More than 500 participants from various relevant sectors attended the session that will last four days.
Suhair Hassan Al-Qurashi, dean of Dar Al-Hekma, gave a speech, welcoming the guests and explaining why they chose to discuss learning difficulties in Gulf countries.
“We are aiming to organize a number of programs and activities on the occasion of today's ‘Gulf Learning Difficulties Day’ in order to raise awareness: How to detect learning difficulties at an early stage, how to deal with them, and the services available for students who suffer from learning difficulties,” she said. “The Gulf Learning Difficulties Day will include lectures and educational workshops for teachers of public and private education.”
According to Al-Qurashi, a child who suffers from learning difficulties is almost always an intelligent child. “This group of children knows that they have learning difficulties, which makes them frustrated, especially when they live in an environment that does not understand the problems they are facing,” she said.
According to Al-Qurashi, it is not easy for the family to detect their child’s disability at an early stage.
“Learning difficulties are considered one of the most confusing problems that a family might suffer. Statistics about Saudi families issued recently confirmed that the family needs private information about their child in order to answer the important question: ‘What role can the Saudi family play in order to provide the appropriate home environment for the care of children with learning difficulties?’”
Mervat Tashkandi, vice dean for academic affairs and director of the special education program at Dar Al-Hekma, stressed the importance of organizing this event to educate the community on the concepts of learning difficulties.
“An estimated 10 percent of the Saudi population suffers from learning difficulties, so for every 100 people there are 10 people who suffer from this problem,” she said.
“A school with 400 students will have approximately 40 students with learning difficulties. This rate is considered very high and dangerous, given not all schools know how to deal with this problem,” she added.
The learning difficulties program started off with a lecture given by Amal Al-Yamani, a director of the special education program and assistant professor in the program of special education, who said that “we should be aware of what learning difficulties are, how to discover them and how to evaluate them.”
According to Al-Yamani, global statistics confirmed that between seven and 10 percent of children have difficulty both reading and writing, and 40 percent of them drop out of school because of this.
“Some studies and researches indicate that many students with learning difficulties have difficulties with learning mathematics. These problems often start in elementary school and continue through secondary school and perhaps college,” said Al-Yamani.
