4 Dyscalculia Case Studies We Can Learn From
Diagnosis is scary for parents. Having your child’s school tell you that there might be a reason for underachievement that extends beyond simply insufficient effort. And for teachers or administrators, the conversation is intimidating. In addition, there has historically been a lot of stigma associated with having a child in special education classes. While this stigma is less significant than it used to be, and “mainstreaming” more common, it’s important that parents understand the value of intervention.
Getting a diagnosis answers a lot of questions, too. For instance, school psychologists and other practitioners will need to determine whether or not a student has a level of intelligence that’s at least average. In addition, each student has a unique tapestry of strengths and weaknesses. These can be used to teach math facts and concepts. In other words, the educational evaluation tells professionals how to help someone who is struggling.
Let’s look at some dyscalculia case studies and what we can learn from them.
Study 1: Student perpetually struggles (Kay)
Kristin Montis of the University of Minnesota tells us of a fifth-grade girl, named “Kay,” that she tutored. Kay is an intelligent child, and she does what every student is supposed to do: attend school every day, do her homework, and work hard. In addition, Kay is described as an eager learner, even though she struggled at math and reading. However, standard tutoring didn’t make enough of an improvement on her academic performance. This is not unusual with dyscalculia.
After significant experimentation, Montis determined that Kay’s difficulty was with phonetics: she had trouble expressing ideas in words. For instance, she would mis-hear or mis-interpret written works and as a result not understand them completely. In math, concepts such as fractions were difficult to properly articulate. However, Kay was able to interpret symbols and understand the relationships between concrete objects.
Montis was able to leverage Kay’s ability to interpret symbols to teach important concepts. For instance, fractions were reduced to diagrams and taught using manipulative objects such as pieces of paper cut into parts, or different-colored items representing quantities. As a result, she understood the concepts behind math. From there, it was necessary to teach her how to associate mathematical symbols with the concepts, a task that the case study doesn’t discuss.
Study 2: Student learns with manipulatives (Sam)
An unsigned case study tells us of a 6-year-old boy named Sam. While most children his age have relatively uniform achievement across subjects, Sam is brilliant in English and other topics, but struggles in math. Like many children with math or reading differences, Sam was already diagnosed with dyspraxia and some other challenges. However, the evaluator missed the math struggles because this is easy to do in early elementary.
When a new evaluation was done, Sam was shown to have superior verbal intelligence and ability but struggling in math-related measures. He had a slow processing speed and poor perceptual abilities, which are classic signs of dyscalculia. In addition, his mastery of math concepts such as counting were typical of dyscalculia.
To address these weaknesses, Sam was given access to one-on-one math instruction and a computer program that’s intended to help children with dyscalculia. The tutoring employed tactile tools to help teach math concepts, while the computer program used other sensory approaches. 10 weeks later, Sam had made significant progress, nearly catching up to expectations. As a result, he was able to stay in a mainstream school with supports, rather than a specialist classroom.
Study 3: North African school learns to grapple with dyscalculia
Even in international schools, the education of children with learning differences isn’t always as advanced in less developed countries. This case study focuses on one 5th grade student in an international school in North Africa. Due in part to lower levels of awareness and service availability, the student was identified as having dyscalculia relatively late. Pull out sessions were given to the student in an attempt to improve his math skills. There were other students in the sessions, but they weren’t identified as having dyscalculia.
During pull-out sessions, researcher Anas Lahrichi noticed that the interventions were mainly focused on assigning worksheets to help the student learn. This meant doing more math problems. Meanwhile the resource teacher kept trying to explain math concepts. In addition, the teacher made the overall environment encouraging and empowering for all students in the class. There was no pressure to make certain benchmarks, so students could work at their own pace.
At the end of this study, the student with dyscalculia had made only minor progress in math skills. Lahrichi noted that the reason for this was likely teaching methods. In particular, few manipulatives were used in classes. These are tactile toys that help teach math concepts. Specialized computer programs or math games weren’t being used, either. Finally, assessment tools were poorly designed for these students.
