Understanding Adults Who Have Learning Disabilities

Kevin is 25 years old. At 7, he was diagnosed with a verbal learning disability that affected his reading and oral expression. He struggled through school but managed to graduate from high school with help from his family, tutors, teachers, and friends.

Kevin was involved in church until he reached his junior year in high school. He recalls the day he decided he no longer wanted to go to church. His Sunday School teacher required the class to memorize a set of Bible verses she said would help them as they approached their college years. Kevin took the assignment seriously, and for him it was a disaster. He struggled to read and comprehend the Bible verses. And although he was able to read them, he was unable to memorize them. He rarely could memorize vocabulary words for Spanish, much less whole Bible verses. Kevin told his mother that he would never return to this class. Gradually he dropped out of church altogether.

How Common Are Learning Disabilities?

According to information from the National Institutes of Health, 15–20 percent of the U.S. population have some form of learning disability. Most individuals who manifest learning disabilities have deficits in reading or in the processing of language (e.g., understanding what is said or in succinctly organizing a response). Most experts agree that more boys than girls (some researchers suggest approximately a 3:2 ratio) are likely to have learning disabilities.

What Is a Learning Disability, and How Does a Disability Develop?

Controversies continue about a clear definition and criteria to be used to diagnose a learning disability; however, most experts agree there are different types of learning disabilities. Subtypes of learning disabilities include: (1) dyslexia (a verbal learning disability that impairs reading, spelling, verbal memory tasks, and rapid naming); (2) dyscalculia (a disability that impairs math skills due to spatial organizational problems, sequencing difficulties, poor graphomotor control, inadequate attention to visual detail, and poor number logic); (3) dysgraphia (a writing disability; however, there are limited studies in this area).

Adults with a diagnosis of dyslexia make up the largest group. A smaller number of individuals have deficits in visual-spatial cognition (nonverbal learning disabilities) and experience significant difficulty conceptually understanding math or have poor handwriting and appear to be motor clumsy. In addition, over the last 15–20 years, concern has grown for individuals who experience significant difficulty in social situations. These individuals experience difficulty interpreting the behavior of others, such as gestures and facial expressions; thus, they may appear to be socially awkward and experience limited skills interacting with others.

Adults who have learning disabilities are likely to experience poor reading comprehension, slow reading rate, laborious writing, slow processing of new information, poor mathematical skills, and/or secondary emotional or behavioral problems, such as depression, poor self-esteem, somatic complaints, anxiety disorders, and social problems.

While the causes of learning disabilities remain unknown, a genetic basis is likely. Risk factors cited in research literature associated with learning disabilities include: (1) the presence of learning disabilities in other family members; (2) a very low birth weight; (3) head traumas; (4) seizure disorders; and (5) radiation therapy treatment for long-term survivors of acute lymphocytic leukemia.

Many laypeople mistakenly associate low intelligence or laziness with a learning disability. While each person with a learning disability is unique, one of the most common factors noted in these individuals is that they tend to achieve significantly below their intellectual abilities even though they are of average or above average intelligence.           

What Is the Prognosis for Individuals with Learning Disabilities?

 "I can read pretty good now, but it takes me much longer than it does my wife. My spelling is terrible, too."

Despite their disabilities, many people achieve functional reading skills. They can read the newspaper and most material at work. Most continue, however, to read at levels that do not match their intellectual abilities. Most adults with learning disabilities report that they rarely read for pleasure, even though they remain curious and possess a desire to learn. They just adopt other methods to acquire information. They may do this by carefully listening and watching educational or news programs on television.

A learning disability is a chronic problem that does not go away with maturity. Research has suggested that even if an individual with a learning disability graduates from college, he or she is at high risk for job dissatisfaction. Thus diminished feelings of self-worth continue to plague many adults with learning disabilities.

However, an important positive influence in the lives of adults with learning disabilities is a strong family support system. The church can serve as an extended support system, and this support system is significant even when the person with a learning disability has a strong family support system. If you teach a person with a learning disability, you may be a vital link for acceptance between a person with learning disabilities and his or her peers.

What Can I Do to Help an Individual with a Learning Disability?

First, increase your efforts to empower and encourage the individual with a learning disability. You can do this by helping that person feel safe in the class and church environment. Don't set up the individual for embarrassment or failure by asking him or her to read a passage of the Bible aloud before he has read it silently.

Deborah Hancock, experienced teacher of adults in California, offers examples of approaches that can result in embarrassment and/or alienation for the individual with a reading problem ("He Can Hardly Read and He's in My Class," Life and Work: Directions, Winter 1998–99). The person with a learning disability is more than able to participate in your Sunday School class if you create an atmosphere in which everyone makes an effort to accept all individuals and it is tailored to fit the unique needs of its participants. Every member is responsible for creating an emotionally safe environment.

