1 Introduction

Dyscalculia and mathematical learning

difficulties: The test protocol
b sung cho
This book was written to complement The Trouble with Mathematics: A Practical Guide
xem xét dánh giá chan oán
to Helping Learners with Numeracy Difficulties. It looks at assessing and diagnosing
and learning difficulties in mathematics and dyscalculia and links those processes to
triet ly thuc dung
the teaching philosophies and pragmatics in The Trouble with Mathematics: A Practical
Guide to Helping Learners with Numerical Difficulties (now in 4th edition).
It contains:
chan doan
giao thuc Chn các thành phn
OO A suggested diagnostic protocol and the reasons for selecting the components
c tham chieu theo tieu chuan
OO A norm-referenced (UK sample*) 15-minute Mathematics Test for ages 7 to 59
years old
OO Norm-referenced (UK sample*) tests for the four sets of basic facts (+ − × ÷) for
ages 7 to 15 years old
OO A norm-referenced (English sample*) anxiety, ‘How I feel about mathematics’, test
of mathematics anxiety for ages 11 to 16 years old (a version for adults is available
on my website, www.stevechinn.co.uk)
OO A test of thinking cognitive (thinking) style in mathematics
OO A Dyscalculia Checklist
OO Informal tests for vocabulary, symbols, place value, estimation
OO A structured, exemplar test of word problems
OO Informal tests of short-term memory and working memory
OO Guidance on how to appraise the ability to estimate
OO Guidance on how to use errors and error patterns in diagnosis and intervention
OO Guidance on how to construct criterion referenced tests and how to integrate them
into day-to-day teaching
OO Case studies

*Samples for each test were over 2000

Many of the factors from the protocol interact.

The tests and procedures in this book should enable teachers and tutors to diag­
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

nose and identify the key factors that contribute to learning difficulties in mathematics
and dyscalculia. There are many examples where the relationships between topics
reinforce the need to take a broad and flexible approach to diagnosis and assessment.
None of the tests are restricted.

Dyscalculia

This book is about assessing and diagnosing mathematics learning difficulties and
dyscalculia. It takes the view that mathematics learning difficulties are on a spectrum.

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 2 Introduction - dyscalculia

At the severe end of the spectrum, the learning difficulties might be labelled as
‘dyscalculia’.
This book is also about the evidence that might be collected, evaluated and ana-
lysed to make decisions about those mathematics learning difficulties, their causes
and their severity.
A definition of dyscalculia, a specific learning difficulty, published by the UK’s
Department of Education (2001) stated:

Dyscalculia is a condition that affects the ability to acquire mathematical skills.

Dyscalculic learners may have difficulty understanding simple number concepts,
lack an intuitive grasp of numbers and have problems learning number facts and
procedures. Even if they produce a correct answer, or use a correct method, they
may do so mechanically and without confidence.

Note that this is not a deficit definition.

The DSM-5 definition from the American Psychiatric Association offered this defi­
nition of (developmental) dyscalculia (2013):

A specific learning disorder that is characterised by impairments in learning basic

arithmetic facts, processing numerical magnitude and performing accurate and
fluent calculations.
These difficulties must be quantifiably below what is expected for an indi­
vidual’s chronological age and must not be caused by poor educational or daily
activities or by intellectual impairments.

It is of note that this is a deficit definition and that it also rules out poor educational
activities as a root cause. This definition tallies well with the diagnostic protocol out­
lined in this book, where many of the tests are to probe for unexpected low scores.
Further support for the existence of difficulties could be gleaned from the responses
to adequate and standard teaching.

Note that ‘acquired dyscalculia’ is the consequence of brain injury or stroke.

In the UK, SASC (2019) published this definition of dyscalculia:

Dyscalculia is a specific and persistent difficulty in understanding numbers which

can lead to a diverse range of difficulties with mathematics. It will be unexpected
in relation to age, level of education and experience and occurs across all ages
and abilities.
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

Mathematics difficulties are best thought of as a continuum, not a distinct

category, and they have many causal factors. Dyscalculia falls at one end of
the spectrum and will be distinguishable from other mathematics issues due
to the severity of difficulties with number sense, including subitising, symbolic
and non-symbolic magnitude comparison, and ordering. It can occur singly but
often co-occurs with other specific learning difficulties, mathematics anxiety and
medical conditions.

