About 8-10% children (more boys than girls) have one or more learning disability (LD), which may impact their academic and general adaptive functioning. LD is a neurobiological disorder of cognitive and/or language processing caused by abnormalities in the cerebral cortex of the brain. LD presents as a serious difficulty with reading, writing, speaking, or arithmetic that is unexpected, given the child' intellectual ability. LDs are different from mental or physical disabilities, but they may occur together with various emotional or medical conditions LDs include dyslexia (reading disability), dyscalculia (math disability), dysgraphia (hand-writing disability), information- processing disorders, and language disorders. Schools must evaluate, monitor, and provide accommodations and services to children with learning disabilities while retaining them within regular classrooms to the maximum extent possible. For each child with a disability, schools must develop Individualized Educational Program (IEP) that is revised annually and includes the specific academic, developmental, and functional goals, and the accommodations or services that are needed to reach those goals.If parents do not wish to open an IEP for their child, who suffers from dyslexia,ADHD, auditory processing disorder, they may still get educational services for their child. 504 Plan provides such services as paraprofessional staff to redirect your child when he gets distracted, a note taker who writes notes for a child who cannot do it herself due to a fine motor disorder, etc. Essentially, a child can attend general educational class but still receive additional educational services and accommodations, such as extra time on tests. Psycho-educational or neuropsychological evaluationis required to substantiate the request for 504 plan.  However, school remedial services typically focus on teaching the child to read or solve math problems, but do not focus on improving attention span, memory, information processing, reasoning, and sustained focus. Brain Academy tutoring does just that- focuses on both very important aspects of learning: teaching chidlren toread and solve math problemsand improving their memory, attention, thinking, processing, and focus. Read more about learning disabilities, tutoring, and natural ways to improve focus, attention, memory and other cognitive skills (clickhere).   Dr. Danov, PhD, is a Harvard-trained pediatric and adult neuropsychologist and the founder of theBrain Academy Tutoring, Testing&Coaching Centerin New York. This Center provides comprehensive cognitive and academic evaluations in order to diagnose dyslexia, math learning disorder, auditory and visual processing disorders, mental retardation, ADHD, and other conditions that require educational services, test accommodations, tutoring, special class placements, private school placements, speech and occupational therapy, and other treatments and educational services. The center also provides individual tutoring, test prep, and effective remediation of cognitive deficits that cause learning problems for children and work-related problems for adults. For more information about the Brain Academy Tutoring, Testing and Coaching Center and how to diagnose and remediate learning disabilities, call 877-55-MyTutor (877-556-9888, 646-355-3395), or visit our websitewww.55mytutor.com. Offices are located in New York City, Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island. ...read more

Test accommodations are offered by the College Board, Law School Admission Council (LSAC) and other organizations that oversee standardized testing, such as GRE, SAT, ISEE, PSAT, SHSAT, TACHS, LSAT, and professional examinations, such as the Bar exam, Social Work licensure exam, Nursing licensure exam, and other exams. Test accommodations include extra time (typically 50% more time) on standardized tests, additional breaks and longer break time between the portions of a lengthy exam, the use of a calculator, computer with a spell check, extra scrap paper for notes, and/or scribe services. These test accommodations allow the students to take more time to read and answer test questions, write an essay, and respond to open-ended questions. Some are allowed to take extra breaks to fight mental fatigue. Others are allowed to compute math operations using a calculator or have their responses written for them by a scribe. In order for students to qualify for any of these test accommodations, they must provide medical and neuropsychological documentation showing that they suffer from a specific neurological, learning or cognitive disorder that puts them at a disadvantage when they compete with their peers who do not suffer from these disorders. Some of such cognitive, learning and neurological disorders are Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), Attention deficit Disorder (ADD), fine motor disorder, dyslexia, math learning disorder, or otherlearning disability.    These learning, cognitive and neurological disorders cause substantial difficulty sustaining focus on the test questions, reading test instructions and questions, quickly processing written information and producing a response, writing their responses and essays, or calculating math operations in mind without the calculator. Students with attention deficit frequently overlook important details of math problems, skip words or lines while reading, cannot organize information to answerreading comprehensionquestions or write an essay, omit portions of verbal instructions, carelessly copy test assignments that they cannot later decipher. While they may study for hours and days for a particular test, when students withAttention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)take the test, they may impulsively select the wrong answer, misunderstand the test question due to inattention to key words such as ‘but’ or ‘except’, or skip or misperceive digits in a math problem. They may also get distracted from time management and completely forget to keep track of their time limit while answering difficult and easy questions on a test. Those who learned to double check their work, may need more time to recheck their work and correct their errors.  