educational info

Educational Information

Teaching Adults with Learning Disabilities

The number of adults with learning disabilities (LD) is difficult to estimate. They may comprise as many as 80% of adult basic education students, but a smaller proportion of students in other adult education settings. Many adults with LD exhibit strengths that enable them to compensate for their disabilities and perform successfully without supportive services. Among the most serious issues concerning adults with LD are lack of an agreed-upon definition and scarcity of appropriate assessment tools. Prevailing theories assume that individuals with LD have difficulty learning because of a difference in information processing that may have a neurological basis. This difference can affect self-esteem, education, work, socialization, and daily living. Adult educators should be aware that few diagnostic tools are appropriate for use with adults. Adults with LD should assist in the assessment process, which is useful only to the extent that it helps adults live more fully. A combination of intervention strategies and teaching techniques is most effective in meeting the needs of these adults. Techniques include: assessing learning style and using multisensory techniques; motivating students through feedback and positive experiences; teaching memory techniques and transferable strategies; using compensatory aids such as tape recording, word processing, and computer-assisted instruction; and being organized and clear in instruction. (SK)

Text:

Adult educators concur that youngsters with learning disabilities (LD) do not simply outgrow them. They become adults with LD, and many of them participate in adult education programs. This ERIC DIGEST discusses the number of adult learners with LD, identifies relevant issues, describes intervention strategies, and suggests specific techniques that adult educators can use with their LD students.

INCIDENCE

The number of adults with LD in adult education is not easy to estimate because extrapolating from the number of school children receiving LD services (4.84 percent in 1987-88) may result in a fair estimate of learning disabled adults in the population but not of those in adult education.

Adults with LD may comprise as many as 80 percent of the students in adult basic education programs (Ross 1987), but a smaller percentage of students in other adult education settings, such as corporate training programs and continuing education, are estimated to have LD (Ross-Gordon 1989).

Teachers may observe the following characteristics in adult learners who have LD (HEATH Resource Center 1989):

1. Pronounced difficulty with reading, writing, spelling, and number concepts, although other skills are average to superior
2. Poorly formed handwriting that may be printing instead of script and that may have uneven spacing between words
3. Difficulty in listening to a lecture and taking notes at the same time
4. Severe difficulty in sticking to simple schedules, repeatedly forgetting things and losing things
5. Confusion about up and down and right and left
6. Excessive anxiety, anger, or depression because of frustration when coping with social situations
7. Misinterpretation of the subtleties in language, tone of voice, or social situations

Nonetheless, Ross-Gordon (1989) points out that many adults with LD exhibit strengths that enable them to compensate for their disabilities and to perform successfully even without supportive services.

ISSUES

Among the most serious issues concerning adults with LD are the lack of an agreed-upon definition of LD and the scarcity of competent assessment tools to identify adults who have them.

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