[Misc] Learning difficulty versus learning difference

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

Perhaps there are people on NSC who can clear up something for me.

I have noticed that when our students (I am a uni lecturer) are given extra time in exams owing to dyslexia or ADHD, and when staff are asked to provide captions for recorded lectures to assist students who are deaf, these students are now being described as having a 'learning difference', rather than a 'learning difficulty'.

I had been quite happy with 'difference' as it legitimately predicated a need to making special arrangements to put students on a level playing field.

However, a learning difference does not sound to me like something that predicates special arrangements. I have a tendency to prefer information in words and pictures to help me learn facts. Some students prefer words and some prefer pictures. These are learning differences. They are not learning difficulties (unless the lecturer uses slides with only words or only pictures, disadvantaging different students). And they are not difficulties of substance; I have never me a student in 35 years who cannot learn from words or pictures; it is largely a personal preference.

So to me there are a range of learning differences, that have nuanced impact on an ability to learn. Some of us need silence whereas others can read and retain information in a room full of loud conversation or music. Some of us like to take a break from learning after 20 minutes or so. Others can do learning marathons lasting hours. Differences. Not difficulties.

So, does it make a big difference to a student who gets a statutory extra 30 minutes in a written exam if they are labeled with a 'difference' versus a 'difficulty'? Surely if a 'difficulty' is recognized then a solution can be sought. A 'difference' is not necessarily a difficulty, is it? In fact the lable 'difference' is actually signalling it is not a difficulty, surely?

I deliberately wrote 'learning difference' in reply to a poster who said they struggle learning lyrics, yesterday. I noticed in follow ups other posters wrote 'learning difficulty'.

So please someone explain to me how a difference is now a reason for special arrangements and is yet no longer a difficulty.

If I were deaf and were given transcripts of lectures to read because of my 'difference' I suspect I'd feel patronized.

Ironically as an autistic person, my 'difficulty' is not accomodated in any way in the workplace. I can tell you it is a f***ing difficulty and I need help dealing with ambiguous communications. I don't want a pat on the head and someone telling me I'm delightfully different. Or told, when struggling with an ambiguous instruction that 'it's not rocket science' as a colleague did recently - he apologized when I explained the issue.

Do people actually feel better being told they have a 'difference' (that requires special arrangements) as opposed to a 'difficulty'? I certainly wouldn't.

Mrs T disagrees and seems to think it has been 'difference' for ages and that nobody would say 'learning difficulty' anymore. I'm not sure this stands up to scrutiny:

For example, consider this: https://www.inclusiveemployers.co.u... list of,are judgmental, biased and offensive.

Happy to be schooled. Thoughts?

 

[Thunder Bolt]

I wonder if it relates to the definition of difficulty. We are told difficulties can be overcome but if there is a difference then it needs assistance.
Just my ponderings.

 

[The Clamp]

I blame the A*+ system.

In recent years GCSE and A level results have been big news. Plastered all over the news feeds.

These headline grabbing results are seen to be quite easy to achieve, probably because they are handed out with such fanfare.

So when loads of kids come home with A*’s, little Johnny Mutton Head thinks he should have some stars and whistles and bells too.

The only reason he could possibly have not got the amazing results he so richly deserved must be that he learns “differently”, surely?


In the words of Andrew Crocker-Harris;

You shall get exactly the results you deserve. No less and certainly no more.*














*I may or may not be being a little tongue in cheek. Just a trigger warning.

 

[Zeberdi]

Perhaps there are people on NSC who can clear up something for me.

I have noticed that when our students (I am a uni lecturer) are given extra time in exams owing to dyslexia or ADHD, and when staff are asked to provide captions for recorded lectures to assist students who are deaf, these students are now being described as having a 'learning difference', rather than a 'learning difficulty'.

I had been quite happy with 'difference' as it legitimately predicated a need to making special arrangements to put students on a level playing field.

