When Reading Isn't Easy

For all that we do know about reading disabilities, scientists haven’t figured out precisely why some kids struggle with reading and others don’t. Neurobiological disorders, brain injury, being a non-native English speaker as a child, and even poor reading instruction in school have been cited as contributors, but increasingly scientists speculate there is a difference in the neurological wiring of struggling readers. There is also some evidence there is a genetic component to reading disabilities.

“Some parents discover there’s a name for a problem they encountered when they were in school, but they didn’t realize it was a problem until their own child experienced the same thing,” says James H. Wendorf, executive director of the National Center for Learning Disabilities in New York.

It can take time, though, for parents to accept that their child might have a problem. When they hear the word “disability,” some parents worry their child is being prematurely branded with an undesirable label.

“The initial reaction parents go through is they feel that their child doesn’t work or try hard enough and that if he tries harder he will learn to read,” Alexander says. “But that’s not true—they do try and parents need to get through that. Then they wonder if it’s a cognitive issue, some mental retardation issue, dyslexia, or an issue of IQ. Next there’s the guilt of ‘Did I do this to my kid? Is it my fault? Could I have done something different?’ Finally there’s the acceptance stage where parents increase their knowledge base on what the problem is, get a handle on it, accept it, and start to work towards a solution.”

What Parents Can Do
Thankfully, resources abound for families and they include websites, message boards, and local symposiums such as last month’s Ted and Roberta Mann Foundation Symposium for Children’s Mental Health and Learning Disabilities in Minneapolis. Co-sponsored by the Pacer Center, which works to help parents of children with all types of disabilities, the symposium addressed strategies for parents and teachers to address learning disabilities.

Mary Schrock, development director for the Pacer Center, says the response from the community was overwhelming. “There is a great demand for this kind of information,” she says. “We had a waiting list for attendees because parents want to do the best they can for their children and teachers want the same thing in the classroom.”

Sometimes the need for information can begin before a disability has been formally identified, as parents pick up on symptoms that teachers can overlook. “Parents are usually the very first to sense there might be a delay or an issue, something of concern that a professional should look at,” Wendorf says. “Yet what we found is that the majority of parents do not bring their concerns to the attention of a teacher, often waiting a year or more. That’s a problem because early detection and intervention is critical—it can mean the difference between successfully bringing [a child] up to proficiency or not.”