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 | You and Yours - Transcript ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Radio 4 |
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| TX: 07.07.03 WHAT SUPPORT DO CHILDREN WITH DYSPRAXIA NEED? |
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PRESENTER: DIANA MADILL MADILL Now you might have heard of clumsy child syndrome or what's now become known as dyspraxia. The children who have it often go undiagnosed for years, not surprisingly as its main symptoms are the not too uncommon poor coordination and posture. Interestingly four cases in five are boys and it actually afflicts one person in 15 or seven per cent, which is why the seventh day of the seventh month has been chosen for Dyspraxia Awareness Day. Rachel Schofield reports. MAX COLLINS WOLF The school had a special needs unit said there was nothing wrong with me and I just wasn't trying basically. And then I was diagnosed as having dyspraxia by an educational psychologist. SCHOFIELD Max Collins Wolf is 10, he was diagnosed as dyspraxic at the age of seven. MAX COLLINS WOLF Well I was quite glad that someone had realised that I was trying but it did sort of make me feel quite upset that there was something wrong with me. ELAINE COLLINS WOLF He learnt to read incredibly quickly at school, which puts you off thinking that there might be a specific learning difficulty because he's coping so well. SCHOFIELD But as Max got increasingly frustrated with certain physical activities his mum Elaine started to suspect there might be a problem. ELAINE COLLINS WOLF It wasn't clear whether he was left footed or right footed and left handed and right handed, it's just these sort of mild difficulties which it's so easy to put down to clumsiness, not trying, not concentrating. Every time I tried to get him to put something down on paper every word that I made him write was agony and it became a real battleground, I mean the times we ended up in tears, I couldn't understand why he couldn't just sit at a table and write something. SCHOFIELD Dyspraxia often runs in families but it may never have been diagnosed. If parents are worried about their child and go to their GP it can take a long time to get a diagnosis from the right medical expert. Laura Irwin is a physiotherapist specialising in dyspraxia. IRWIN Some of the earliest signs that people will notice are a hesitancy with things like building blocks, doing puzzles, maybe a very strong aversion to doing activities with crayons, pencils, anything that involves creating shape and forms, a bit like having a car race where the head of one car is travelling at say 90 miles an hour and their hand conversely travelling at 30 miles an hour, obviously then one's going much faster than the other so the hand actually can't keep up. SCHOFIELD When Max's mum Elaine became concerned about his development she approached the special educational needs coordinator at his school. ELAINE COLLINS WOLF The school was able to deal with dyslexia brilliantly, the sort of support, the diagnosis was really very strong. But I think with dyspraxia we're where we were with dyslexia 30 years ago, or 20 years ago, where so many go unrecognised. And when we brought it up the reports she got back from all his teachers was that he was doing fine, he should just concentrate a bit more and everything would be okay. But we trusted our judgement and took him off to see an educational psychologist and the classic split between the verbal IQ and performance IQ was very, very evident. MAX COLLINS WOLF Left, right, left right, left … IRWIN In terms of the things that you can do there's a whole variety of activities, games that you can play with the children. As I always say there's nothing wildly scientific about it, a lot of it can be done through just normal play or modifying things that you normally do. MAX COLLINS WOLF … left, right, left right … IRWIN We do a lot of posture work, which would involve things like wheelbarrow races, jumping on trampolines, wobble boards for balance and there's a lot of shop bought games which are very useful, so games like Operation which help them deal with pencil grip. So I think one of the key things that a lot of parents don't realise is actually they can do basically most of the stuff themselves if they've just been given a bit of guidance in terms of what is it they actually should be doing. MAX COLLINS WOLF There are some exercises which are more enjoyable than others but they're not huge sacrifices. I wouldn't say I enjoy them. They take about five minutes - I do two in the morning and two in the afternoon. SCHOFIELD And there's one tool in particular which can really make a difference to children like Max. IRWIN I think laptops are definitely the thing for the older child and you see amazing results whenever the child goes on to the laptop because it takes away all of the pressures of doing the writing neatly, spatially planning it, getting the presentation, getting the spelling and organisation, it's such a relief. MAX COLLINS WOLF There are definitely improvements that people have noticed. I can track things much better, so if something's moving I can keep my eye on it much easier without losing it. So that helps with copying from the board. I can balance much better and I can catch better. Advice I'd give to somebody who was newly diagnosed dyspraxic, they should definitely tell a teacher or make sure that the teachers know that you are dyspraxic. Teachers definitely to help they can understand what's wrong with people and not get cross at them, not sort of take it out on them if they're not very good at something. MADILL And that was 10-year-old Max Collins making a plea for more understanding about dyspraxia and he was ending Rachel Schofield's report. And if you want more information about dyspraxia you can look for links from our website or you can call us on 0800 044 044. Back to the You and Yours homepage The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ is not responsible for external websites |
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