Back To School Spells Hell For 1000s Of Children

8th October, 2007

BACK TO SCHOOL SPELLS HELL FOR THOUSANDS OF CHILDREN WITH UNDIAGNOSED LEARNING DIFFICULTIES

Faking illness, bunking classes, hating homework – this may seem like bad behaviour but it could also be an undiagnosed learning problem.

“When a student behaves like that it’s often dismissed as ‘a kid trying it on’, ‘laziness’ or ‘attention seeking’ - it could also be a child whose become isolated and distressed because of their inability to learn at the same pace as their classmates”, said Dore Centre’s NZ General Manager, David Conroy.

The Dore Centre is a specialist treatment clinic for people with learning difficulties like dyslexia, dyspraxia, ADD & ADHD. It opened in Greenlane Auckland 4 years ago, a Wellington centre opened in August and the South Island centre opened last Wednesday in Christchurch.

“It’s estimated nearly 700,000 kiwis of all ages have a learning difficulty, and many are never diagnosed correctly, which means there could be as many as 125,000 children feeling extremely anxious going back to school today”.

“The final school term is particularly hard for all students with (diagnosed or undiagnosed) learning difficulties. They commonly take 2 or 3 times longer to complete work so the time pressure of tests and exams can completely overwhelm them”.

Major advancements in research and technology over the last decade has dramatically increased our understanding of how people learn, and why some learn differently.

Dore’s UK based researchers have developed an exercise based treatment, which develops new pathways in the brain and helps to remove the physiological barriers that were preventing efficient learning.

If parents, students or journalists would like to take a free test which will indicate the likelihood of you having a learning difficulty, go to www.dore.co.nz or phone 0508 DORE NZ (0508 367 369).

COMMON SYMPTOMS OF LEARNING DIFFICULTIES

A sufferer will usually show a number of behaviours or signs including:

- difficulty following instructions – even simple ones

- poor short term memory – can’t remember phone numbers and names

- gets frustrated, angry or has tantrums when faced with tasks

- difficulty making and/or keeping friends

- gets frustrated because they know the answer but can’t communicate it

- can’t, or was slow to learn to tie shoe laces, tell the time or ride a bike

- not good at catching or kicking a ball

- very good at some sports like (say) skateboarding but very bad at others

- has little interest in sport, especially team sports

- clumsy, walks into things

- walk or run with a gait or unevenly

- as a baby - walked early but didn't crawl

- late speech development

- problems getting dressed

- incessant talking

- irrational phobias

- poor spatial awareness

ENDS

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