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I recently saw an article on a blog where a mother, an educator herself, had a child with learning disabilities and was struggling to find a remedy that had a important impact on her child's learning ability. (/abettereducation.blogspot.com/2009/06/vision-therapy-for-treating-learning.html) A Mom's Journey She writes, “Dr. Manniko estimates that 20% of students in K-12 are learning disabled and of that group, 80% of these children suffer visual problems that cause their learning issues. The diagnoses go beyond the 20/20 visual acuity, revealing issues like amblyopia (lazy eye), strabismus (crossed eyes), general binocular trouble (eyes failing to work together), etc. He measures reading speed, next line identification, eye movement efficiency, backward movement and a number of other factors involved in reading. According to Dr. Manniko, “Individuals who are learning disabled generally make appreciably more eye movements and spend greater time focusing on each word, while they are getting less information than a competent reader. A widespread pattern among learning disabled individuals is that their eyes do not function together, hindering their reading comprehension.” After treatment for the diagnosed vision difficulty, this mom discovered that her child improved considerably, and she is now an advocate for vision therapy as a treatment procedure for children with learning disabilities. A Practitioner's Journey As a Behavioral Optometrist, I know the power of these ideas because I witness them work every day with children in my place of work. I previously practiced regular Optometry, but became annoyed when I found I could not help child after child who were suffering with learning disabilities of various sorts. I began to study, to learn, to alter my essential philosophy and to try and create a new approach to treating these needy children. Two decades later and I am more intrigued and more committed to helping these kids than ever! In fact, I am so dedicated to helping children with learning disabilities that I have now published an entire, based-at-home vision therapy program, using precisely the same therapies and exercises I use in my office, thus I know that these activities are absolutely assured to work, usually to a larger degree. A Preschooler's Journey A question loads of young mom's ask me is, “Do we have to delay until grade school (and my child having a critical learning disability) before we start to help them?” This subject challenged me, because it showed that most parent's of preschool or kindergarten children care sufficiently for their kids that they need to be proactive rather than reactive in helping their learning. As one mom told me, “Even if my son is a normal learner, couldn't your techniques take him from being an average or above average learner to becoming a A Grade student?” The answer is, “Yes!” However, lots of of the therapies we apply to older children who have learning disabilities are too complicated to apply to younger kids. In fact, when treating preschool and kindergarten children you need to slant the therapies towards whole body and gross motor activities, while still keeping the vision therapy aimed at focus, eye coordination, visualization for spelling, acceptable motor for writing, sequencing and coding. So, with a lot of deep thought, a bit of research and a join of misspent weekends, I prepared the first internet based home vision therapy program developed principally for preschoolers. I have kept it inexpensive, uncomplicated to recognize and straightforward to apply. If you are concerned about your preschool child and their development, visual or general, please contact me for more information. These moms are right: we should be proactive not reactive, and we must present to our kids every chance to perform to their best in preschool, school and further into life!
Article Source: http://articlehotline.com/articles
To learn How You Can Accelerate Your Preschool Child's Learning And Development, Check Out Darin Browne's Online Therapy Site, Preschool Vision Development.
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