Title: Make It or Break It

Name: Haley N. Snyder

General Purpose: To Inform
Specific Purpose: To inform the COMM 210 class about common learning disabilities seen in
college students.
Introduction: Can anyone tell me what this says? (Hold up two papers with scrambled words)
When you are attempting to unscramble these words and read it correctly, you are
metaphorically looking through the eyes of someone who is diagnosed with dyslexia which is a
common learning disability in college students around the world. A few years ago, as a high
school student, I was involved in a club called Peer Mentors. Within this community, my
responsibility was to aid disabled students with their homework, school activities and to help
them understand that they were no different than anyone else at that school no matter what
disability they had. The experience of working with them really opened my eyes to how common
learning disabilities are whether we realize it or not. Considering that our college community is
one that awards students with disabilities certain scholarships, I believe it is important to
recognize students with not only physical handicaps but also mental disabilities as well.
According to a U.S. News article based on Hidden Disabilities within the freshman
communities of college, Delece Smith-Barrow states: Learning disabilities, the other hidden
condition, was the third most identifiable disability among students. Within the next few
minutes I hope to inform you with new information on common learning disabilities that a lot of
college students cope with on a daily basis. In order to understand some of the background on
learning disabilities, I am going to review a few of their main aspects: What a disability really is,
the common disabilities college students have, the characteristics of each disability as well as
hoe each is treated.
Transition: What is the first thing you picture in your mind when you hear the word disability?
Youre probably thinking about a physically handicapped person, right? Wrong. Lets think
about what a disability really is.
I. What a disability really is
A. The definition of a disability is a physical or mental impairment that limits the
ability to pursue an occupation as well as limits any qualification or hinders any
type of disadvantage.
B. A disability is not just a physical incapability. It can also be a mental incapability
whether it is a learning disability or an emotional disability.
1. Imagine having a physical incapability but mentally having the need and want
to do something you are unable to perform. (Ex: Being paralyzed and wanting
to walk across the beach and feel the sand between your toes.)
2. Imagine having a mental incapability and physically having the ability to
perform the certain task you are unable to mentally perform. (Ex: You had
brain damage after a car accident and the simple task of sitting up in bed
cannot be done due to the messages from your brain no reaching your arms to
push you up.)
3. Considering the hard times these students go through with the disabilities they
endure every day, it is understandable that going to college as a freshman and
being on your own could be fearful. This leads a percentage of disabled
students in high school to either not attend college or drop out after on a year
or so. According to a 2011 report from the National Center for Special
Education Research, many students with learning disabilities are in the
minority of four-year institutions. Only 19 percent of young adults with
disabilities enroll in a four-year college or university.
Transition: Learning disabilities are more difficult to recognize in comparison to physical
disabilities. When you walk down the sidewalk to class you can easily observe that someone
cannot walk based on the fact that they are in a wheelchair. However, you cannot pin-point
someone on the street who has a hard time reading, writing or performing simple math
calculations.
II. The most common disabilities in college students are dyslexia, dyscalculia and
dysgraphia.
A. Dyslexia is the most common of any learning disability and effects reading skills
in young adults as well as children.
B. Dyscalculia affects the ability to perform any math skills and the ability to retain
numerical values in memory.
C. Dysgraphia is a disability that affects the comprehension of language in general
whether it is mentally expressed or written down on paper.
Transition: Although the diagnosis of each learning disability may seem simple and
straightforward, the process of actually deciphering how to diagnose these young adults in the
challenging aspect.
III. In each disability there are numerous signal symptoms and behavioral patterns that
become noticeable and detectable throughout development.
A. People with dyslexia show a number of characteristics and behaviors. However,
their behaviors can change from day to day and even from moment to moment.
1. Some of the characteristics of dyslexia include:
a. Although they have high IQs, they are unable to read, spell or write at the
appropriate grade level.
b. They are very talented in music, art, sports, mechanics and telling stories
to others due to the creativity.
