At Paul Harvey Optometry we love kids, and we know kids love learning.

However, we also know that learning is sometimes unnecessarily difficult. There can be many reasons your child may struggle with learning, which can make it tricky to know where to start to get help. Teachers, school counsellors and health professionals are all good places to start - and this includes seeing your local optometrist for a comprehensive vision assessment.

When your child sees an optometrist, they will be assessed for refractive conditions (such as long-sightedness or astigmatism), which can be corrected with glasses to make things clearer. If your child is still struggling to know all their letters and won't be confident to read the letter chart, the optometrist can use numbers or shapes to evaluate their vision. Other times, your child may see things clearly, but their accommodative (or eye-focusing) system is working sub-optimally, which can lead to short attention spans, slow reading speeds, trouble copying from the board, or tiredness.

Your optometrist may prescribe certain lenses or eye exercises to
allow the focusing system to work more efficiently. Other symptoms
to look out for that may indicate an eye test is in order, is your child mixing up
letters, skipping words or lines when reading, or complaining of headaches,
particularly in the afternoon or evening after school. An eye test is also a good
chance to relay any family history of eye conditions to the optometrist, so they
can monitor the health of your child's eyes.