Learning Disability Assessment & Diagnosis
About LDs & ADHD
Psycho-eductional Assessment:
You or your child may benefit from an assessment if you struggle with:
- Reading, writing, math, or language skills
- Understanding and remembering things
- Paying attention so you can be present for learning
- Getting along with peers, teachers, and family members
- Worrying, nervousness, and/or irritable mood
If you or your child have difficulty with learning, remembering or understanding things, you may benefit from a psycho-educational assessment. This type of assessment looks at how a person learns and what kinds of things may be getting in the way of their learning. The information that is gathered through a psycho-educational assessment helps make decisions about how to help the individual.
Registered psychologists who have specific training in psycho-educational assessments can provide these types of assessments. Training refers to the type of schooling they received, as well as practical experience they have had working with clients under supervision by another psychologist.
Schools: Parents should always check with their child’s school first to see if the school psychologist can conduct a psycho-educational assessment. There is no cost for this service, but schools often have long waiting lists, and your child is not guaranteed to be assessed.
The health care system: In some cases, there may be a special program or clinic within the health care system that can offer psycho-educational assessments, however, the eligibility criteria are often very specific and require a referral from a physician. It is worth enquiring about this option, as it would be covered by Alberta Health Services (AHS).
Non-profit organizations/agencies: Registered psychologists will often work within non-profit agencies and are qualified to provide psycho–educational assessments. There is often a cost but many run on a sliding scale. Alternatively, funding assistance may be available.
Private practice psychologists: In Alberta, there are many psychologists who work in private practice who are also qualified to provide psycho–educational assessments. You will have to pay out of pocket for this option. However, some insurance plans may cover some of these services. You can search for psychologists through the Psychologists Association of Alberta.
Here are some questions that you can ask a psychologist to determine if you feel comfortable working with them.
What kind of training have you had in psycho-educational assessments?
Ideally, the psychologist will have attended graduate school in either a clinical psychology or school psychology program that specifically focused on psycho-educational assessments, Learning Disabilities, and related challenges. They should also have had practical experience using their skills with clients under the supervision of another psychologist who has this training.
Sometimes psychologists trained in other areas of psychology, such as counselling, will learn how to do assessments outside of a structured graduate school program. In these cases it will be important to discuss what kind of training they participated in and whether they were supervised. Attending a workshop about using a particular intelligence test is not sufficient training to be conducting psycho-educational assessments.
What types of information do you gather for the assessment?
A psychologist who is qualified to conduct psycho-educational assessments should be gathering multiple types of information (e.g., interview, questionnaire, standardized testing) from multiple sources (e.g., the child, the parents and the teacher). Ask them how they make decisions and draw their conclusions. Diagnoses should never be made based on one test or questionnaire.
What is a Learning Disability? How is it diagnosed?
A qualified psychologist will be able to answer these questions, as they would have studied Learning Disabilities and learned how to diagnose them during their training.
To understand what a Learning Disability is go to LDs – Definitions & Terminology
Be open. You may have an idea of what the problem is or perhaps you may even think that you or your child has a particular disorder or meets criteria for a specific diagnosis. It is fine to have hunches about these things, but keep in mind that the end results of the assessment may point to something different. A good psychologist should have an open mind as well.
Be planful. Engage in the assessment process at a time that is not too busy or stressful for you or your child. The psychologist will want to get the best “snap-shot” of what you or your child is capable of and what you/they are typically like in everyday life. For example, it would not be best to start the assessment process after a death in the family, as you/your child may be behaving differently as a result of grieving.
Be prepared. Gather ahead of time all of the relevant information (ie., report cards and any previous assessment reports or other medical or educational documentation). This will save time and make the process go more smoothly. It will also help the psychologist in forming conclusions, as it gives them a better sense of the bigger picture.
Be careful and thoughtful. Not every problem requires a psychoeducational assessment as the first solution to a problem. Counselling, academic support such as tutoring, or other strategies may be tried first. Ask the psychologist what are some of the other options and the pros and cons of waiting.