Kavale and Forness (2000) wrote a critical analysis of definitions of learning disabili­
ties. Their observations about the problems of building a diagnostic procedure around

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 Introduction - dyscalculia 3

a definition, as I think is proper, lead me to think, as a lapsed physicist, that a fully

satisfactory definition of dyscalculia has yet to evolve. Towards this future, Bugden
and Ansari (2015) discuss the emerging role of developmental cognitive neuroscience
in helping us to discover much more about the precise parts of the brain that are dis­
rupted, how they interact, change over time and are affected by education.
Thambirajah (2011) has suggested four criteria for diagnosis of dyscalculia. They
are:

1. Difficulties with understanding quantities or carrying out basic arithmetic operations

that are not consistent with the person’s chronological age, educational opportu­
nities or intellectual abilities.
2. The severity of the difficulties is substantial as assessed by standardised measures
of these skills (at or below the fifth percentile of achievement) or by academic
performance (two school years behind peers) and is persistent.
3. There is significant interference with academic achievements and the activities of
daily living that require mathematical skills.
4. The arithmetic difficulties are present from an early age and are not due to visual,
hearing or neurological causes or lack of schooling.

There are a couple of observations to make with these criteria:

The use of the word ‘chronological’ does not imply that mathematics achievement
levels continue to increase throughout our age span, but it is more relevant to the
age of students when at school.
The choice of the fifth percentile is somewhat arbitrary, but does match the general/
average prevalence quoted in research papers on dyscalculia, for example, Ramaa
and Gowramma’s (2002) study found that 5.54% of their sample of 1408 children
were considered to exhibit dyscalculia.
Prior to this Kavale (2005) had discussed the role of responsiveness to intervention in
making decisions about the presence or absence of specific learning disabilities.
It is evident that many children do not respond to more of the same, even when
delivered ‘slower and louder’.
In the US, Powell et al. (2011) defined low performance in mathematics as mathemat­
ics difficulty, where low performance is below the 26th percentile on a standardised
test of mathematics. This definition is apposite for this book.
Mazzocco (2011) defines MLD, mathematics learning disability, ‘as a domain-specific
deficit in understanding or processing numerical information, which is often and accu­
rately used synonymously with developmental dyscalculia’. Maybe it’s the replacement
of ‘difficulty’ from Powell et al. with ‘disability’ that distinguishes between these two
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

definitions and clarifies the difference in prevalence. The use of the words ‘difficulty’
and ‘disability’ is, obviously, highly significant. And there is a potential for confusion
in using ‘MLD’ unless it is clear which of these two words is represented by the ‘D’.
Bugden and Ansari (2015) add a note of caution about the current state of our knowl­
edge about dyscalculia: ‘It is evident that current findings in the DD literature
are contradictory and that there is no clear conclusion as to what causes DD.
Furthermore, there is no universally agreed upon criteria for diagnosing children
with DD’. However, this should not prevent schools from observing and address­
ing the deficits in the key skills that will depress the mathematical achievements of
learners. Problems should not always require a label before they are addressed.

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 4 Introduction - dyscalculia

Recent research from Northern Ireland, Morsanyi et al. (2018), on the prevalence of
dyscalculia found that of the 2421 primary school pupils in the study, 108 had received
an official diagnosis of dyslexia, but only one pupil had been diagnosed with dyscal­
culia. However, the research identified 112 pupils with dyscalculia. This 4.6% preva­
lence is in line with previous research. They also noted that of this 112, 80% had other
developmental disorders, such as dyslexia. There is a section on this (comorbidity)
at the end of this chapter.

What is mathematics? What is numeracy?

