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Photo: R. Ashok

Problem area Dyspraxic children find it tough to fit into a group

He believed that he was being treated differently by the teachers and other students. Nevertheless he had managed to cope until his exclusion from cricket and football. The group of boys with whom he wanted to be involved felt he lacked the skill. They excluded him from the game and he became aggressive. The mother was concerned about his destructive behaviour, abusive language, mood swings and unwillingness to do homework. The comprehensive psycho/ educational assessment identified him as Dyspraxic.

Dyspraxia is a motor planning disorder. Motor planning or “praxis”, is the ability of the brain to conceive, organise and carry out the sequence of un-familiar action.

Praxis enables us to deal with the physical environment in an adaptive manner. In Dyspraxia Syndrome, there is a reduced ability to carry out non-learned movements even though adequate physical and conceptual ability exists.

According to Jean Piaget, the Swiss psychologist, the child moves from the sensory motor period to preparation period in the second year of his life. For this transition to occur successfully, the child must first master the ability to imitate. In a typically developing child, we take it for granted.

Imitation is essential for the development of praxis, and difficulties with praxis and motor planning problems affect a child’s ability to learn through imitation.

They cannot learn through actions demonstrated to them and since much of early childhood learning is done in this manner, they miss out on a lot. Children with praxis disorder may be able to generate their own plan but cannot follow someone else. They may seem uncooperative, as they cannot perform on demand.

Hesitancy to movement is the key to understand dyspraxia. They may have difficulty in manipulating mouse, scissors, dressing, with buttons, or zips, writing tools, keys, school bags, taking a catch while playing and so on. Dyspraxic children know what they want to do but find it hard to complete their actions. Their performance may be clumsy, slow, awkward, non-fluent and they may experience problems moving from one activity to the next.

A neat and legible handwriting is a major concern for parents and teachers. They need to remember that the child’s handwriting suffers because there is difficulty in the coordinated movements of smaller muscle groups. He/she might find writing difficult because of the inability to grip a writing instrument adequately or may have a problem because handwriting involves crossing the body’s midline. It may be very difficult to coordinate the movement so that the right hand reaches the left side of the left hand page without error.

But a child having a problem with midline definition could be very good with keyboard, since both hands are used, each hand works on its own side of the body. Handwriting which is a complex perceptual motor skill is critical to children’s success in school and beyond, yet constant reminders from the teachers that “this work is untidy” and their insistence on rewriting will not bring any visible improvement. It merely adds to his frustration and further lowers his self-esteem. Every effort should be made to support the dyspraxic children and we need to bear in mind that they do not fit in because they do not learn in the same manner.

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