This is what happens when a child has a weakness in micro-skills. Micro-skills are foundational learning skills. They can be auditory, visual, or kinesthetic. They are the skills that not only allow us to interact with the world but also learn academics such as reading, math, writing, or spelling.
So, for example, what if auditory discrimination was weak? This is actually very common in some forms of dyslexia and it is a big cause for reading difficulty. Auditory discrimination helps us read because, when we read, we mentally hear the words in our head. So if we have no mental map for certain sounds, thinks can get very confusing and difficult.
Not only would this weakness in auditory discrimination cause a difficulty in reading, but also a confusion in one’s world.
Since the brain always tries to find a coping mechanism it may just filter certain sounds out, or maybe replace them. It will also likely try to find another, stronger micro-skill, to try to cope in another way.
No matter how it does it. The situation is not ideal. The brain is trying to find workarounds to cope.
And this may display itself as an attention problem.