Learning Disabilities in Primary Education (A field study on a sample of Primary School Pupils)

Abstract

Learning disabilities -in particular- are common disorders among primary school pupils. This is what has prompted researchers in the field of education and psychology to take an interest in the study of this subject and to seek various means and techniques to help detect these difficulties in their early stages; to avoid exacerbation and difficulty of treatment.

The current study aimed to reveal the differences between normal students and students with learning disabilities in each of the academic difficulties, behavioral characteristics and perceptual-motor difficulties, and to find out the differences between males and females in thesevarious difficulties. The Learning Difficulties Scale prepared by Zaidan Al-Sartawi (1995), adapted to the Algerian environment, was used by (Moussa and Beshlaghem, 2020). The study was conducted on a sample of (65) male and female students (34 males and 31 females) of fourth and fifth year students.

The results led to the following:

- There are statistically significant differences between normal pupils and pupils with learning disabilities in each of the academic disabilities, behavioral characteristics and perceptual-motor disabilities; this is for the benefit of pupils with learning disabilities.

- There are statistically significant differences in learning disabilities between girls and boys; in favor of boys. However, the differences were not statistically significant in perceptual-motor disabilities.

- There are no significant differences in each of the academic disabilities, behavioral characteristics and perceptual-motor disabilities between girls and boys with learning disabilities.