Be realistic. It is helpful to understand that a psycho-educational assessment will provide you with information about how you or your child learns, but it will not provide solutions to every problem or quick fixes. Many of the recommendations involve hard work and dedication to a new way of learning and working. Start with recommendations that are manageable and meaningful and move forward from there. Be patient.
Be active and interested. When the assessment is complete and you meet with the psychologist to get the results, actively listen, take notes, and ask any and all questions that you might have. You want to leave that appointment feeling confident about your next steps. If you don’t understand something, ask the psychologist to explain it further.
A psycho-educational assessment is conducted by a registered psychologist who has training in this particular type of assessment. The types of information gathered include:
Personal background information through interviews with parents, teachers and/or the individual. Examples of information gathered include birth and developmental history, education history, medical and health information, and family relationships.
Questionnaires that may look at the person’s behaviour, daily living skills, attention, mood, and social skills.
School records, which include report cards, teachers’ letters, and other assessments.
Sometimes observing the child in their classroom setting can be helpful for understanding their behavior and learning challenges.
Standardized testing, which looks at things like a person’s intelligence, academic skills, memory, and language abilities. These are typically standardized, norm-referenced tests. Standardized means that when they created the test, they made very specific instructions that everyone giving the test must follow, and they gave it to lots of people who are a representative sample of the population. Norm-referenced means that they have statistical information that allows the psychology to compare your child’s performance with other students her age and/or grade.
Standard Scores: These are typically scores that give a number based on several smaller tasks. On these tests 100 is the middle score. Percentile Ranks are easier to understand though.
Percentile Rank: This score tells you how well you or your child performed compared with a person the same age or grade. These are numbers that range from less than one to just under 100, representing the performance of 100 people who are the same age. If your score is at the 10th percentile, that means that you performed better than or equal 10 out of 100 other people the same age. If your child’s score is at the 75th percentile, that means that he performed better than or equal to 75 out of 100 children his age.
Referral Questions: What types of tests, questionnaires and observations will be done will depend on what you and the psychologist decide will be the primary focus of the assessment. This is often called the “referral question”. Referral questions help to give the assessment a purpose.
Common referral questions include:
-Why am I or my child struggling to learn to read?
-Why am I or my child struggling in all academic areas?-My teenager works very hard, but doesn’t seem to be getting grades that reflect this effort. Why?
-Do I or my child have a Learning Disability?
-What can help with my or my child’s learning?
Diagnosis:
After the psychologist has gathered all the information that they need to answer the referral question, they can start to make conclusions about the individual’s learning.
It is important to understand that conclusions are not made simply on the basis of tests scores. Conclusions are based on the combination of test scores, background information, education history, observations and other relevant information. This is why a psycho-educational assessment is not a quick process and involves making sure that all relevant information is available for the psychologist to consider before they draw their conclusions.
Post-Assessment Meeting: Once all information is gathered the psychologist will meet with you to discuss the results of the assessment, any diagnoses that were made, and what may help. This information should be explained in a way that makes sense to you. If something doesn’t make sense, ask about it. It’s your right as a parent to understand the results of your child’s assessment. It’s also your right to understand your own assessment.
If a diagnosis is made, the psychologist will discuss with you the importance of sharing the assessment results. You should receive a report that you can share with others. However, the ultimate decision on whether or not you share the assessment is up to you.
You should have a meeting where the psychologist explains the results to you. During the meeting and after you receive the report, you should ask the psychologist for more information
Here are a few questions to ask yourself about the report:
-Did the report capture the question I was asking about myself or my child?
-Did the report answer the question I was asking about myself or my child?
-Did the report explain how the data was used to come to the conclusions and diagnoses?
-Did I understand my or my child’s functioning in each of the areas measured?
-Are there practical recommendations included?
-Are the recommendations connected to the individual’s strengths and weaknesses?
Educational psychologists in Canada may diagnose a Learning Disability with the LDAC definition and/or a Specific Learning Disorders, using the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual for Mental Disorders (DSM-5). Whichever diagnostic assessment the psychologist uses, it should be explained clearly in the report and during your meeting.
