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CNN Live Today
Learning Disabilities
Aired August 29, 2002 - 10:26 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: For some school-aged kids, learning their ABCs is not as easy as 1, 2, 3. We are talking about learning disabilities. How do you know if your child is just a slow learner and not someone suffering from a learning disability?
Well, we are paging our Dr. Gupta on the issue.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Davis King is like many other kids. He loves football, being in the kitchen and avoiding books. But Davis doesn't dislike reading; he has dyslexia, which is a type of learning disability.
DR. LISA GUY, CHILD PSYCHOLOGIST, MARCUS INST.: It's a neurological disorder that's affects the way a student's brain processes information. So it could have an impact on the way that a student hears information, the way they express themselves. It may have an impact on the way they read, write or do math problems.
GUPTA: Davis's mom first suspected something might be wrong when he was 3 or 4, and he wasn't rhyming like other children.
JAN KING, PARENT: You sing the nursery rhymes with them, you sing the little church songs with them, and those things didn't come easily for Davis.
GUPTA: Almost 10 percent of adults and children have learning disabilities. It could be even more, as many never get tested. Most, as with Davis, still have above average intelligence. Many have had extraordinary success, such as Tom Cruise, Pablo Picasso, and even Albert Einstein.
GUY: So it's not the case that they are dumb, that they really have good thinking and reasoning skills. They have difficulties in a particular area.
GUPTA: Dyslexia and other learning disabilities often go undetected, but there are early warning signs. Parents should pay attention if their preschooler speaks later than most children, has pronunciation problems, has difficulty rhyming words, has trouble learning numbers, and demonstrates consistent letter reversals.
KING: You see a letter on a page and you reach out and get that letter, and you put it in your brain, and you turn it around, and you take it out and you put that down on the page, and then instead of mountain, he said, an m, it as w. GUPTA: The good news is that learning disabilities are treatable and can be found through testing.
KING: Testing would be a very good idea. And he was 6. So we were very lucky.
GUPTA: Lucky because the Kings caught it early. Today, Davis attends a special school and special classes.
Painter, actor, scientist. Or?
DAVIS KING, MIDDLE SCHOOL STUDENT: Cooking, overall. My favorite thing, cooking.
GUPTA: Even chef. Davis King is well on his way to being whatever he wants to be.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GUPTA: And Davis King is not alone. Four million children, it's predicted, have learning disorders in this country today. Why they occur, that's a bit more difficult question. It could be subtle changes in the brain or the structure of the brain, but the key is, everyone found, getting tested early -- Leon.
HARRIS: Exactly, that's a good point. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, appreciate that.
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