Study 4: Italian researchers find that manipulatives work
Finally, let’s take a brief look at an Italian study. This involves two students, ages 8 and 9, who struggle with math. In one student, the difficulty has been identified as dyscalculia, while the other student simply struggles. Our authors want to know if the use of manipulatives will help either or both students.
Both students were given a specialized type of blocks that are intended to help children learn math by “doing” math. At the end of this brief study, investigators found that the student with dyscalculia experienced significant improvements in math skills such as counting and learning math facts. Meanwhile, the child without dyscalculia only improved a little, which the researchers determined was mainly due to increased confidence.
What do each of these case studies teach us?
In short, these case studies all teach us one thing: traditional math teaching methods are inadequate for students with dyscalculia. This was especially evident in the North Africa study. Despite getting “extra help,” the student experienced minimal improvement in his math skills. In addition, the study suggests that simply drilling a student on math facts and encouraging him or her might not work well if they have dyscalculia. For many students, it takes a specialized kind of instruction to truly break through.
On the other hand, the African school did very well in trying to boost student confidence. Most people don’t like to do things which they don’t enjoy, or which they find discouraging. By attempting to boost the student’s confidence, the school is setting the stage for continued effort. Once the right help is available to the student, there’s a good chance they will be more effective than they would be with a completely discouraged child.
The cases of Kay and Sam demonstrate the efficacy of multisensory teaching methods. For Kay, learning to visualize math concepts was helpful for learning. While the study didn’t indicate how Kay learned to transfer these skills into ordinary math work, she still was able to articulate learning in math. Other interventions or accommodations may have been able to help her transfer that knowledge into schoolwork. For instance, people who are illiterate can often express concepts orally. Either way, Kay benefitted from the teacher leveraging her strengths.
With Sam, we see a classic example of multisensory teaching enabling a student to learn and understand concepts. Sam is given access to manipulatives and computer games, as we see with Kay. Only in this case, Sam was able to transfer this to more traditional, age-appropriate assessments. Even better, it made a huge difference to Sam in allowing him to be mainstreamed with additional help. Sam has lots of potential for academic achievement in the future, whether this is in math or other subjects.
Finally, let’s look at the Italian study. The most significant finding here is that manipulatives provided only minimal help to the “struggling” student, while making a big difference to the one with dyscalculia. This tells us that manipulatives have potential for students with dyscalculia, while it has limited benefit for struggling students without the difference.
Almost anyone can succeed, even with dyscalculia.
The truth is simple: with proper teaching methods and perseverance, anyone with normal intelligence can succeed. While we can’t expect miracles for every child, proper teaching methods and encouragement work wonders in many learning differences. Combined with student diligence, there’s a very good record for timely interventions. Many students with dyscalculia and other learning differences have graduated high school, attended university, and even achieved advanced degrees.
Let’s close by looking at a few professionals who have overcome learning differences to enter a professional field. Rose Lister is a woman who struggled with dyscalculia, but who is now a teacher. Her advice to others with the condition is simple: learn to persevere. Even with the best instruction, determination to succeed is one of the best indicators of success. In fact, perseverance can even help overcome bad teaching to some extent.
Another successful person with dyscalculia is Charles Schwab. Although he struggled in school, Schwab became an important financier and securities broker. He’s also the founder of Charles Schwab brokerage. And, like Lister, he chose to give back. His legacy to the learning differences community is the Schwab Foundation for Learning, which focuses on promoting success for students with differences.
Looking at these case studies shows us one important thing: proper teaching methods work. So does perseverance. In fact, proper interventions have helped many people, like Lister and Schwab, become very successful despite their differences. Having a diagnosis of dyscalculia or any of several other differences is far from a “death sentence” for academic achievement. Instead, it’s an opportunity to receive the help that’s needed to promote success.
For further reading on dysclaculia, please see: How Dyscalculia Can Affect Teenagers
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