The most significant problem for students with tracking problems is difficulty reading. This leads to academic problems generally. When reading, people use small jumps to view groups of words. A person with tracking problems doesn't have control of the peripheral vision that locates the next group of words in coordination with the central vision that is looking at the group of words being read at that time. This leads to the eyes jerking around the page, going back and forth between lines, repeating words and moving up and down between lines. These students sometimes have to hold their finger under the line of text to keep their eyes focused on the next phrase. This limits comprehension, and leads to frustration with reading.
Eye tracking problems can lead to dizziness, nausea, headaches and red and itching eyes. These symptoms are especially common after a child has been required to maintain concentration visually for an extended period of time.
There is some link between Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, or ADHD, and visual tracking problems. Some researchers believe there is a tendency to misdiagnose vision tracking problems as ADHD, as the symptoms can be similar. A child who has difficulty seeing words, skips words as he reads and can't comprehend what he has read due to missing or mixing up the words, doesn't want to spend time reading. He may be labeled as having a "short attention span" or "lack of focus," leading to an ADHD diagnosis. This may mean the vision problems are missed entirely.
There are commercial therapies for tracking problems, but there are therapies a family can engage in themselves to help the problem. According to educational therapist Bonnie Terry, eight activities can assist with tracking issues. They include dot-to-dot activities, tracing activities, writing on a whiteboard from left to right, rolling a ball between two people, playing catch with a ball or beanbag, doing read-aloud drills, and using maze books. Professional therapists use a variety of other specialized tools. These include printed workbooks with activities that exercise the fine motor muscles in the eye, such as picking the ABCs in order from a group of scrambled letters, or following a sentence that jumps around the page. Therapists also use electronic and mechanical tools that use exercises such as having a child follow a marker across the screen. Therapists can perform a computerized evaluation of a child's eye movement while reading, which helps them develop individual therapies for each child.