However, a learning difference does not sound to me like something that predicates special arrangements. I have a tendency to prefer information in words and pictures to help me learn facts. Some students prefer words and some prefer pictures. These are learning differences. They are not learning difficulties (unless the lecturer uses slides with only words or only pictures, disadvantaging different students). And they are not difficulties of substance; I have never me a student in 35 years who cannot learn from words or pictures; it is largely a personal preference.

So to me there are a range of learning differences, that have nuanced impact on an ability to learn. Some of us need silence whereas others can read and retain information in a room full of loud conversation or music. Some of us like to take a break from learning after 20 minutes or so. Others can do learning marathons lasting hours. Differences. Not difficulties.

So, does it make a big difference to a student who gets a statutory extra 30 minutes in a written exam if they are labeled with a 'difference' versus a 'difficulty'? Surely if a 'difficulty' is recognized then a solution can be sought. A 'difference' is not necessarily a difficulty, is it? In fact the lable 'difference' is actually signalling it is not a difficulty, surely?

I deliberately wrote 'learning difference' in reply to a poster who said they struggle learning lyrics, yesterday. I noticed in follow ups other posters wrote 'learning difficulty'.

So please someone explain to me how a difference is now a reason for special arrangements and is yet no longer a difficulty.

If I were deaf and were given transcripts of lectures to read because of my 'difference' I suspect I'd feel patronized.

Ironically as an autistic person, my 'difficulty' is not accomodated in any way in the workplace. I can tell you it is a f***ing difficulty and I need help dealing with ambiguous communications. I don't want a pat on the head and someone telling me I'm delightfully different. Or told, when struggling with an ambiguous instruction that 'it's not rocket science' as a colleague did recently - he apologized when I explained the issue.

Do people actually feel better being told they have a 'difference' (that requires special arrangements) as opposed to a 'difficulty'? I certainly wouldn't.

Mrs T disagrees and seems to think it has been 'difference' for ages and that nobody would say 'learning difficulty' anymore. I'm not sure this stands up to scrutiny:

For example, consider this: https://www.inclusiveemployers.co.uk/blog/understanding-learning-disability-terminology/#:~:text=Instead have a list of,are judgmental, biased and offensive.

Happy to be schooled. Thoughts?

I’m having difficulty absorbing all this at 8.30 on a Monday morning.

Or maybe I’m just ‘different’

But I think I agree

Edit - Absorption complete :-

How a society embraces ’difference’ is a matter of attitude. How a society responds to ‘difficulties’ is a matter of funding.

 

[JBizzle]

I wonder if it relates to the definition of difficulty. We are told difficulties can be overcome but if there is a difference then it needs assistance.
Just my ponderings.

I think it's as simple as this. FWIW, I believe it's been "difference" for years

 

[The Clamp]

Could someone please clarify what I need to be offended / outraged by here?

 

[Muzzman]

At Sussex (I work in admissions), it’s classed as ‘reasonable adjustment’. But to apply for it, you have to register your ‘disability’ with the university during registration, so ultimately, any adjustment allowed by the uni will class the student as having a disability.

Reasonable adjustments for your studies : University of Sussex

 

[Thunder Bolt]

I’m having difficulty absorbing all this at 8.30 on a Monday morning.

Or maybe I’m just ‘different’

But I think I agree

Edit - Absorption complete :-

How a society embraces ’difference’ is a matter of attitude. How a society responds to ‘difficulties’ is a matter of funding.

Good point.

 

[Chicken Run]

Could someone please clarify what I need to be offended / outraged by here?

I would imagine simply by opening this thread is enough to cover off all of the above

 

[Nitram]

When I started in the mid 1980’s the people I worked with were termed as mentally handicapped, this changed to learning difficulties which was then changed to learning disability, as the term learning difficulties was reserved for children in main stream schools. Hope that clears it up

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I wonder if it relates to the definition of difficulty. We are told difficulties can be overcome but if there is a difference then it needs assistance.
Just my ponderings.

