Dyscalculia

I’ m currently reading the book Alex’s Adventures in Numberland. I had the opportunity to meet and talk to the author of this book, Alex Bellos, when he visited my school during a Book Week. His book is very interesting in that in it he explains the fundamental ideas behind mathematics and integrates them, (pun intended) into everyday life, and in doing so he highlights how the world we live in has been built from a complex numerical concepts.

However this post is not going to be book review. Instead I want to bring up the subject of dyscalculia. I for one had never heard of the disorder before reading the book. It affects roughly the same amount of people as dyslexia (3-6% of the population) and yet its not as widely researched. Bellos mentions how papers on Dyslexia outnumber those on Dyscalculia by 10 to 1. This could be due to the fact that there are several other factors that can be attributed to people’s lack of math skills, such as poor teaching methods, or absence during classes where key concepts are covered, so poor numeracy skills cannot always be confidently linked to Dyscalculia.

However those that do suffer from Dyscalculia can have trouble associating the symbol for a number with the actual quantity or number of objects. I looked up the process of diagnosing the problem and learnt that pen and paper tests were primarily used. Which occurred to me to be quite imprecise compared to other diagnostic tests.  You have to take into account all other possible influencing factors. Additionally behavioral analysts have to be consulted with. This has made me realise how difficult it can be to test for learning disabilities.