What is the connection between dyslexia and dyscalculia?
Often dyslexia and dyscalculia occur together in one child. Dyscalculia is a problem of understanding basic arithmetic, the decimal system and the general concept of numbers. In both learning disorders there are often difficulties in perception.
Such difficulties are often seen as the cause of learning disorders, but it remains unclear whether there is a connection when both learning disorders occur together. Another common feature of both disorders are the problems in recalling short and long-term memory. It can be summarized that both dyslexia and dyscalculia are both learning disorders. When making a diagnosis, it is important to make sure that the problems and difficulties a child has are based on two learning disabilities or only one. For example, it is possible that students in mathematics class may have difficulty reaching an age-appropriate level because of their dyslexia.
Is there a connection between intelligence and dyslexia?
Dyslexia and intelligence have no scientifically proven connection. This means that children who have dyslexia do not have to score badly on an intelligence test. The distribution of intelligence is just as distributed among dyslexics as among people without dyslexia.
As a rule, when dyslexia is diagnosed, an intelligence test is also taken to assess this. It is possible that people with a very high level of intelligence or even with a high level of giftedness may suffer from dyslexia. Often, however, children with dyslexia are mistakenly considered stupid by their classmates, since the learning content of the German school system can sometimes cause great problems for dyslexics.
Can giftedness cause dyslexia?
The combination of high aptitude and dyslexia seems to many people very absurd. However, a person suffering from dyslexia does not have to be less intelligent, nor is it impossible for him to have high aptitude. It is therefore quite possible that dyslexia is accompanied by a high aptitude, but that these are not related to each other.
People with dyslexia may accordingly have special strengths in areas that have nothing to do with cultural techniques. Often, however, a high aptitude or particularly high intelligence of these students remains undiscovered because they have great deficits in certain areas. The areas of spelling and reading comprehension are also often mistakenly equated with intelligence, so that a child with dyslexia is not considered to be highly gifted from the outset.
