[Dyspraxia: landmarks].

Despite its frequency, little is known about dyspraxia. Dyspraxia, which represents disorders in development and learning movements, within the context of a deficiency in the management of spatial information (in children whose verbal intelligence is spared), is often a severe handicap at school and in social life. Dyspraxia must be distinguished from "common" difficulties of unmotivated children at school, with which it is often confused. Hence, the diagnosis must correspond to rigorous methodology. And one should avoid proposing endless training for the deficient action (writing, getting dressed...); indeed such strategies only lead to short-term 'pseudo' progress, without any long term efficacy on the educational success of these intelligent children. To the contrary, the child should be rapidly oriented in two therapeutic directions: (1) a battle between the "double-task" effect stemming from the graphical and spatial difficulties; (2) the use of palliatives (including computing). In conditions of early diagnosis (at 4-8/9 years of age) and well-coordinated management with the school, the prognosis would be excellent in terms of schooling, choice of a profession and social insertion. If not, or if (as is the case in almost a third of cases) dyspraxia is not isolated (associated with dyslexia, hyperactivity, attentional deficit and psychotic traits), the child should be oriented towards a specialised classroom and care. Copyright 2009 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.