Overview
Dyscalculia was originally identified, in
case studies, with patients who suffered specific arithmetic disabilities as
a result of damage to specific regions of the brain. Recent research
suggests that dyscalculia can also occur developmentally, as a
genetically-linked learning disability which affects a person's ability to
understand, remember, or manipulate numbers or number facts (e.g., the
multiplication tables). The term is often used to refer specifically to
the inability to perform arithmetic operations, but it is also defined by
some educational professionals and cognitive psychologists as a more
fundamental inability to conceptualize numbers as abstract concepts of
comparative quantities (a deficit in "number sense").[1]
Those who argue for this more-constrained definition of dyscalculia
sometimes prefer to use the technical term "Arithmetic Difficulties" (AD) to
refer to calculation and number memory deficits.
Dyscalculia is a lesser known disability,
similar and potentially related to dyslexia and developmental dyspraxia.
Dyscalculia occurs in people across the whole IQ range, and sufferers often,
but not always, also have difficulties with time, measurement, and spatial
reasoning.[citation
needed] Current estimates suggest it may affect about 5% of the
population. Although some researchers believe that dyscalculia necessarily
implies mathematical reasoning difficulties as well as difficulties with
arithmetic operations, there is evidence[citation
needed] (especially from brain damaged patients) that arithmetic
(e.g. calculation and number fact memory) and mathematical (abstract
reasoning with numbers) abilities can be dissociated. That is (some
researchers argue)[who?]
an individual might suffer arithmetic difficulties (or dyscalculia), with no
impairment of, or even giftedness in, abstract mathematical reasoning
abilities.
The word dyscalculia comes from Greek and
Latin which means: "counting badly". The prefix "dys" comes from Greek and
means "badly". "Calculia" comes from the Latin "calculare". which means "to
count". That word "calculare" again comes from "calculus", which means
"pebble" or one of the counters on an abacus.
Dyscalculia can be detected at a young age
and measures can be taken to ease the problems faced by younger students.
The main problem is understanding the way mathematics is taught to children.
In the way that dyslexia can be dealt with by using a slightly different
approach to teaching, so can dyscalculia. However, dyscalculia is the lesser
known of these learning disorders and so is often not recognized.
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