How Common?

• Several million children qualify as "disabled" under federal law:
  • ~48% of kids with disability have a learning disability
  • roughly 5.5% of all kids have a learning disability (~1 in 18/19 kids)
  • ~20% receive support in school because of oral impairment
  • ~2% diagnosed with intellectual disability
  • ~8% emotional (anxiety, depression, ocd)
  • ~6% other disabilities
• Low incidence: autism, cerebral palsy, traumatic brain injury (~1% of kids receiving services for disabilities)
• Increasingly common that kids will have learning disability AND another diagnosis
• Century ago: 0% of kids received support

Neurodevelopmental disorders — disorders that are present from birth and that impact development across various stages of life

• Learning Disability is the most common neurodevelopmental disorder (½ of all)
• Others include:
  • Intellectual disability (severity level ranges from mild, moderate, severe, profound),
  • Global developmental delay,
  • Communication disorders (language, speech, any affecting verbal/non verbal communications),
  • Language disorder,
  • Speech sound disorder (producing language problem),
  • Childhood onset fluency disorder (stuttering),
  • Social communication disorder (Autism),
  • Unspecified communication disorder (symptoms without clear category),
  • Autism spectrum disorder,
  • ADHD (Combined presentation, Predominantly inattentive presentation, Predominantly hyperactive/impulsive presentation),
  • Specific learning disorder (impairment in reading, written expression or math)