Intellectual Disabilities could be identified instead of LD. Intellectual disabilities, as defined by the DSM-5, require three things:
- Significant challenges in reasoning, problem solving, abstract thinking, and planning, which is measured using an intelligence test. Intelligence test scores would be lower in a person with an Intellectual Disability as compared to someone with a learning disability.
- Significant challenges in daily living skills, which include things like communication skills, self-care, managing money, being independent in the community and at home.
- Evidence that the challenges in number 1 and 2 started when the person was a child.
For more information about Intellectual
For more information about Intellectual Disabilities visit AAIDD.ORG.
Giftedness:
Technically, giftedness isn’t a diagnosis because it isn’t considered a disability. However, some parents may want a psycho-educational assessment for their child if they wonder about giftedness. Giftedness can co-exist with LD.
Different school boards and organizations define giftedness in different ways. Within the context of a psycho-educational assessment, giftedness usually requires intelligence test scores that are in the top 2% of the population. Knowing whether a child is gifted can be helpful in determining what kinds of educational programming may be beneficial for them.
Other Diagnoses:
Other diagnoses that can be made through psycho-educational assessments include: ADHD, General Anxiety Disorder, and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). A diagnosis of ASD usually requires additional extensive interviewing with the parents and play-based testing with the child.
As ADHD is a condition that can be medically managed, it is often diagnosed by physicians (family physicians, pediatricians, psychiatrists). ADHD may also be diagnosed within the context of a psycho-educational assessment.
It is important to understand that technically a psycho-educational assessment is not necessary to diagnose ADHD, as the diagnostic criteria for ADHD are behavioral (e.g., loses things). A thorough interview with the family, questionnaires and observations are often used to diagnose ADHD.
However, it may be necessary to also do a psycho-educational assessment, particularly when there may be concerns about underlying learning difficulties. This would be important to fully understand all of the challenges that the child is facing including ADHD.
Keep in mind that there are no “tests” for assessing ADHD. There are tests out there that measure attention in different ways (e.g. being able to focus for long periods or being able to stop yourself from doing something). However, these are mostly used in research settings and are not considered appropriate for diagnosing ADHD.
If a professional wants to solely use a test to assess for ADHD and does not conduct a comprehensive interview to learn about possible ADHD symptoms in everyday life, consider working with someone else.
The Learning Disabilities Association of Canada (LDAC) has identified specific processing challenges: Learning Disabilities result from impairments in one or more processes related to perceiving, thinking, remembering or learning.
These include, but are not limited to:
Language Processing: is the understanding and expression of oral and written language; includes vocabulary, word structure, sentence structure, and meaning across sentences.
Phonological Processing: is the ability to identify the different sounds that make words and to associate and manipulate these sounds within words we speak and write.
Visual Processing: is the ability to make sense of information taken in through the eyes. Difficulties with visual processing affect how visual information is interpreted, or processed by the brain.
Processing Speed: refers to the pace at which you are able to perceive information (visual or auditory), make sense of that information, and then respond.
Memory and Attention: Short-term memory is the process by which you hold on to information as long as you are concentrating on it.
-Long-term memory refers to the process by which you store information that you have repeated often enough.
-Attention: is the ability to sustain attention to a task
Executive Function is needed for planning, organization, strategizing, attention to details and managing time and space.
Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD) is a lifelong condition that makes it hard to learn motor skills and coordination. It’s not a learning disorder, but it can impact learning. Kids with DCD struggle with physical tasks and activities they need to do both in and out of school.
Dysgraphia is having difficulty with the physical act of writing.
More recently, DCD has become the more recognized term used to describe challenges with motor skills and coordination, such as difficulty with the physical act of writing. Occupational Therapists (OTs) may work with a person struggling with dysgraphia or DCD to improve motor skills.
Nonverbal Learning Disability (NVLD) describes a well-defined profile that includes strengths in verbal abilities contrasted with deficits in visual-spatial abilities. Individuals with NVLD often have trouble with some of the following: organization, attention, executive functioning, nonverbal communication, and motor skills.
