Background: Here, I examine the status of 'learning disability' as a basic concept. This kind of questioning may be thought a task for philosophy, or at least for 'theory' or 'disability studies'. Materials and methods: I identify history instead as a discipline well placed to reveal the category errors that surround the concept. Results: These…

Aim/Purpose: To identify and rectify the learning difficulties of online learners. Background: The major cause of learners' failure and non-acquisition of knowledge relates to their weaknesses in certain areas necessary for optimal learning. We focus on e-learning because, within this environment, the learner is mostly affected by these…

This study examined performance on transitive inference problems in children with developmental dyscalculia (DD), typically developing controls matched on IQ, working memory and reading skills, and in children with outstanding mathematical abilities. Whereas mainstream approaches currently consider DD as a domain-specific deficit, we hypothesized…

Three training methods differing in degree of abstraction (demonstration, slide-diagram, and diagram) were used to instruct adolescents (26 control and 21 aphasic) in the completion of two tasks. Results indicated that aphasics have a deficit of abstract thinking which can prove a handicap in training situations. Ten sources are cited. (EJS)

A curriculum model in logic is proposed for learning disabled students based on reasoning and content needs. A diagnostic test with probes yields a profile of the child's reasoning ability and pinpoints areas of strengths and weaknesses. Three levels of instruction are provided: thematic concrete, specific concrete, and abstract. (CL)

Comparison of elementary grade students with (N=42) or without (N=42) learning disabilities (LD) on their logical-mathematical structures of thought found that, though both groups generated grouping relationships, children with LD tendered to generate solutions showing less coordinated structures of thought. For both groups, scores on the…

The field of education has largely ignored the concept of the dialectic, except in the Socratic teaching method, and even there bipolar meaning or reasoning has not been recognized. Mainstream educational psychology bases its assumptions about human reasoning and learning on current demonstrative concepts of information processing and levels of…

Twenty-nine children with learning disabilities (LD) in grades 2 and 4 through 7 were compared with children without LD for their development of proportional structures of thought. Significantly fewer children with LD had constructed second-order logical structures necessary to act on problems using multiplicative and preproportional reasoning.…

Thirteen learning disabled and 15 remedial high school students were taught reasoning skills using computer-assisted instruction and were given basic or elaborated corrections. Criterion-referenced test scores were significantly higher for the elaborated-corrections treatment on the post- and maintenance tests and on a transfer test assessing…

This paper presents a rationale for teaching higher level thinking skills to students with special needs, including those with mild mental handicaps and learning disabilities. It briefly reviews the literature on teaching such skills, stressing that thinking skills can be taught through specific teaching methods such as a four-step method…