Visual challenges can be varied and sometimes hard to detect, but often mom or dad know something isn’t quite right. The challenge is to figure out what is causing the problem.  The doctor might say, “The child’s vision is fine.”  The question from a neurodevelopmentalist standpoint is, would the doctor be talking about 20/20 acuity (able to see up close and far away) or vision (the way the visual information is interrupted by the brain in giving the visual message)?

See if you recognize any of these symptoms of visual inefficiencies:

• Are you constantly saying, “Look at me when I am talking to you” but the child doesn’t seem to be able to maintain eye contact? 
• Are there challenges with coloring within the lines or writing on the line or with writing letters that are the same size? 
• Is the child too close to the reading material or math page when doing academics? 
• Does the child skip lines or small words when reading? 
• Does the child like to watch things that twirl or move like fan blades or toy car wheels? 
• How about constantly wanting to dangle something like a string, sock, or anything else he can find to whirl and watch?

Discover more about The NeuroDevelopmental Profile as it relates to vision and visual distortions in this Brain Coach Tip episode.  There are seven main developmental levels that all children should go through.  Some of these areas of development are compromised by our cultural practices of putting our infants in gadgets such as walkers, swings and jump-ups. When we don’t go through the correct stages where vision is developed, challenges can occur.  The good news is that we don’t have to focus on the symptoms that can be on the checklists for labels such as Autism, ADD/ADHD or Sensory Integration Disorder.  We can find the root cause of the symptoms and change the child’s function, thus eliminating the symptoms all together.