It is valuable to know what we are assessing, whether it is arithmetic, mathematics

or numeracy. These are terms that we often use casually. Although that ‘casually’ is
adequate in most cases, it may be useful to look at some definitions of these words.
The task is not as easy as I had hoped. Authors of ‘mathematics’ books often avoid
the challenge. For a subject that often deals in precision, the definitions are not a
good example.
In England we frequently use the term ‘numeracy’. We introduced a ‘National
Numeracy Strategy’ for all schools in the late 1990s, defining numeracy as:

A proficiency which is developed mainly in mathematics, but also in other sub­

jects. It is more than an ability to do basic arithmetic. It involves developing con­
fidence and competence with numbers and measures. It requires understanding
of the number system, a repertoire of mathematical techniques, and an inclina­
tion and ability to solve quantitative or spatial problems in a range of contexts.
Numeracy also demands understanding of the ways in which data are gathered by
counting and measuring, and presented in graphs, diagrams, charts and tables.
(DfEE Framework for Teaching Mathematics: Year 7. 1999)

However, as if to illustrate how we interchange words, the DfEE explained that the
National Numeracy Strategy would be implemented by schools providing a structured
daily mathematics lesson.
Wikipedia defines numeracy, more broadly, as:

the ability to reason with numbers and other mathematical concepts. A numeri­
cally literate person can manage and respond to the mathematical demands of
life. Aspects of numeracy include number sense, operation sense, computation,
measurement, geometry, probability and statistics.
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

A different perspective was given, somewhat controversially, by Michael Girling (2001)

who defined basic numeracy as:

The ability to use a four function electronic calculator sensibly.

Finally, to focus in on a basic concept, number sense, which is a key component of

numeracy: Often we assume we know what we mean when we say ‘number sense’,
as with so many of the things we meet that are in everyday use. In fact, Berch (2005)
found 30 alleged components of number sense in the literature. I have selected the

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 Introduction - dyscalculia 5

ones that are relevant to the test protocol used in this book. As a cluster they provide
a sensible, but somewhat lengthy description of number sense:

1. Elementary abilities or intuitions about numbers and arithmetic.

2. Ability to approximate or estimate.
3. Ability to make numerical magnitude comparisons.
4. Ability to decompose numbers naturally.
5. Ability to use the relationships among arithmetic operations to understand the
base-10 number system.
6. A desire to make sense of numerical situations by looking for links between new
information and previously acquired knowledge.
7. Possessing fluency and flexibility with numbers.
8. Can recognise benchmark numbers and number patterns.
9. Can recognise gross numerical errors.
10. Can understand and use equivalent forms and representations of numbers as well
as equivalent expressions.
11. Can represent the same number in multiple ways depending on the context and
purpose of the representation.
12. A non-algorithmic feel for numbers.
13. A conceptual structure that relies on many links among mathematical relation­
ships, mathematical principles and mathematical procedures.
14. A mental number line on which analogue representations of numerical quantities
can be manipulated.
15. A nonverbal, evolutionarily ancient, innate capacity to process approximate
numerosities.

The assessment and diagnostic tools in this book primarily address arithmetic, the
part of mathematics that focuses on numbers and the four operations, that is, addi­
tion, subtraction, multiplication and division. I am working on the hypothesis (and long
experience) that this is where the majority of mathematical learning difficulties are
rooted, certainly at the dyscalculia level.

Mathematical learning difficulties

If dyscalculia is at the severe end of a spectrum of mathematical learning difficulties,

then there are going to be difficulties above that imprecisely defined threshold, hence
the use of the term ‘Mathematical Learning Difficulties’. These difficulties, like dyscal­
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

culia, stretch beyond school into adult life which suggests that they are perseverant
and/or resistant to current teaching methods.
The term ‘Mathematics Learning Disabilities’ is often used inter-changeably with
‘developmental dyscalculia’ in the USA (for example, Mabbott and Bisanz, 2008).
In the USA Mathematics Learning Disabilities are estimated to affect 5% to 8% of
school-aged children (Geary, 2004). There is, again, a difference between the use of
the word ‘disability’ and the use of the word ‘difficulty’. In this book I use the term
‘Mathematical Learning Difficulties’ and am using that to refer to the bottom 20–25%
in terms of achievement in mathematics.

