Haley's Blog

I very much enjoyed listening and connecting with the video in class.  It was called “The Dangers of a Single Story”, and goes in depth about the misconceptions that can be made, and the importance of knowing more than one story behind a person and their life. There was one part that really touched me.   She was talking about a family she knew, and how she had heard they were poor.   She stated, “Once I knew they were poor, it was hard for me to think of them as anything else”.  This to me hit home on working with students with disabilities, and the whole classification process.  I have seen and heard parents express worry about misconceptions that might be made about their child if they enter the “special ed.” program, how they might look to others and labels that might be placed on them as they enter different classes.  And it might be sad, but like she said in the video, it’s easy to make these judgments if you’re not constantly careful of your thinking.  Back in September, I remember sitting down with my co-teacher and sorting out the general ed. and classified students, and their modifications/ accommodations.  It’s very hard to not anticipate slower learning and higher needs.  But as the year went on, we found this to be very untrue, for we held all students to the same expectation, and are now looking at 3 possible de-classification plans!

I also connected the message in this video with one of my students in particular.  He came to use half-way through the year, straight from Africa, knowing next to no English.  Half of my head was thinking, Oh no, how are we going to get through to this kid? While the other half was thinking, this poor kid…math is going to be another foreign language to him! As I talked with him one on one and got to know his background about family and his past-times, it wasn’t hard to see that he was very well educated in his prior school and enjoyed running track and doing other normal teen-age things.   And as he progresses through the year, I wish I had held off those first impression thoughts for a couple of weeks and gotten to know the other couple of stories first.

The message of this video, as well as this class overall, has helped me grow as an educator.  It has also helped in developing who I am and the things I truly believe in.  There are morals that I have found more important than others, and hope to uphold throughout my life.   Making assumptions from single stories is one that I hope to eliminate with time and knowledge.

I read an article about a case study on a child with Autism named Joshua.  It goes through his daily activities and how he deals with each transition and how it affects him emotionally.  It appears that Joshua exerts less aggressive behaviors when he has a choice to what he’s doing, and is independently playing.  He clearly has patterns or repeating behaviors that comfort him, and is thrown off by whole group, loud noises (song being sung for circle time).  During outside play, typically plays on his own and does whatever he sees infront of him.  Maybe being paired with one other student and shown how to play with one type of toy would be more useful to Joshua.  This may help him develop some small social skills for he obviously lacks these.  It doesn’t have to be for the whole time, maybe even schedule periods of time that are known ahead of time. 

Before circle time begins with the song, maybe a symbol or notification that it’s going to start could ease his transition and eliminate his “drop and cry” behavior.  Also, it seems like a lot of what Josh is “choosing” isn’t really being chosen by him.  It says more than once, “hand over hand assistance” with the chosing of a toy or option.  Maybe taking Josh to a different part of the rug to eliminate distractions and let him really choose his own plan would help him feel like he has more control over his enviornment. Then, he can possibly choose 1 friend to play with during this time, again to help with social interactions.   During center-based activities, instead of allowing Josh to run around the room with a hammer and pound things, get him a drum stick (since he normally chooses long and narrow items) and a drum and channel his behaviors to a more socially acceptable activity.  Maybe even invite another child to play the drums with him.  Creating a more structured play time in which he is playing with a toy he likes may be soothing to him. Again, before taking the toy from Josh, let him know a couple of minutes ahead of time to ease the transition.

I read an introduction article on Assistive Technology and Early Childhood.  This article discusses the purposes in which assistive technology serves for a child in pre-school or earlier.  I personally enjoyed this quote, “the goal of assistive technology with young children is to enhance their ability to actively participate in their own life.” (pg. 11).  Not only is it used to educational purposes, but also to allow a child to have control over their own lives.  Some examples of ways that technology is used include turning things on, offering alternate play positions, child play, holding things steady, and controlling objects.  These are all things that I feel we take for granted so often, and to hear/see that a child does not have control over these things naturally is upsetting, yet eye opening. 

There are also devices for physical, sensory, or speech/language impairments that assist with the more daily living end of the spectrum.  Some devices include positioning equipment for standing independently, communication devices for speaking and writing, remote controls for enviornment issues (appliances, electronics, etc.) and self-care devices to assist with daily living skills.  It truly amazes me that there is technology out there, and still growing, that allows such limited people to do so much.  Just from my small bank of experiences, I have seen a high school kid with muscular distraphy participate in public high school setting with ease due to assistive technology and accomodations.  He is accomodated 5 minutes before the period ends to beat the kids in the hall because of his wheelchair size.  He uses special pens that assist with his grip and expressive language. He has a 1:1 aid that compensates for his slow, limited movements, things such as getting his folder from his bookbag.  It may take him 4 minutes to do that, but with a monitor, 30 seconds.  It truly is wonderful that people with such severe disabilities have the opportunity to enhance their lives through technology and a strong support system.

The tutorials I navigated were on assistive technology software called Write Outloud and Co:Writer.  Some of the Write Outloud files that could be used are called Text To Speech and Reading e-Text.  These both assist struggling readers with reading and writing, giving them a multisensory approach to guided learning.  Co:Writer tutorials helped with sentence structure, and forming grammatically correct phrases and paragraphs.  The teacher can designate a specific vocabulary bank to focus on a content area topic.   The technology can predict words, minimizing the number of key strokes.  This may also help students choose better words if a dictionary is set before hand.

