Dyspraxia in Children: How to Test for It
dyspraxia in childrenAs a caring parent, do you always find your child experiencing some difficulties carrying out daily life activities? This could be in terms of poor relations with the peers or finding it hard to execute some simple activities. Have you ever taken time to establish what this challenge really is? There is a practical solution that has been tested over time and can help in determining the real cause of such unusual behavior displayed by your child. Most parents would wish to know exactly what is denying their children the comfort of normal life. This condition is known as dyspraxia, and dyspraxia in children is responsible for the signs exhibited by the affected children.
There are measures that can be undertaken to determine whether the child is affected, and they include the following tests:
Education tests
Any parent with a child experiencing academic challenges at school should consider the services of education experts. How is this relevant towards solving the problem? Education experts are professionally trained individuals who can analyze and give proper judgment about the issue at hand. They subject the affected child to some simple academic work that correlates with the child’s age. This is to establish whether the child can handle the task with ease or will be forced to quit along the way.
The conclusion will be based on the end result. Should the child fail completely in the given test, it leads to the conclusion that there is a mental factor which is responsible for the behavior. The experts have many years of experience in the study of the human mind and can advise on the appropriate action to be taken. For instance, a twelve-year-old child should be able to write with ease the word ‘earth’. Should there be failure, it means there is an issue that needs urgent attention.
Physical-exercise tests
Subjecting the child to some exercises that involve gross use of energy is also necessary. This is because some children find it hard performing activities such as riding a bicycle or even playing with bean bags. By involving physical trainers who in most cases have a medical background, the problem at hand will be established. Dyspraxia has a tendency of impairing proper communication between the brain and the muscles. Should the children under testing find it hard to execute activities that require a high level of energy, it can be concluded that they are affected.
Medical tests
Some children experience difficulties with sight and have impaired hearing. It is therefore necessary that once these signs are detected, the child is taken for clinical examination to establish the cause. A hearing test could be performed by letting the child stand at a distance away from the source. This is important so as to establish whether the child can respond positively at various distances in relation to the sound generated.
It is important that proper and careful judgment be made regarding how the child started to adapt to basic activities such as crawling and holding objects. It helps to ascertain whether the problem was congenital or was acquired as the child advanced in age.
General-observation tests
Some children with dyspraxia tend to have social problems, such as relating well with their peers. In most cases, they may tend to be aggressive towards their friends or avoid direct eye contact. This is brought about by feelings of inadequacy on their part. In some cases, their speech could be affected such that they may not be able to pronounce words clearly. It is important that they are exposed to new words to check whether there is any improvement in pronunciation. Should the results remain the same in all the tests done, then it can be concluded that the child in question is indeed affected by dyspraxia.