. The most common reading error was omitting words and writing error was missing letter and spelling error. Out of 23 students , only 4 students were rightly picked up by teachers as having specific problems in reading and writing, while in remaining 19 students teachers were having vague generalized opinion of poor academic performance (P<0.05).Out of 23 students, 14 parents were not having any scholastic concern about their children (P<0.001). These students on Intelligence Quotient assessment, showed low performance scores as compared to their verbal scores.Conclusions: The prevalence of Specific learning disability was 2.87% and these students were having lower performance scores in IQ. Teachers and parents were unable to perceive about Specific learning problems.