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 6 Introduction - dyscalculia

The Programme for International Student Assessment from the Organisation for
Economic Co-operation and Development (PISA) collects and publishes data for
maths. New results on their international assessments are due as I write this (2019),
but they will not be available before my publisher’s deadline. The most recent results
are from 2015. A sample of the positions in the survey has Shanghai (1), Singapore (2),
Hong Kong (4), Switzerland (9), New Zealand (16), UK (24), Ireland (28) and the US (35).
The UK’s results for 15-year-olds in maths have remained stable since 2006, around
the OECD average.
Rashid and Brooks (2010) in their study, ‘The levels of attainment in literacy and
numeracy of 13- to 19-year-olds in England, 1948–2009’, noted that 22% of 16- to
19-year-olds are functionally innumerate and that this has remained at the same level
for at least 20 years.
The 2017 National Numeracy booklet, ‘A New Approach to Making the UK
Numerate’ stated that ‘Government statistics suggest that 17 million adults – 49% of
the working-age population of England – have the numeracy level that we expect of
primary school children’.
The UK was the worst performing of the 17 OECD countries in the ‘Numeracy/
Knowledge’ component of Adult Financial Literacy (2016). Mathematics as taught in
UK schools seems not to endure into adulthood.
Further evidence of the persistence of the problem with low achievers in math­
ematics comes from Hodgen et al. (2010) and their 30-year comparison of attainment
in mathematics in secondary school children:

A further rather worrying feature is that in all three topic areas (algebra, deci­
mals and ratio) and all year groups there are now a higher proportion of very
low performances than there were in 1976/7. It is difficult to explain this; one
possibility is the closing of many Special Schools and greater inclusivity within
the mainstream sector. However it is not clear whether this factor could account
for the full size of the difference. Another possible explanation lies in the finding
that the National Numeracy Scheme introduced into schools in 1999 had the
effect of depressing attainment at the lower end, perhaps because of the failure
to address children’s particular needs in attempting to provide equal access to
the curriculum.

Many of the problems surrounding mathematics are international, for example,

Ramaa and Gowramma (2002) found that 25% of the children in their sample of
1408 primary-aged Indian pupils were considered by their teachers to have arithmetic
difficulty
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

Learning difficulties in mathematics can be caused by many factors, with each

factor contributing a variable influence that depends on many things, such as the
mathematics topic or the current level of anxiety in the individual. Some of the fac­
tors can be attributed to the person, for example, a poor working memory; some are
external, for example, inappropriate instruction. (More detail is provided in Chapter 2
of the companion book, The Trouble with Mathematics: A Practical Guide to Helping
Learners with Numerical Difficulties.)
Thus, learning difficulties in mathematics are a complex problem and any diagno­
sis will largely reflect the situation on the day and time when it is carried out, although

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 Introduction - dyscalculia 7

a thorough procedure will usually produce much useful and valid information. One
consequence of this complexity and the many factors involved is that the approach
to assessment/diagnosis should always be multi-dimensional and flexible. A second
consequence is that there will be, inevitably, a spectrum of difficulties for every factor.
This should not be a revelation to any educator. We should expect a wide variation in
children and adults and for the normal distribution to apply to each of the contribut­
ing factors. It will be a heterogeneous population. Kaufman et al. (2013) argue that
heterogeneity is a feature of developmental dyscalculia.
A further implication of the heterogeneous nature of mathematics learning difficul­
ties is that there should be no prescribed order of structure for the assessment or the
subsequent intervention. For example, it may be that for one person it is the anxiety
issues that have to be addressed before any input for the cognitive issues. For another
person, it may be that the investigation has to be targeted initially at a particular area
of mathematics, such as basic facts, so that that particular barrier can be overcome
and success experienced. Ultimately all the factors will interlink. However, it is often
the case that the very basics of maths need to revisited and secured before progress
can be achieved.
As a final observation for this section, I have included some (UK) data from the
norm-referencing process for the 15-minute test included in this book. The percent­
ages are for correct answers.