Evidence now supports the use of strategy and organizational instruction for individuals with learning disabilities rather than an approach that uses the lecture and a "take-a-turn" approach to reading the Bible. Strategy instruction provides a framework for thinking as well as techniques for teaching concepts and truths. This approach works well for an individual with any kind of language-related learning disabilities (i.e., problems with reading, understanding language, or expressing himself/herself) or for the individual with memory problems. This approach can be helpful for all participants in your class.

Here are some steps to using strategy instruction in your adult groups:

1. Prior to launching into the details of the discussion, provide a clear idea of the central concept (or "big idea") for the lesson. One possible approach to share this with the class is by preparing a handout of this statement with several letters deleted in key words. For example, "Jesus offers God's f_ _g_ _ _n_ _ _ and restoration, not condemnation, to those who have broken God's l_ _ _."
   
   By distributing this at the beginning of the lesson, the individual with learning disabilities will be able to listen more attentively and effectively. Discuss the meanings of more difficult words or modify the language. For example, the big idea mentioned could be restated: "Jesus offers God's forgiveness, not blame, to those who have broken God's laws." Discuss what this means in everyday language.
   
   
2. If the discussion has a number of concepts that seem important, sift through the possible concepts and determine the most important ones. A well-organized and well-supported lesson can be retained more easily than one that focuses on the details in the passages in a hit-and-miss approach. Provide the class with a written outline of the discussion with the main ideas listed. This outline can be presented on the chalkboard, an overhead projector, or in a handout.
   
   
3. Use effective questioning techniques and discussions, as well as visual aids, charts, pictures, and graph organizers. If you allow members time to discuss a topic in small groups or with one other person, the persons with learning disabilities will be better able to process the information with greater understanding. Individuals with learning disabilities appear to do better when they have many opportunities to verbalize what they are learning.
   
   
4. At the end of the discussion, summarize what was presented. Using a common rule for public speaking is helpful when teaching individuals with learning disabilities: "Tell 'em what you're going to tell 'em; tell 'em; then tell 'em what you've told 'em." By providing opportunities for (1) previewing the main idea, (2) presenting the information in a well-organized approach using good questioning and discussion techniques, and then (3) summarizing the information presented, more opportunities for learning will occur. Other suggestions for your teaching include:
   
   
1. Before beginning the discussion, review the main concepts from last week and try to relate new information to old knowledge. By doing this, you will be integrating prior learning to new learning. This helps all learners acquire new information.
   
   
2. Provide practical problems that encourage the learner to apply concepts presented. Talk about them.
   
   
3. Rather than ask members to memorize Bible verses, ask for a paraphrase of the verse or discuss what the verse means.
   
   
4. Never ask class members to take turns reading the Bible passages aloud. Ask for volunteers, ask individuals in advance to read a selected passage, or read the passages aloud yourself.
   
   
5. Use mnemonic approaches when presenting new information. For example, an adult missionary with dyslexia used a mnemonic approach when he recently presented a talk to adults at our church. His topic was on the role of each individual as a missionary. The mnemonic approach was G-O-T. Step 1: Make God your number one priority in life. Step 2: Be Open to daily opportunities to serve God. Step 3: Take these opportunities to serve God and be a missionary. As do many adults with learning disabilities, this young man developed excellent compensatory strategies to assist him in remembering verbal sequences.
   
   
6. Provide members with videotapes and audiocassettes to supplement the printed material. For the individual who is motivated to study the material in advance, tape record the printed material and offer this tape to the individual with a learning disability.

Your role as a teacher should be to help each person gain a better understanding of God's truth and to help each person live out this truth. If someone in your group has a learning disability, carefully consider the way you share God's love. Be appreciative that someone along the way has not alienated him or her from church. Remember that people with learning disabilities can have the same desire to learn and grow in their relationship with God as all others. They are just as intelligent and curious as everyone else is. They simply may need a different approach or added steps to their learning and growing process. These approaches may make you a more effective teacher to your entire class, too.

We may all need to recall the old Chinese proverb in our teaching: "I hear and I forget, I see and I remember, I do and I understand."

For further reading:

A Place for Everyone: A Guide for Special Education Bible Teaching-Reaching Ministry by Athalene McNay (Nashville: Convention Press)

Teaching Adults: A Guide for Transformational Teaching compiled by Rick Edwards (Nashville: LifeWay Church Resources)

Here's a Thought:

Do you have adults with special needs in your class? What techniques have you incorporated into your teaching to keep them involved and to help them learn?

You may have adults with learning disabilities that you don't know about. How can new techniques help them?

How might these same teaching-learning approaches help all learners?

______

Written by Dr. Jane Hannah, assistant professor of pediatrics, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, and a member of First Baptist Church, Nashville, Tennessee.