Students that have disabilities in the area of reading, writing, autism, speech/language, would all benefit from these technologies.  They assist with expressive language, and can reduce anxiety/frustration with skills they already struggle with.  Students that have these disabilities have a hard enough time getting their thoughts on paper.  Their last concern is how to put a sentence together. Their expressive language could be dramatically improved if they first learn how to appropriately use the software, and have it structured in a way that the outline and expected outcome are given ahead of time.   It may also motivated students to write if they know they will face minimal difficulties along the way.

My perceptions as to why the disability community bought into facilitated communication so readily and easily...

My first impression of facilitated communication was…wow that is great! These humans who are limited in so many ways finally have a chance to express themselves.  But after watching the video and hearing discussions, my perception has changed.  Facilitated communication could be a powerful tool, if everyone in the world could be trusted equally.  The reality of it is that there are people in this world that are not truthful, and should not be in charge of another human beings determination of skill and ability.  The part of the movie that shows an examination in which the facilitator sees a dog, but the person with disabilities sees a house, and the keyboard read dog, which is not what was seen by the client.  This caught my attention and literally made my jaw drop. What is the motive behind these actions? I suppose a feeling of despair and sympathy, or maybe just madness.

I could only assume that the disabled community bought into the facilitated communication is because it made them feel like they knew more than they really did. It made them feel more normal. Who doesn’t enjoy being right? Who doesn’t take pride when someone praises them? These “prisoners of silence” have had a journey through life in which no one can understand them, or hear them.  They may have felt like this would be their chance for a semi normal life, which who could blame them?

I had the opportunity recently to experience a hearing loss simulator online.  The simulators let you experience numerous situations of audio processing in 3 different forms of hearing: normal, mild and moderate. I explored some single sound clips, such as a duck quacking.  The sound of the quack progressively got queiter, but you could still make out the noise.  The more interesting situations were ones that involed loud background noise.  There is a clip of a stadium full of people, and as the hearing loss got more and more severe, the sound became more of a blurr, as well as a headache. The sound of peoples voices quickly turned to murmurs and noises blended together.  Another situation that stood out to me was a 2 person dialogue at a resturant.  In this situation, there was very mild background noise, but still had a huge impact on the moderate level hearing loss person.  The slight sound of background noise effected their ability to focus on the other persons voice.  As I completed this simulator, I began thinking about how this type of disability does not just happen to elderly people.  I have students in my special education classes that have auditory processing issues.  This made the experience even more interesting as I began to imagine my students trying to focus on my voice at 7:30 AM, and how annoying it must be!  Thank god the self-contained setting allows for smaller ratio of student-to-teacher…otherwise there might be a bigger problem!

Before the readings for todays class, I was unsure of what was meant by the term ”gifted and talented children.”  At first, I assumed it defined students with special needs that somehow excelled in other ways than intellectually.  But after reading the articles, I find this opposite of the truth.  I find it eye opening that the most intelligent, high functioning children often end up being isolated and depressed.  These “gift and talented” children are those who are reading way above grade level, with outstanding IQ levels (exceeding 170).   Also, I found one of the myths amazing to read about: Gifted children do just fine without special services.  This myth is not true, in that students that are gifted may not develop effective problem solving skills at a young age because they are not being challenged in their current academic placement.  In turn, creating problomatic situations when they finally do reach challenge in their adolescent years/classes. Differentiated instruction must be implemented at a very early age in order to prevent confusion and frustration later on.

One quote I found amazing was…”Some of your school’s highest achievers are not gifted, and some of the most gifted children you will meet are not high achievers” (Delisle, J. 2005)  The article then goes on to describe how gifted children are often ones that earn average grades, rather than straight A’s.  They are also the children that will become very hard on themselves for not achieving to a higher standard. It’s amazing to me how children come with so much more than what’s in front of you in class. They hold a past, a bank of experiences that have shaped them into the type of students, learners, and people they are molded into.  To think that as an educator we can have that much of an impact on someone’s life is astonishing. As a rookie teacher, I hope to hold these optimistic views (discussed in the articles) as I continue down the educational path, and advocate for the students that need it.  Every student is an individual mind, has individual feelings, and deserves individual supports as they mature into young adults.

Last week at a staff meeting, our principal decided to split us up into three groups. The group I was in had to read an article, and to my suprise, it was enriching and meaningful to me.  The article was about this guy’s philosophy on teaching, and the different “zones” of learning a student has.  The first zone is when the student is presented with a problem, and can use the appropriate skill to solve it all on their own.  If they can complete it successfully by themselves, then they haven’t really learned anything new.  They are in fact demonstrating mastery of the skill, and the repetition will have no other effect on their learning.