)
10 6030
10yrs 44.5% 13yrs 48.7%
15yrs 62.3% 16–19yrs 62.6%

23 ÷ 1000
10yrs 14.5% 13yrs 31.4%
15yrs 46.8% 16–19yrs 51.2%

33
­16
10yrs 54.5% 13yrs 72.8%
15yrs 81.8% 16–19yrs 88.3%

37
42
73
+68
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

10yrs 75.9% 13yrs 74.9%

15yrs 83.2% 16–19yrs 87.5%

103
­96
10yrs 63.6% 13yrs 69.6%
15yrs 83.6% 16–19yrs 87.9%

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 8 Introduction - dyscalculia

)
2 38
10yrs 59.1% 13yrs 60.7%
15yrs 75.0% 16–19yrs 74.7%

)
9 927
10yrs 14.5% 13yrs 31.4%
15yrs 46.8% 16–19yrs 38.4%

1
=
4 12
10yrs 65.5% 13yrs 75.4%
15yrs 84.0% 16–19yrs 88.3%

Write 0.125 as a fraction in its simplest form

10yrs 7.7% 13yrs 17.3%
15yrs 31.4% 16–19yrs 33.6%

20% of 140
10yrs 32.3% 13yrs 53.9%
15yrs 66.8% 16–19yrs 73.3%

150% of £64
10yrs 16.4% 13yrs 46.1%
15yrs 60.0% 16–19yrs 63.0%

541
´203
10yrs 14.1% 13yrs 15.2%
15yrs 38.2% 16–19yrs 39.5%

2y + 5 = 31 y=
13yrs 52.4%
15yrs 60.9% 16–19yrs 63.7%
(My favourite error for this question, if not the whole test was: y = years)

(x + 15) + (x − 23) = 44 x=
13yrs 9.9%
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

15yrs 23.6% 16–19yrs 24.6%

1 km ÷ 5 = metres
13yrs 37.7%
15yrs 56.0% 16–19yrs 58.7%

5.67 km = metres
13yrs 36.6%
15yrs 51.0% 16–19yrs 49.1%

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 Introduction - dyscalculia 9

Tests and testing

This book contains a range of tests and diagnostic activities. They represent the most
significant causal factors for mathematical learning difficulties and dyscalculia. Each
one is included, of course, to make meaningful contributions to the assessment and
diagnosis. However, tests have to elicit answers to be of any use. The classic reaction
of the anxious, low-confidence learner is not to attempt the task (Chinn, 1995). The
assessment must be carried out in a way that creates, at the very least, a basic level
of confidence and a willingness in the subject to participate.
Should you have concerns about test anxiety, there is a test anxiety inventory for
children and adolescents, the TAICA (Whitaker Sena et al., 2007).
Tests are a snapshot of ‘now’ and are influenced by many of the factors that we
may suspect are present, such as anxiety, and by factors that we may not fully appre­
ciate are present, such as the memories of past experiences of learning mathematics.
We need to remember that testing is something that you do to the student, whereas
diagnosis is something you do with the student. So, this book contains a range of
materials that will help the process of diagnosis.
If you are about to undertake an assessment/diagnosis, then there are some ques­
tions that might guide you in carring out that task.

Some basic questions

For each component of the assessment/diagnosis, the leading questions are:

What do you want to know?

Why do you want to know it?
How will you investigate it?

Then more targeted questions should include:

OO How severe is the problem?

You may want to know a mathematics age or the percentile at which the subject
is performing. This will require an appropriate norm-referenced test. Knowing the
severity of the deficit may attract resources to help address the problem.
OO What can’t they do?
It is important to know where the gaps are so that the intervention can be directed
efficiently. For example, there may be issues with procedures, working memory,
language or speed of working. Problems may lie a long way back in the roots of
arithmetic.
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

OO What can they do?

Intervention will be most effective if it starts where the learner is secure. The proto­
col must focus on the strengths as well as the weaknesses. For example, addition
seems to be the default procedure for many people who are weak at mathematics.
Finding topics that ‘they can do’ can be used to give a rare experience of success
for the learner.
OO What don’t they know?
There are two facets to this question. One is from the USA’s National Research
Council report (Bransford et al., 2000) on How People Learn. It had three key findings.

