Discalculia

Printed by: Jeramae V. Barillo

Dyscalculia is a learning disorder that affects a person’s ability to understand number-based information
and math. People who have dyscalculia struggle with numbers and math because their brains don’t
process math-related concepts like the brains of people without this disorder. However, their struggles
don’t mean they’re less intelligent or less capable than people who don’t have dyscalculia.

The symptoms of this disorder usually appear in childhood, especially when children learn how to do
basic math. However, many adults have dyscalculia and don’t know it. People who have dyscalculia often
face mental health issues when they have to do math, such as anxiety, depression and other difficult
feelings.

There’s also a form of dyscalculia that appears later in life. This form, acquired dyscalculia, can happen at
any age.

Put simply, dyscalculic people have no clear understanding of quantity. They lack number sense, which
means that they have a hard time comprehending our number system and how numbers relate to each
other. This affects school learning as well as everyday life and day-to-day task like paying for shopping,
for example. It can also lead to maths anxiety where people with dyscalculia worry about having to deal
with numbers.

Causes of dyscalculia

1. Cognitive deficits

Although some causes of dyscalculia have a genetic origin, and environmental factors play an important
role, cognition mediates brain-behavior relationships. Therefore, it offers a sufficient level of explanation
for developing interventions. Thus, we must understand the cognitive difficulties that underpin math
failure, regardless of whether their origin is constitutional or environmental (Elliott & Grigorenko, 2014).

Research has shown that attention; visual and auditory processing; visual, visuospatial, working memory;
and logical thinking are essential foundational math skills.
 2. Brain differences

Found strong evidence that dyscalculia is caused by malformations in the right parietal lobe.

Differences in brains are certain to exist whenever differences in behavior exist, including differences in
ability and performance. Therefore, findings of brain differences do not constitute evidence for
abnormality; rather, they simply document the neural substrate of the behavioral differences.

3. Genetics

Dyscalculia is known to run in families, suggesting that genetic factors contribute to the risk of
developing this learning disorder.

If one twin has dyscalculia, there is a 58% likelihood that their identical twin and a 39% chance that a
non-identical twin will also be dyscalculic.

4. Deficits in math skills

Landerl et al. (2004) concluded that dyscalculia results from specific disabilities in basic numerical
processing rather than deficits in cognitive abilities.

There are many things in mathematics that a student must learn to do, like, for example, the skills of
counting, adding and subtracting, multiplication and division, applying place value and fractions, and
reading time.

There is also much in math that one has to know and therefore has to learn, for example, many terms,
definitions, symbols, theorems, and axioms. These are all things a student must know, not things that they
must know how to do. For example, a child, who does not know what a sphere is, will have to guess when
confronted by twelve objects and the question, “Which of the above objects has the same shape as a
sphere?”

Signs of Dyscalculia
The indicators, manifestations or symptoms of dyscalculia can be thought of in terms of four different
areas of learning:

• Core number

• Reasoning

• Memory

• Visual spatial

What are the symptoms of dyscalculia?

The symptoms of dyscalculia depend on which parts of the process a person struggles with most. It can
also depend on the person’s age and the situations they encounter most often.

Young children (up to the pre-K and kindergarten levels) For very young children, the most common
symptoms include trouble with:

• Counting upward.

• Connecting a number to that many of an object (for example, connecting the number 4 to that many
marbles in front of them).

• Recognizing numbers and math symbols.

• Organizing numbers, such as largest to smallest or first to last.

• Recognizing and using number lines.

• Learning using money (such as coins or bills).

School-age children (primary/grade/elementary school)

The symptoms of dyscalculia often draw attention when children start school around age 6. For these
children, the symptoms include trouble with:

• Counting on fingers with small numbers (especially at an age where that seems unnecessary).

• Identifying small quantities of items just by looking (this looks like needing to count each one by one).

• Doing simple calculations from memory.

• Recognizing the same math problem when the order of the numbers or symbols changes (struggling to
understand that 1+7=8 is the same as 8=7+1).

• Understanding word problems or more advanced symbols (such as > meaning “greater than” or <
meaning “less than”).

• Organizing numbers by scale (10s, 100s, 1,000s) or decimal place (0.1, 0.01, 0.001).

Teenagers (secondary school- or high school-age) and adults

The symptoms in teenagers and adults often look like trouble with the following:

• Counting backward.

• Solving word problems.

• Breaking down problems into multiple steps to solve them.

• Measuring items.

• Measuring quantities (such as for cooking/baking recipes).

• Using money (coins and bills) to pay for items, exchanging bills for coins (and vice versa) and making
change.

• Understanding and converting fractions

Teaching strategies for students with dyacalculia

1. Talk or Write Out a Problem

For the dyscalculic student, math concepts are simply abstracts, and numbers mere marks on a page.
Talking through a problem or writing it down in sentence form can help with seeing relationships between
the elements. Even restating word problems in a new way can help with organizing information and
seeing solutions.

2. Draw the Problem

Drawing the problem can also help visual learners to see relationships and understand concepts. Students
can “draw through” the problem with images that reflect their understanding of the problem and show
ways to solve it.
 3. Break Tasks Down into Subsets

Dyscalculic students can easily get overwhelmed by a complex problem or concept, especially if it builds
on prior knowledge — which they may not have retained. Separating a problem into its component parts
and working through them one at a time can help students focus, see connections and avoid overload.

4. Use “Real-Life” Cues and Physical Objects

Relating math to the practicalities of daily life can help dyscalculic students make sense of concepts and
see the relationships between numbers. Props like measuring cups, rulers and countable objects that
students can manipulate can make math concepts less abstract.

5. Review Often

Because dyscalculic students struggle to retain math-related information, it becomes hard to master new
skills that build on previous lessons. Short, frequent review sessions — every day, if necessary — help
keep information fresh and applicable to the next new task. Creating written or drawn references such as
cards or diagrams can help with quick reviews.

Like other learning disabilities, dyscalculia affects student success both in and out of the classroom. Study
strategies that bring the abstract world of mathematics down to earth with visual and verbal cues and
physical props can help dyscalculic students overcome obstacles to making sense of math.
References:

https://www.edubloxtutor.com/what-causes-dyscalculia/

https://www.brainbalancecenters.com/blog/strategies-for-managing-dyscalculia

https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/23949-dyscalculia

https://thirdspacelearning.com/blog/dyscalculia/