by Patti Brace
What Are Nonverbal Learning Disabilities?
Nonverbal learning disabilities (NLD) are less well known than
language-based learning disabilites such as dyslexia.
Nonverbal learning disabilities often go undiagnosed because reading
ability tends to be regarded as the chief indicator of academic
well-being by most public school systems. Because it has a pronounced
effect on social interaction, as well as academic performance, nonverbal
learning disabilities present a unique challenge to parents, teachers
and adult consumers.
When people with nonverbal learning disabilities are assessed,
typically, their performance IQ is significantly lower than their
verbal IQ, because of visual-spatial weaknesses.
Young Children
Young NLD children tend to stray from home or groups and get lost
easily. They often spill things at mealtime because of problems
with motor coordination and have trouble dressing themselves for
the same reason. Problems with spatial skills appear in a weak understanding
of nonverbal information (e.g. pictures, cartoons, passage of time)
and nonverbal tasks like puzzles.
Many children with NLD use words in an adult fashion and learn
to read before school age because of their auditory strengths. Thus,
they often try to gain information about the world around them by
asking endless questions of adults rather than by exploring on their
own. The inaccuracy of their visual perception, physical awkwardness
and difficulty integrating information in space and time make it
harder for them to make sense of the physical world. This compensation
can compound the problem, however, for the less the child engages
in physical exploration, the less she/he learns about relationships
between objects in space.
Academic Issues
Students with NLD generally appear to possess above-average cognitive
skills because of their verbal strengths, but often show academic
difficulties as they reach secondary levels.
Spatial and coordination problems make printing and writing, learning
math, telling time, reading and colouring maps and keeping one’s
place on the page difficult from early grades. By secondary school
more complex verbal language is based on nonverbal processes like
spatial relationships (in science, for example), logical ordering,
and sequencing (both skills necessary for writing essays.) This
can cause problems in subject areas other than math. For example,
students often experience difficulties with sense of time, arranging
written material on a page, making change, and sewing and typing,
all of which demand good spatial awareness.
Throughout the school years, children with NLD are often inattentive
and poorly organized because they have trouble integrating and interpreting
incoming information. They tend to pay attention to each detail
as it comes in, rather than combining them into more meaningful
wholes. The effort quickly leads to information overload, with which
these students will often cope by clinging to familiar habits and
routines that help them to structure their world. Sometimes this
means of coping appears as misbehaviour.
In later secondary and post-secondary education, information is
frequently presented in lecture form. For students with NLD, problems
arise because they have to integrate information they hear with
the act of writing, already difficult because writing is often awkward
and slow. In addition, students who attend equally to individual
details as they appear have enormous difficulty separating important
from unimportant information.
Teachers can support students with NLD by outlining material to
be covered, using overheads containing central points while lecturing,
providing clear schedules of the day's events, breaking down complex
tasks into smaller, sequenced pieces, using discussion rather than
lectures to develop and integrate ideas, and using students' strengths
in rote learning to help them develop habits and routines to organize
themselves and their work.
Social and Emotional Issues
Possibly the biggest area of concern for children and adults with
NLD is social skills. One result of having trouble processing nonverbal
and spatial information is missing or misinterpreting subtle social
cues like facial expressions, gestures and tones of voice. For example,
a phrase like "nice going" means something different when
you've just dropped a ball or tripped over a skipping rope (again)
than when you've gotten a perfect score on a spelling test. Confusing
the two can spell "disaster" on the playground.
Unlike a student who has difficulty reading but does well with
social and sports activities, students with NLD are affected in
all areas. This can lead to social isolation which children will
sometimes try to alleviate by interacting only with adults, who
are more appreciative of their verbal strengths and less concerned
about physical awkwardness or violations of social conventions.
However, because children with NLD are highly verbal, parents and
teachers tend to attribute their academic and social failure to
laziness or poor character. This can lead to emotional problems
like depression and anxiety that may be expressed in physical ways
(e.g. nail and cuticle biting, headaches, stomach problems, phobias).
Parents and teachers can help children with NLD learn more effective
social skills by talking about social rules and playing games in
which children guess the feelings that go with facial expressions
and tones of voice, and figure out appropriate responses. Friends
and spouses of adults with NLD can help by pointing out social rules
and articulating the information often carried by a look or a gesture.
References
- Gross-Tsur, Varda et al. "Developmental Right-Hemisphere
Syndrome: Clinical Spectrum of the Nonverbal Learning Disability".
Journal of Learning Disabilities, February 1995.
- Harnadek, Michael and Byron P. Rourke. "Principal Identifying
Features of the Syndrome of Nonverbal Learning Disabilities in
Children". Journal of Learning Disabilities, March 1994.
- Humphries, Tom. Nonverbal Learning Disabilities: A Distinct
Group Within Our Population. Communique (LDA Ontario), Autumn
1993.
- Moss-Thompson, Owinda. "The Nonverbal Dilemma". Journal
of Learning Disabilities 1985.
- Rourke, Byron. "Nonverbal Learning Disabilities: Development
of the Syndrome and the Model". News & Events (LDA Nova
Scotia), February 1997.
- Adapted with permission from an article by Patti Brace in LDA
of Kingston Newsletter Winter 1998.
Typically, people with nonverbal learning disabilities
show:
- excellent memory for things they hear
- poor memory for things they see
- good reading ability
- very poor arithmetic ability
- excellent verbal expression and verbal reasoning
- problems with written expression (often because of poor handwriting)
- problems with sense of direction, estimation of size, shape,
distance
- problems reading facial expressions, gestures, social cues,
tones of voice
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The chief characteristics of nonverbal learning disabilities
include:
- tactile-perceptual deficits, usually on the left side of the
body
- coordination difficulties, again often more marked on the left
side of the body
- problems with visual-spatial organization
- extreme difficulty adapting to new and complex situations
- reliance on rote behaviours (which may or may not be appropriate)
in new situations
- trouble understanding nonverbal feedback in social situations
- problems with social perception, social judgement and social
interaction
- distorted sense of time
- very strong rote verbal abilities (e.g. large vocabulary)
- reliance on language as the primary means for social relating,
information-gathering and relief from anxiety
- difficulties with arithmetic and, later, with scientific concepts
and theories
- inattention and hyperactivity earlier in childhood; and social
withdrawal and isolation later
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