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 10 Introduction - dyscalculia

Part of the second finding is that students need ‘a deep foundation of factual knowl­
edge’. For some ‘traditionalists’ this means, for example, that students should be able
to retrieve from memory (quickly) all of the times table facts. If ‘not knowing’ these
facts is made into an issue, then not knowing them may become part of the problem
of learning mathematics. There is also substantial evidence, for example, Nunes et
al. (2009) and Ofsted (2006), that the dominant way of teaching mathematics in the
UK is by memorising formulas. The Education Endowment Foundation (Henderson
et al., 2017) provides eight recommendations to improve outcomes in maths for
7–14-year-old students. Over-reliance on memorising is not a top recommendation.
The other facet is to define what exactly constitutes a ‘deep’ foundation of
knowledge. In other words, what do you NEED to know (and what can you work
out)?
OO What do they know?
Intervention should start where the learner’s knowledge and, hopefully, understand­
ing are secure. Sometimes it may be necessary to question what seems to be
known rather than understood. A good memory can take you a long way in basic
mathematics, but understanding is better and memory alone does not seem to be
enough as mathematics progresses. There seems also to be a decline in the amount
of information stored and available for retrieval as time (undefined) moves on.
OO How do they learn?
The process of learning is more complicated than the process of memorising. I sus­
pect this statement applies to teaching as well. There are many factors around this
four-word question. These may include the cognitive style of the learner (Chapter
10), their working memory (Chapter 5) and their response to teaching materials (that
is, do they need to start at the concrete stage of learning?).
OO How can I teach them?
It would be sensible to teach them the way that they learn (Chinn, 2020). Much
of this concept is covered in The Trouble with Mathematics: A Practical Guide to
Helping Learners with Numerical Difficulties (4th edition, 2020). One of the objec­
tives of a diagnosis is to find out the way the student learns.
OO What does the learner bring?
A learner can bring emotional baggage, a lot of anxiety, poor self-efficacy and a
long history of failure at mathematics. In my informal survey of teachers around the
UK over many years and in many other countries, teachers are stating that enough
children are giving up on mathematics at seven years old to be noticed in a class.
So, an adult of 19 years may have many years of failure and withdrawal behind them.
OO Where do I start the intervention?
This is another key question. The answer is usually further back than you might
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

initially think. The answer to this question has to be another key objective for the
diagnosis to answer.

A diagnostic protocol

In 1991, Chinn suggested a structure for diagnosis that included:

1. A standardised (norm-referenced) mathematics age

2. An assessment of the child’s ability to recognise and use mathematics symbols

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 Introduction - dyscalculia 11

3. An assessment of basic fact knowledge, compensatory strategies and under­

standing of numbers and their relationships
4. Cognitive style
5. The level of understanding of place value
6. Mathematics language
7. A measure of the learner’s accuracy in calculations
8. An assessment of understanding and accuracy in using algorithms (procedures
and formulas)
9. A measure of speed of working
10. An analysis of error patterns
11. A test of ability to solve basic word problems

Later this was modified (Chinn and Ashcroft, 1993) to include attitude and anxiety,
money and mathematics language. Later working memory and short-term memory
were added to the list.
The structure of this protocol forms the basis for the work in this book. Of course,
it has been further refined and modified over the following 30 years.
It seems to be important that the test and procedures included in this book are
practical, user-friendly and informative. They have been chosen because they can
generate information that will help in the assessment and provide diagnostic clues
as to how intervention can best be provided for each individual. The tests and activi­
ties, with the exception of the tests for working and short-term memories, are directly
about mathematics. There is no need to extrapolate any findings.
Three norm-referenced tests have been produced by the author specifically for
inclusion in this book. Also included is a test of cognitive style, which was written
by the author with colleagues John Bath and Dwight Knox and, in its original form,
published in the USA in 1986.
One of the goals of this book is to make the interpretation of tests more realistic,
maybe even intellectually cynical. The process of assessment/diagnosis is there to
help a child or an adult, not to provide data for performance comparisons and politi­
cal points. It is about finding out why there are difficulties and what can be done to
address those difficulties.

