Hello, Um, how should I start this..
I have this learning disability that I don’t know what it’s called but it’s when the brain allows you to perform difficult tasks at ease but when doing simple tasks(mental tasks that is) the brain will freeze or paralyze then things will become a major struggle at times. I especially noticed this when I was putting together a computer desk. The instructions were suppose to be simple since they break it up into like 20 steps but no matter how carefully I looked at them I just couldn’t get it assembled correctly, until I lost my temper and tore up the instructions and just looked at the picture on the box, and in 10 minutes I was done!
The problem I have is that I can’t seem to follow directions. If they try to teach me something new it won’t process. It either has to be something I’m familiar with or until I can figure it out on my own!
And back when I was in High School my grades were all over the place my Junior year. I had A’s and D’s but not a single C. It wasn’t until I took honor classes as opposed to the typical college prep. classes when my grades dramatically improved but never knew why. All I can think of was because there was no “real” (meaning only one way to do things) set of instructions to follow in any of those classes, you were pretty much on your own. Or maybe I just got lucky 5 times.
I ignored this for a few years but I knew it would come back and haunt me again in the job field. What is this condition called and what can I do about it to balance it out?
Re: What is it?
Thanks.
Yes those three words are very familiar. Every test I’ve taken result in that “right-brained” visual spatial learner or VSL. And from the looks of it it’s some type of dyslexia. [img]http://forums.ldonline.org/images/smiles/icon_eek.gif[/img]
Re: What is it?
Pardon the double post, but I’d like to also point out that in my “elementary” years, (God I HATE being arrogant) Things were reversed I was one of the top students in my class. In fact, number one at one point that the school board district wanted me to skip a year. And so be it. It wasn’t until the 7th grade when it took a turn for the worse or just changed the way I think. That is translate words to images.
Re: What is it?
You know, doing well or badly in school is a two-way street. Sometimes the problem is on the student’s side, and often the problem is on the school’s side, and occasionally neither is wrong but the student and school are just a really bad match for each other.
Being a visual spatial learner is *not* a negative, it’s just a different approach. I’m highly visual-spatial and it is an excellent skill in real math classes (which spend a lot of time undoing the unprintable stuff they do in junior high, mostly teaching the opposite of what you really need), and in finding your way around, and in art and design, and in construction and renovation, and in mechanics, and a multitude of other areas.
OK, so you don’t do well with verbal directions. Keep a mini notebook in your pocket and make notes that make sense to *you* — maybe a personal shorthand, or maybe diagrams of what to do.
Try doing some other kinds of work — work with a weekend mechanic and see if you’re good with cars, work with a guy who does handyman work and see if you’re good at renovation and construction, work with a friend on an old house and see if you have an artistic eye for decoration. When you find something where your visual-spatial skills are *used* and not put down, go for it and get into classes or apprenticeship to make a career of it.
Re: What is it?
Thanks Victoria,
Actually, I already have another job Sort of. I watch the news and pay attention to the surrounding world and like you said, I do carry a small notebook but for a different purpose, I jot down every observation throughout the day translate it into a visual and then perform stand-up comedy, but it’s just barley enough to get by. And I always seem to be running out of material. I don’t do it for the money, it’s just something I love to do. And then I work in Sales to keep me financially stable, but this is what becomes a casualty sometimes.
Welp, online diagnostics have their own problems —
— but people who think in three dimensions have a dickens of a time with directions that go in a straight line, with words.
One thing that might help is to consciously translate from “words” to “okay, what would that look like in three dimensions?”
I doubt you got lucky five times :-) You might also google “visual spatial learner” — but if you do better in honors classes you probably have verbal strengths too, and “just” have trouble trying to get from one to the other. (“Just…” like it’s not a big pain ;))