When I first began to wonder if my daughter might have dyscalculia, I felt overwhelmed and flooded by the idea. I knew nothing about learning disabilities or what I should do next to figure out if she indeed had the learning disability I suspected!

Without knowing what steps to take, I stumbled along, making several blunders along the way. The lack of knowing what to do and the resulting mistakes cost me time, stress, and delay in getting the help we desperately needed.

I want to save you that hassle and give you a better start!

Please Note: While I will be sharing our story particular to a discovery of dyscalculia, this information is applicable to the discovery of ANY of the specific learning disabilities.

Gather YOUR PERSONAL Observations

While gathering and recording your observations about where your child is struggling is a simple and straightforward step, I'll give you a heads up - it can be an emotional leap! As you record your observations, you may come to a new realization of just how many aspects of your child's life may be impacted by a math learning disability. This is a hard reality to accept when you love your child and want the best for them.

However, it's important to acknowledge the reality of your child’s situation, and not minimize the difficulty. This will also grow your understanding and empathy for your child, which is absolutely necessary if you are to truly help your child thrive.

On a lighter note, you may have some "Ah, ha!" moments as you realize that there are reasons behind your child’s specific struggles or different ways of doing everyday activities. Those super frustrating and annoying behaviors your child has – they may be because of dyscalculia, or another learning disability, and not because they are purposely trying to annoy you.

For example, I remember I was frequently frustrated at how long my daughter would take to get ready to leave the house. I’d send her up to brush her teeth, and 15 minutes later, call up to see what she was up to. She was brushing her teeth, but with no sense of time and didn’t realize she had been distracted in the process. I didn’t realize until much later in our journey that her dyscalculia was impacting her ability to be aware of how much time had passed!

The easiest way to gather your observations if you are wondering about the possibility of dyscalculia, is to use the free worksheet on my website. It will also help you notice potential areas of impact you may not have been aware could be linked to a learning disability. Print it out and fill it in the best you can. Write any notes down that you think would be helpful, such as certain times or situations you noticed your child's particular behaviors. It is designed just for this. Keep this quiz on file; when the time comes you will have what you need to share with school staff or health care providers.

(If you suspect a learning disability other than a math one, then check out the website, www.understood.org for signs and symptoms of other learning disabilities.)

Gather School Records

Other important records that you should gather are your child’s test scores or grades from school. This includes class tests and statewide or district test scores. Include any comments teachers have made to you in report cards, or in person, about their performance in math at school.

While school records can sometimes be helpful in confirming your own observations, they can also be very unhelpful. For example, you may look at the school records and notice that they are not showing any areas of difficulty.

Here is a couple of reasons why school records may not point to a learning disability, and may NOT be helpful as part of your gathered evidence:

• School tests and report cards don’t usually take into account HOW your child is coming up with the answers. For example, my daughter didn’t score that terribly on her math tests in her early years, so the teachers didn’t detect a problem. But how she was reaching her answers was the problem. She could only count by using her fingers to solve each problem. For multiplication problems, she would quietly draw dots on paper (for example for 5x7 she would draw a grid that was 5 dots by 7 dots,) then count each and every dot to come up with the answer. These methods worked, but they were inefficient and she was prone to errors as the questions became more complex. School tests and grading systems are limited in their scope, and often unable to consider how the child is reaching conclusions.

• If your child is twice-exceptional, then the area of difficulty will most likely be undetected by the school. The term “twice-exceptional” or “2e” refers to students who have two exceptions to the norm. They have both an area(s) of struggle or learning disability (an exception to the norm), and they also have an area in which they are gifted or highly capable (another exception to the norm) - hence the term. It’s like two sides of a coin. In this case a learning disability can easily go undetected by the teachers because the child often uses their gifted side to overcompensate areas of weakness. For example, our daughter loves writing and is gifted in story-telling. Because of her appearance as an excellent student who loves learning, her math struggles were less noticeable. This is often the case for 2e children.

Include the school records in your gathered information if they do show an area of struggle. There is no need to if they don’t validate your suspicions. It is important to understand that a lack in school record evidence does not mean your personal observations of your child are invalid or that they don’t have a learning disability. Your child could easily have a learning disability that has not yet been noticed by the school.

Good work! Now that you have gathered your personal observations plus your optional school records, you are ready to move forward to the next step.

You’ve got this, just one step at a time!

your simplified Action Steps:

#1: If you suspect dyscalculia, then complete this free online worksheet HERE. If you suspect another learning disability then use the website www.understood.org to sort through your observations of a possible other learning disability.

#2: Gather any school records that may be helpful.

#3: Read about assessments and evaluations for dyscalculia on this page.

If you want to learn more about dyscalculia awareness, education, and support, you can receive a new article from me each Saturday. Privacy respected, no spam, unsubscribe anytime.