Mathematical learning difficulties and individuals

The realisation that children with learning difficulties in mathematics are a heterogene­
ous group is not new. For example, in 1947, Tilton noted that ‘some children fail owing
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

not to carelessness or simple ignorance, but because of individual misconceptions of

rules, and a lack of grasp of number concepts’. Austin (1982) observed, ‘perhaps the
learning disability population simply includes too diverse a student population to make
teaching recommendations unique to this group’. Chinn and Ashcroft (2016) consider
that the interactions between the factors that can contribute to learning difficulties in
mathematics create an enormous individuality amongst dyslexic learners.
There are a number of individual reasons and even more combinations of reasons
why a child or adult may fail in mathematics. The implication from this should be that
there will need to be both a range of interventions available to teach to those individual
profiles and an equally diverse set of diagnostic tools which are used in a responsive

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 12 Introduction - dyscalculia

and adaptable diagnostic protocol. This is a heterogeneous population (Bugden and

Ansari, 2015), facing a constellation of mathematical challenges (Zhou and Cheng,
2015).

Teaching and diagnosing

The two activities, teaching and diagnosing, should be inextricably linked. Each should
inform the other, hence this volume and its complementary volume, The Trouble with
Mathematics: A Practical Guide to Helping Learners with Numerical Difficulties. One
book is on diagnosis and the other is on teaching. The relationship between diagnosis
and teaching is an example of the chicken-and-egg dilemma. The answer may not be
quite appropriate to a biologically sound solution for the chicken or the egg, but for
intervention and diagnosis, the two should be concurrent.

Co-occurring difficulties: Comorbidity

There has been an increasing awareness of co-occurring difficulties. From a per­

sonal perspective, the first edition of the Chinn and Ashcroft book, Mathematics for
Dyslexics (1993) became Mathematics for Dyslexics including Dyscalculics in the third
edition (2007).
This has recently raised a question, ‘Does a diagnosis of maths learning difficulties
and/or dyscalculia necessitate a diagnosis of dyslexia as well?’
I think the answer to this question is, ‘It depends’. In other words, I do not consider
it to be obligatory. A perceptive diagnosis (which one hopes applies to all diagnoses)
would recognise behaviours that might indicate a need for a complementary diagno­
sis for the co-occurrence of dyslexia. A further factor would be the reasons why the
diagnosis was requested.
A paper from a group of researchers from the US (Willcutt et al., 2013), which
includes three highly respected names in the field, looked at three groups, Reading
Disability only, Mathematics Disability only and RD + MD. Not surprisingly, the RD +
MD group exhibited the most pronounced academic and social impairments. All three
groups exhibited significant weaknesses on measures of processing speed, working
memory and verbal comprehension. Deficits in phonological processing and naming
speed were uniquely associated with reading difficulties, whereas difficulty shifting
cognitive set (an executive function which involves conscious change in attention) was
specifically associated with deficits in maths.
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

Landerl and Moll (2009) carried out a study which tested the hypothesis that dys­
lexia and dyscalculia are associated with two largely independent cognitive deficits,
namely a phonological deficit in the case of dyslexia and a deficit in the number mod­
ule in the case of dyscalculia. Again, three groups were studied, RD, MD and RD+
MD. Their findings were:

A phonological deficit was found for both dyslexic groups, irrespective of addi­
tional arithmetic deficits, but not for the dyscalculia-only group. In contrast, defi­
cits in processing of symbolic and non-symbolic magnitudes were observed in
both groups of dyscalculic children, irrespective of additional reading difficulties,

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.
 Introduction - dyscalculia 13

but not in the dyslexia-only group. Cognitive deficits in the comorbid dyslexia/
dyscalculia group were additive; that is, they resulted from the combination of
two learning disorders. These findings suggest that dyslexia and dyscalculia have
separable cognitive profiles, namely a phonological deficit in the case of dyslexia
and a deficient number module in the case of dyscalculia.

Further reading

Chinn, S. (2020). Mathematics learning difficulties and dyscalculia. In: L. Peer and G. Reid
(eds.), Special Educational Needs: A Guide for Inclusive Practice, 3rd edn. London: Sage.
The chapter gives a comprehensive overview of dyscalculia.
Copyright © 2020. Taylor & Francis Group. All rights reserved.

Chinn, Steve. More Trouble with Maths : A Complete Manual to Identifying and Diagnosing Mathematical Difficulties, Taylor & Francis Group, 2020. ProQuest Ebook Central,
http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/rmit/detail.action?docID=6144272.
Created from rmit on 2024-09-07 05:10:44.