The second zone is where a student can complete a problem using a skill with moderate support from the teacher.  If they can get the problem started, and ask a few questions along the way, they are learning and repetition will make a difference in their learning. The more they do the skill, the better they will become at it, and eventually be able to do it on their own. The last zone is when the student has absolutely no idea how to start or finish the problem.  They need support the entire time, and are not learning anything new by attempting on their own.  Students in this zone with a skill need re-teaching and modeling in order to reach any sort of independent ability.

I loved this article, and found it valuable to my teaching.  I actually took the ideas presented and have started using it in my classroom. Now, I teach 2 self-contained classes of Pre-Algebra, both groups with very high needs.  They benefit most from constant review and repetition of concepts and skills.  What I’ve done is created a list of skills I feel most essential for them to walk away with from my class, and are implementing 4 at a time per class. They start off each class with stations, and at each station is a specific skill.  After completion of the problem, they must self-assess how they did: 1. completely on my own, 2. with a little help, and 3. with a lot of help.  From there, I am taking their responses and tailoring the next days stations to their needs of instruction.  If a particular student as mastered a skill, they will not receive another station on it next class. They will continue to move down the list of essential skills.  If they needed a little help, they will get a station with the same skill, but different problem. They will be shooting for mastery this class. If a studnet needed a lot of help, then they will get a station on the same skill, but with a model example to follow to re-teach the skill, along with assistance from me.

So far, the kids have responded very well to this! They have been trying so hard to do it “on their own”, and take pride in their work when they do.  It’s making them more aware of their strengths and weaknesses, and suprisinngly I have found most students to be very honest when self-assessing. They WANT to succeed and are able to admit when they needed help. I am enjoying watching them grow as freshmen and am proud of them when they reach levels of improvement!

This weeks articles focused on a technique called video modeling to assist children and adults with autism in developing social skills they lack.  Just to name a few, research has found it to help with skills such as joint attention, playing, self help, instructional prompts effectiveness and community survival.  Through video modeling, children with autism watch examples of people interacting in a socially acceptabel manner, focusing on cues such as facial expressions, verbal comments and gestures.  They then have to practice these skills by modeling what they saw in the video. 

Video modeling is something that I have never heard of! It’s a very interesting technique, and to me it makes sense.  Think about it…where do children/teens today learn about many of societal expectations, norms and negativities?  Television! Amongst many other types of media, but through movies and watching the interactions between actors, we learn much about the rights and wrongs of social interactions.  And often times, that is where we make misconceptions.  That’s why this video modeling technique is a great way to eliminate negatives and model the desired behaviors/skills, especially for children who honestly don’t know any better.

As I read, I found myself thinking about my students that have autism.  I started to think about their social deficiencies and how it effects their academics and high school career. I have a few students with autism in the self-contained setting who I would love to recommend a move to a more least restrictive enviornment next year (team-taught).  It’s unfortunate that some of them are truly cognitively ready, but their social anxiety of large groups and interaction will impede their success.  Then I got to wondering about how much intervention did they have growing up to assist with teaching socialization skills? Did they ever get video modeling? If not, what else was used? How much of it is up to the parents? Or the school? Will they ever grow out of it?  Will they ever be able to function normally in society? This is why teaching is one of the most personal, rewarding, and real job out there. Educators are always trying to find new ways that will help children grow into better people.  We think about it day and night. But I wouldn’t want it any other way.

I chose the article on Algebra and Learning Disabilities since I am a teacher of math!  I thoroughly enjoyed this article, and was able to make connections to the ideas explained in the article.  I think it’s essential that when we teach students with disabilities, despite the content area, that we take a step back and remember that we already know how to do this.  We’ve known how to do this for years, and we teach it time and time again, but our students are hearing this for the first time in their life.  It is like a foreign language to them.  That’s why it’s imperative that we think about how we explain things, and anticipate failure/confusion.  This article talks about many aspects of teaching and the importance of planning and preparation to better the learning that we want to take place.

The first thing that caught my attention, and that I was able to relate to was the idea of breaking down a multi-step task into smaller, more doable chunks of skills.  They gave an exact example of something that I taught this year: applying rules of multiplication and division in the same problem.  The problem in particular appeared as a fraction with numbers, variables and exponents, in which you had to perform multiplication in the numerator, and then proceed with division of the denominator.  This problem was broken down into two sets of skills: first perform the multiplication separately so the skill is mastered on its own.  Once multiplied (numbers and added exponents), you re-write the problem with the new product and then divide it by the denominator.  This is an excellent example of breaking down a problem into specific parts and skills, decreasing frustration and complexity of the problem, which is important to do with students that have disabilities.

As I kept reading, I found the STAR strategy to be interesting and new!  STAR stands for S-search the problem for information that we know vs. need to know, T- translate words into symbols/properties of math, A- answer the problem, and R-review or reflect on your path and solution.  I thought this was a great way of again, breaking down a problem with structure and creativity.  Another “wow” idea I found was an example of a graphic organizer they used for solving quadratics.  I really liked how they started at the top with the quadratic in its original form, then had 2 arrows that lead to the next “factored” parts, and then they came together in the end to denote the “answers” or “solutions”.  I thought this visual image of “first” and then “next” would assist visual learners in problem solving.  I think I’m going to use it for next year! I was really excited to see an article on math, and am glad that I could make these connections and find something useful to my teaching as well!