Guiding Children with Special Needs

1. Guiding Children with Special Needs ECE I Chapter 30

2. Life is like a box of chocolates… you never know what you’re gonna get. Forrest Gump

3. Right for Education • A right to be educated  • If we are indeed a democracy in action and not just in name, it is the obligation of the educational system to help—within reason—each and every student to become all he or she is capable of becoming. • Historically children with special educational needs have been denied equal educational opportunities.

4. Looking Back • Middle Ages and the Renaissance: people who were mentally retarded or psychologically disturbed often considered either divinely possessed or controlled by demons. • Early 1600’s: first programs to teach the deaf to communicate using sign language. • 1760: National Institute for Deaf founded in Paris • Recognized as the first publicly sponsored school for the disabled.

5. Changes in Attitude • Significant changes in attitudes toward special education began in the early 1960s. • 1961: President John F. Kennedy appointed a special committee on mental retardation.  • As a result, laws were passed that allocated funds for training experts in special education. • 1967: Bureau of the Handicapped was established by the United States Office of Education to administer research, education, and training programs in special education

6. Legislation • The Vocational Rehabilitation Act of 1973 • Only half of the children identified as disabled in the early 1970s had access to educational programs appropriate to their needs. • Congress made major provisions to guarantee and protect the rights of disabled people.  • “No otherwise qualified handicapped individual in the U.S. shall solely by reason of his handicap, be excluded from the participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.” • Public Law 94-142 • Passed and signed into law by President Gerald Ford in November, 1975. • Key point: requirement that every child be provided with a “free appropriate public education.” • Among the most controversial conditions of PL 94-142 is the provision that children with disabilities be educated with nondisabled children whenever possible—a process that came to be known as mainstreaming or currently inclusion. • Reauthorized in 1990 as the Individual with Disabilities Education Act of 1990 (IDEA). • Key to interpreting Public Law 94-142 and IDEA has been the policy of placing students with specialneeds into “the least restrictive environment” possible.

7. What is an IEP? • The IEP, Individualized Education Program, is a written document that's developed for each public school child who's eligible for special education. The IEP is created through a team effort and reviewed at least once a year. • Before an IEP can be written, your child must be eligible for special education. By federal law, a multidisciplinary team must determine that (1) she's a child with a disability and (2) she requires special education and related services to benefit from the general education program.

8. IDEA • The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), a federal law, requires certain information to be included in the IEP but doesn't specify how the IEP should look. Because states and local school systems may include additional information, forms differ from state to state and may vary between school systems within a state.

9. Goals • The next step is to write measurable goals that she can reasonably accomplish in one year. Goals are based on what was discussed and documented in present levels of educational performance and focus on her needs that result from the disability. Goals should help her be involved and progress in the general curriculum and may be academic, social, behavioral, self-help, or address other educational needs. Goals are not written to maintain skills or help her achieve above grade level.

10. Variety of SpecialNeeds • Auditory, Speech, and Visual * Physical Impairments: Cerebral Palsy, Muscular Dystrophy • Cognitive Impairments: Autism, Down Syndrome • Learning Disabilities: ADD, Behavioral Learning Disabilities – ADD, Behavioral

11. Physical Disabilities • Physical disabilities involve either loss of physical movement, or a weakness or change in normal motor control. Some physical disabilities are present at birth (congenital) or are acquired due to illness, accident, or unknown causes. Loss of movement is often caused by a spinal cord injury (damage to the nervous system) or by physical trauma such as severe fracture, burns or the amputation of a limb. One of the most common physical disabilities in young people, cerebral palsy (CP), produces disturbances of voluntary motor control ranging from clumsy and awkward movements to little or no coordinated movement. Individuals with CP can have related speech problems, as well as impaired hearing or vision. Other conditions such as muscular dystrophy, multiple sclerosis and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, produce similar types of changes in physical functioning.

12. Learning Disabilities • A person with a learning disability has difficulty in collecting, organizing, or acting on verbal and nonverbal information. Most commonly, the person has trouble understanding or using written or spoken language. The difficulty is due to a neurological difference in brain structure or functioning.

13. Two types of Learning Disabilities • Speech and language disorders (the person is delayed by years in the development of one of these skills) • Academic skills disorders (the person is delayed by years in the development of one of these skills):

14. Inclusion Inclusion is a term which expresses commitment to educate each child, to the maximum extent appropriate, in the school and classroom he or she would otherwise attend. It involves bringing the support services to the child (rather than moving the child to the services) and requires only that the child will benefit from being in the class (rather than having to keep up with the other students). Proponents of inclusion generally favor newer forms of education service delivery.

15. Giftedness • The term "gifted and talented" when used in respect to students, children, or youth means students, children, or youth who give evidence of high performance capability in areas such as intellectual, creative, artistic, or leadership capacity, or in specific academic fields, and who require services or activities not ordinarily provided by the school in order to fully develop such capabilities." (P.L. 103–382, Title XIV, p. 388)

16. Forms of Giftedness • general intellectual ability • specific academic aptitude • creative or productive thinking • leadership ability • visual or performing arts • psychomotor ability."

17. In conclusion • Special Needs Education is an area of the educational system that has come a long way over the past three decades, but there is still a long way to go. There is more that needs to be done, such as every teacher being trained to effectively teach a child with special needs. Direct Instruction programs need to be implemented throughout the educational system, and the federal government needs to take more responsibility when it comes to the funding of special education in schools. With the implementation of each of these things, it will help special needs students to be an effective and motivated leader and person throughout the rest of their lives. • In order to be an effective teacher and build trust with your students withspecial needs it is critical to understand the importance of being flexible with your curriculum and understanding the needs of the child.