Interesting. Am I reading from that: if difficulties can be overcome then differences cannot. I am not sure this would be my understanding of the definition of either.

I remain suspicious that 'difference' has been adopted as terminology to mitigate against the pejorative implication of 'difficulty'. But if there is no difficulty why should there be a need for an adjustment? Difference triggering mitigation equals disadvantage, or why mitigate?

I hesitate to use the expression 'political correctness gone mad'. Instead I will invoke the notion of perversion of language.

To me a learning difficulty is any condition that hampers an individual's ability to learn to their best ability. One could call it a learning hinderance, or learning obstacle. Difference is neutral and does not imply disadvantage.

This of course means that stupidity is not a learning difficulty because no amount of adjustment will allow the student to achieve first class results, unless the achievement bar is lowered, any more than a recruitment and team selection adjustment would allow me to play number 9 for The Albion.

We do not adjust assessments to allow students to achiever better than their abilities allow. We adjust assessments to remove identifiable obstruction and allow students to achieve to the best of their capabilities.

Obstruction
Hinderance
Disadvantage

These are difficulties, not differences.

Perversion of language is where meaning is changed. One could say that Mohamed Fayed exercised a management difference with his female staff, but this hardly conveys an appropriate meaning. Abuse is indeed difference. As indeed is difficulty. But difference does not explain how we are supposed to process the situation and respond.

Anyway, I will now look at the BBC web page to see what's happening with the difference in Gaza, and Manchester City's financial difference.

 

[The Clamp]

I had learning difficulties as a kid. Primary and junior school.

It was more behavioural. Found it hard to concentrate and so would drift off into my own world. Staring out the windows etc. To the onlooker it looked like I was a dribbling buffoon.

I was taken out of class permanently and placed into a forgotten Portakabin at the far end of the playing field.

Along with other kids with barely discernible issues. One kid was in there because he had a cleft palette. Another because he was Muslim.

We even had to use a different school entrance.

We would be filed into the back of assembly after all the other kids had sat down. Lunch was eating in the cabin and play times were separate.

We spent our days drawing and playing with sticklebricks.

This was the mid 80’s. Not that long ago.

So in all seriousness, I’m f***ing relieved for children these days that they are treated with respect and have humane things in place to help.

 

[chip]

At my institution, we now use the term Pause in Study instead of suspension. Apparently, suspension has negative connotations from secondary education and takin a pis is better.

Academic Integrity has become Academic Conduct to avoid confusion with artificial intelligence.

I agree with the OP that difference is not a reason for AER (additional academic requirements) in itself. I expect that a broad and diverse steering group has widely consulted, across all staff groups and student, to find a term that no one will be wholly happy with. Many students have learning difficulties as evidenced by the marks for my exams. More seriously, I had five project students last year and all had learning difference/difficulties (AERs) and all turned out to be rather good in a least some aspects of their work. A couple had real difficulties writing their dissertation. I sometimes see my own neuro deviant traits in these students and talk with them about it, in some cases the difference helps.

The best student last year had ADHD and ASD, when they were explaining one thing you could see them running ahead with their ideas and forgetting what they were originally talking about. Probably like one of my lectures. Structure was this students problem, how they organised things in a logical and progressive development of ideas.

I think that the very large class sizes, compared to my time, have made formulaic processes for dealing with differences and difficulty in learning the norm. This spawns an increase in our welfare and support services but a more distant relationship between academics and students. Essentially, we stop looking at the individual and match them to a code to make some adjustment. In the old days, we used to discuss individuals in exam boards, we aren't allowed to now, even when you are the external examiner. Special considerations and appeals (which I have this week) increase in number each year. It seems like it's become less about the individual development and more about the process.

 

[Green Cross Code Man]

I remain suspicious that 'difference' has been adopted as terminology to mitigate against the pejorative implication of 'difficulty'. But if there is no difficulty why should there be a need for an adjustment? Difference triggering mitigation equals disadvantage, or why mitigate?

