§ 1308.14 Eligibility criteria:
Learning disabilities.
(a) A child is classified as having a
learning disability who has a disorder in one or more of the basic
psychological processes involved in understanding or in using language, spoken
or written, which may manifest itself in imperfect ability to listen, think,
speak or, for preschool age children, acquire the precursor skills for
reading, writing, spelling or doing mathematical calculations. The term
includes such conditions as perceptual disabilities, brain injury, and
aphasia.
(b) An evaluation team may recommend that a child be classified as having a
learning disability if:
(1) The child does not achieve commensurate with his or her age and ability
levels in one or more of the areas listed in (a) above when provided with
appropriate learning experiences for the age and ability; or
(2) The
child has a severe discrepancy between achievement of developmental milestones
and intellectual ability in one or more of these areas: oral expression,
listening comprehension, pre-reading, pre-writing and pre-mathematics;
or
(3) The child shows deficits in such abilities as memory, perceptual
and perceptual-motor skills, thinking, language and non-verbal activities
which are not due to visual, motor, hearing or emotional disabilities, mental
retardation, cultural or language factors, or lack of experiences which would
help develop these skills.
(c) This definition for learning disabilities applies to four and five year
old children in Head Start. It may be used at a program's discretion for
children younger than four or when a three year old child is referred with a
professional diagnosis of learning disability. But because of the difficulty of
diagnosing learning disabilities for three year olds, when Head Start is
responsible for the evaluation it is not a requirement to use this category for
three year olds.
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