Thus, students with learning disabilities and cognitive and neurological disorders end up answering fewer test questions and get lower test scores than they could have if they did not suffer from these disorders. As a result, students with learning disabilities, attention deficit, slow processing speed and motor disorder are unable to adequately compete with their peers who also take the same test. Thus, in situations involving timed standardized tests, individuals with learning disability and attention and processing deficits are unable to adequately demonstrate their knowledge and ability on the subjects tested on the ISEE, SAT, GRE, PSAT, LSAT, MCAT or the others.     What is the acceptable documentation of learning disabilities, ADHD, and other cognitive and neurological disorders that put some students at a disadvantage? Acceptable and required documentation for the test accommodations application is a comprehensive neuropsychological and educational evaluation report provided by aneuropsychologist.   Neuropsychologist aredoctors who were trained for many years to administer multiple academic and cognitive tests with the purpose of diagnosing children and adults withlearning disabilities and cognitive disorders. A thorough academic and neuropsychological evaluation involves administration of many tests of visual and verbal memory, visual and auditory attention, processing speed, reading rate, word reading, spelling, math problem solving, reading comprehension, auditory processing, visual spatial processing, planning, organization, and visuomotor coordination. Neuropsychologist then analyzes these test scores and concludes a diagnosis, which may include reading or math learning disability, attention deficit, memory disorder, or visuomotor coordination disorder.  A report detailing all test results, student’s academic background, prior history of test accommodations and learning difficulties, and current diagnosis and recommendations is what required by the College Board,Law School Admission Councilor other appropriate agencies overseeing the administration of standardized tests. Students who are granted test accommodations are provided with an opportunity to compensate for their cognitive problems, such as attention deficit, slow processing speed, slow reading rate, or reading disorder. Thus, they are able to demonstrate their true intellectual potential by answering more questions on the exam and getting a higher test score. Dr. Danov, PhD, is a Harvard-trained pediatric and adult neuropsychologist and the founder of theBrain Academy Tutoring, Testing&Coaching Centerin New York. This Center provides comprehensive cognitive and academic evaluations in order to diagnose dyslexia, math learning disorder, auditory and visual processing disorders, mental retardation, ADHD, and other conditions that require educational services, test accommodations, tutoring, special class placements, private school placements, speech and occupational therapy, and other treatments and educational services. The center also provides individual tutoring, test prep, and effective remediation of cognitive deficits that cause learning problems for children and work-related problems for adults. For more information about the Brain Academy Tutoring, Testing and Coaching Center and how to diagnose and remediate learning disabilities, call 877-55-MyTutor (877-556-9888, 646-355-3395), or visit our websitewww.55mytutor.com. Offices are located in New York City, Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island. ...read more

About 8-10% children (more boys than girls) have one or morelearning disability, which impacts their academic and general adaptive functioning. Learning disability presents as a serious difficulty with reading (dyslexia), writing (dysgraphia), speaking (aphasia), or arithmetic (dyscalculia) that is unexpected, given the person's intellectual ability. In my experience, children may not necessarily meet the criteria for dyslexia or dyscalculia, but still struggle to learn specific subjects due to cognitive deficits, such as visual processing disorder, auditory processing disorder, memory disorder, or language disorders. Learning disability is different from mental or physical disability, but it may occur together with various emotional or medical conditions, such as depression, bipolar disorder, seizures, brain injury, and others. It does not involve mental retardation or autism. In fact, learning disabled individuals can be very bright, but with specific learning deficits. I have examinedgifted childrenwhith superior intelligence who had very weak academic skills. Where is the line between a mild learning difficulty that many of us have and a disability? The key aspects of diagnosing a disability is objectivelymeasuring cognitive and academic skillsand determining whether the suspected learning problem interferes significantly with the academic and adaptive functioning. Importantly, learning disability does not only interfere with the children's academic performance, but may also have consequences in other contexts, including family and social functioning. For example, due to certain perceptual deficits, a child may misunderstand or misinterpret facial expression, body language, or verbal cues of others leading to awkward social interactions. Many learning disabled children I have examined have trouble making purchases in a store, completing applications for services, organizing a trip, and performing other complex daily activities. In addition, children who struggle to learn are more likely to be ridiculed and bullied by their classmates or other children. Increased stress over academic performance and social difficulties may ultimately increase a risk of social isolation, emotional problems (e.g., anxiety and depression), substance and drug use, and a school drop out. Learning disability does not go away when individuals get older. Adults with learning disabilities continue to experience specificdifficulties in reading, spelling, solving math problems, or processing and remembering information. The underlying cognitive deficits that caused the learning problems in the first place remain in adulthood. This disability prevents adults from advancing their education, acquiring new job responsibilities, and efficiently performing their work (i.e., participating in meetings, preparing projects, reading reports and professional literature, etc). Therefore, it is critical to detect such difficulties in early childhood, when the brain remains plastic and amendable to many changes via speech and occupational therapy, cognitive coaching and tutoring, and remediation services. Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/4639874 ...read more