I was about to say something similar to this regarding perhaps the assumption that the term needed to be politically correct. Educational establishments can't wait to water down any perceived slight to anyone and this results in needing the wisdom of Solomon to try to differentiate words used to describe the same affectation but which have small nuances differences in their meaning. And the second part of this paragraph is absolutely true but only if one holds fast to the idea that the words involved are to be taken literally and not in the watered down PC sense.

 

[Cheshire Cat]

Is my difference a difficulty?

Is my difficulty a difference?

Dunno. Depends what the difficulty and difference is and on the individual circumstances probably.

That doesn't help.

It seems a case of semantics.

 

[beorhthelm]

I hesitate to use the expression 'political correctness gone mad'. Instead I will invoke the notion of perversion of language.

usually the same thing isn't it? find some contortion of the word meaning to alter perceptions of something.

 

[Happy Exile]

I think it's context, and in the context of the standardised education system it's a difference that's being described in cases of dyslexia and ADHD, not a difficulty.

By way of personal example. my daughter has severe dyslexia and is super-smart. She can't extract meaning very well from narrative text, but put it in bullet points and she'll get it straight away. The difference in grades at school in as close a comparison as I can make pre and post diagnosis is from a low D in English Literature as one subject, to an A. So I'd say that's learning differently to the standard, expected/normalised method of learning, not a difficulty in actually learning something.

A difficulty in learning wouldn't respond so well to the changed inputs (I don't think) so is describing a different set of criteria that need managing.

 

[Madafwo]

Having just had a brief conversation with the wife who knows far more about this than I do (she has a physical disability and has just completed a degree in Childhood and Youth studies). I offered the simple conclusion, that she agreed with, that a difference is simply a difficulty that has been accounted/catered for.

I say simply, as that's how I see it in my head and I'm simple. The wife then went on to explain in great detail about what is wrong with the education system and I just concentrated on the driving.

 

[Coldeanseagull]

I had learning difficulties as a kid. Primary and junior school.

It was more behavioural. Found it hard to concentrate and so would drift off into my own world. Staring out the windows etc. To the onlooker it looked like I was a dribbling buffoon.

I was taken out of class permanently and placed into a forgotten Portakabin at the far end of the playing field.

Along with other kids with barely discernible issues. One kid was in there because he had a cleft palette. Another because he was Muslim.

We even had to use a different school entrance.

We would be filed into the back of assembly after all the other kids had sat down. Lunch was eating in the cabin and play times were separate.

We spent our days drawing and playing with sticklebricks.

This was the mid 80’s. Not that long ago.

So in all seriousness, I’m f***ing relieved for children these days that they are treated with respect and have humane things in place to help.

They were even less tolerant in the 60's and 70's

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

I think it's context, and in the context of the standardised education system it's a difference that's being described in cases of dyslexia and ADHD, not a difficulty.

By way of personal example. my daughter has severe dyslexia and is super-smart. She can't extract meaning very well from narrative text, but put it in bullet points and she'll get it straight away. The difference in grades at school in as close a comparison as I can make pre and post diagnosis is from a low D in English Literature as one subject, to an A. So I'd say that's learning differently to the standard, expected/normalised method of learning, not a difficulty in actually learning something.

A difficulty in learning wouldn't respond so well to the changed inputs (I don't think) so is describing a different set of criteria that need managing.

I guess what you're saying is that a learning difference is a learning difficulty that has been addressed. But I am not sure it becomes a difference until it has been identified as a difficulty. The learning difference would describe the alteration in training and/or assessment that levels the playing field. In other words you come in with the difficulty and go out with a difference and a rubric that equalizes you with those who didn't have the difficulty.

I'm not really happy with the requirement necessary to validate the use of 'difference' that a learning difficulty be defined as a condition that confers a disadvantage that cannot be remedied by any attempt to level the playing field. For example, being incapable of grasping fundamental concepts, or mathematics. This redefines 'difficulty' as a disability.

If I'm overthinking this (you can guess the rest).