There are many factors that can contribute to learning problems. Some children experience difficulty in school because they are not visually ready to learn. If a child’s visual abilities are underdeveloped, they may mistakenly be labeled as learning disabled or as having Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD). In fact, the underlying problem for many of these children may be an undetected and untreated vision problem. Studies have shown that at least 20% of school-aged children suffer from eye teaming or focusing issues that make it difficult to remain on task for long periods of time.
Patients who struggle using their eyes together face unique challenges such as double/blurry vision or perceiving stationary words as “jumping around the page”. These symptoms cause a great deal of eyestrain and children with these symptoms often are unaware that what they are experiencing is not normal. Oftentimes this means children try to adapt to the challenges imposed by these conditions alone rather than bringing them to adults or doctors. The most common way this adaptation presents is through avoidance which can include daydreaming, getting a drink, going to the bathroom, being disruptive, talking to others around them, etc. Unfortunately, parents and teachers are not trained to recognize the differences and many patients are misdiagnosed. That is why it is critical if your child has these symptoms or have been diagnosed with ADD/ADHD, that they have their vision evaluated by a developmental optometrist.