Prevalence of Students with Learning Difficulties in Mathematics

This study aimed to find out the prevalence of students with learning difficulties in the subject of mathematics at the primary level. Twenty-three hundred and ninety-two (2392) students were selected as a sample for this purpose. The term learning difficulty is not an indication of intelligence levels, but it means that the students may face problems resulting from physical, educational, emotional, and environmental factors. It included the development of a screening checklist for the identification of students with learning difficulties in Mathematics and the diagnostic test consisting of four subtests: 1-Pre-number Concepts Test (PNT), 2-Number Diagnostic Test (NDT), 3-Arithmetic Operations Test (AOT), and 4-Geometry Diagnostic Test (GDT). Content validity of the screening checklist and the diagnostic test were ensured through the opinion of experts in the relevant field. The reliability of the screening checklist and the diagnostic test was determined through Cronbach¿s alpha coefficient which was .83 and .80 respectively. Descriptive and inferential statistical tools were applied to analyze the collected data.