B. Dyscalculia exhibits slightly similar characteristics as dyslexia, except dealing
more with math issues.
1. They are unable to retain numerical values in their memories and experience
the difficulty of processing a certain number of items in a set.
2. Some of the other characteristics of dyscalculia include:
a. They have problems with working memory.
b. No matter how long the period of time is between learning a math
calculation and repeating it in homework or on a quiz, the storage of the
simple calculation is completely absent.
C. Common characteristic of dysgraphia are quite different in comparison to the two
others.
1. Young adults with dysgraphia often have difficulties not only written down
but also processing language in general and getting thoughts out verbally as
well as processing thoughts on paper.
2. Other characteristics of dysgraphia also include:
a. Frustration of copying notes from a board due to the inability to figure out
where they left off when referring back and forth from the board to the
paper.
b. Their writing skills are very slow and tedious if legible at all.
c. They struggle to get thoughts onto paper in a fashion that is organized and
makes sense as well as verbally expressing themselves.
Transition: You're probably wondering how in the world do you treat so many problems from
only one disability? Well, here are a few of the many answers our medical technology has given
us today.
IV. Each disability is treated and helped in different ways depending on how severe each
case may be.
A. Dyslexia cannot be treated with any medication.
1. Due to the inability to treat this disability with medication, there are learning
tools that are offered in campus, in doctors offices and in home programs that
help enhance learning skills.
2. If it is caught early enough within the childhood years, immediate treatment
could possibly prevent any set-backs concerning their learning capabilities
later on in life.
3. The diagnosis of dyslexia can be aided with the help of ADD or ADHD
medications if the individual as any attention disorders along with the learning
disability.
B. Dyscalculia treatment is similar in ways as well as different in others as well.
1. As well as treatment for dyslexia, dyscalculia cannot be treated with
medication either except the minor aid of ADD or ADHD medicine if the
individual is diagnosed with other disabilities as well.
2. According to Gavin R. Price in his Scholar Commons article on the
characteristics of dyscalculia, he stated a few interesting fact about computer
tools used in helping disabled students with their math comprehension: The
Number Race is designed to improve the precision of numerical magnitude
representations in DD. The game asks the children to select the larger of the
two arrays of dots and, in additions to providing feedback on the correct
response, adjusts the numerical difference between the sets based on the
performance, making the task easier or more difficult. The second program,
Graphogame, follows a similar logic to the Number Race, requiring
individuals to compare sets of objects (Price, 2).
C. Dysgraphia treatment seems to be simpler when comparing it to those of dyslexia
and dyscalculia.
1. The most common treatment of dysgraphia students is the repetition of writing
words or phrases over and over again in order for muscle memory and
cognitive understanding to kick in.
2. Bypass strategies are used by teachers in the academic community which
allows for leeway of assignments for those students who need extra help
and/or time by reducing the requirements for each assignment.
3. As well as the previous learning disabilities, dysgraphia is not treatable with
medication either except if the individual has an attention disorder to where
ADD or ADHD medicine is prescribed.
Transition: Although there is no known cure for dyslexia, dyscalculia or dysgraphia, medical
doctors and technology are approaching answers to give disabled young adults a promising
future.
Conclusion: Now that you are aware of what a disability truly is, the common disabilities in
college students, how to recognize those disabilities based off of behavior patterns as well as
how to treat each disability, it is now your turn to step forward. Be a leader of something bigger
than yourself and offer a helping hand to those in need around our college campus.





References
Dysgraphia Evaluation FAQs | Writing Disability - NCLD. (n.d.). Retrieved from
http://www.ncld.org/types-learning-disabilities/dysgraphia/handwriting-ld-evaluations-
faq-answers
Dyslexia-Treatment Overview. (n.d.). Retrieved from
http://www.m.webmd.com/children/tc/dyslexia-treatment-overview
Strategies for Dealing with Dysgraphia | LD Topics | LD OnLine. (n.d.). Retrieved from
http://www.ldonline.org/article/5890/
Succeed in College as a Learning Disabled Student - US News. (n.d.). Retrieved from
http://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/articles/2013/08/28/succeed-in-college-
as-a-learning-disabled-student
Test for Dyslexia: 37 Common Symptoms. (n.d.). Retrieved from
http://www.dyslexia.com/library/symptoms.htm
Retrieved from
http://www.heri.ucla.edu/PDFs/pubs/briefs/HERI_ResearchBrief_Disabilities_2011_Apr
il_25v2.pdf