Education

Categories of Learning Disabilities

Types of learning disabilities are often grouped by areas of education. Recognizing the signs of each area will make it possible for you to pinpoint a problem and tailor your child’s education appropriately. Early intervention is often very helpful in assisting a child with a learning disability, so making yourself aware of the different signs and symptoms will allow you to help your child.

Math Difficulties/Disabilities
Your child’s difficulty with math can be affected by other disabilities, such as a language disability. If your child’s learning disability falls into the category of math difficulties or disabilities, he or she might struggle with memorizing facts. Your child also might struggle with counting principles or telling time.

Language Difficulties/Disabilities
Language difficulties and disabilities encompass the ability to understand and produce spoken language. Signs of these types of disabilities include the inability to retell a story and the inability to understand the meaning of parts of speech or directions.

Reading Difficulties/Disabilities
Your child may experience different varieties of reading problems. Disabilities dealing with reading can lead to a difficulty in understanding meaning. Your son or daughter could show a lack of ability to recognize letters or words.

Writing Difficulties/Disabilities
These disabilities deal with physically writing and/or understanding information. A writing disability can involve physical difficulty writing words or letters or a struggle to organize thoughts in writing. Symptoms, like writing coherence, revolve around the actual act of writing.

If your child has a learning disability, he or she can still get the education they deserve. Learn what to watch out for so you can get your child needed assistance.

Filed Under: Learning Theories Tagged With: Disability, Education, Learning disability

Innovative Computer Programs Provide Adequate Teaching Methods for Parents

Image by San Jose Library via Flickr

Since the inception of the Internet, there has been a variety of different tools provided to people who utilize it on a regular basis. From the ease of searching through vast amounts of information for a seemingly instantaneous answer, to the endless forms of entertainment; the Internet has uniquely shaped society in a number of different ways. However, among one of the more important aspects of society that the Internet has assisted in changing is that of education. There are a barrage of unique and innovative programs and online tools that can be utilized to help children learn while simultaneously having fun.

Useful Information and How-to Guides

As mentioned earlier, the Internet is full of useful and easily accessible information. Due to this fact, parents can find and use proven teaching methods to work with at home with their children. Whether parents are homeschooling their children through Elementary School, or simply getting the ball rolling before enrolling into a public school; there are many inventive and interactive curriculums available online.

Interactive Teaching Programs

In addition to the large amount of useful information online that pertains to teaching, there are also many free and purchasable programs that help make learning fun for children. Generally, these types of programs provide a unique environment in which children can do things that are stimulating to their brain while simultaneously holding their interest. From mathematics to English, there are programs that cover each of the important fundamentals in general education. These types of visually appealing programs tend to be particularly useful for children with learning disabilities.

Filed Under: Teaching Tips & Tricks Tagged With: Child, Education, Elementary School

How to Hire the Best Tutor for Your Child

When it comes to hiring a tutor for your child, it can be somewhat overwhelming. There are many aspects to consider in ensuring the tutor will be effective in full-filling your child’s needs. In some cases, children have learning disabilities that can pose as a prospective hurdle in their ability to learn specific materials. Choosing the right tutor to help reinforce their individual areas that they might be weak and can be vital to their future success. Due to this fact, it is important to do a few things prior to hiring a tutor for your child that will ensure a positive experience.

Find out What Will Function Best for Your Child

Sit down with your child and get a better feel as to how they respond to learning specific elements. As their parent, you probably already know what kinds of personality they respond to best, as well as their general academic abilities. However, sitting down with them prior to beginning your search for a prospective tutor is a good way to reinforce what you know and allow you to start your search with the right information.

Perform Adequate Research

When it comes to locating a tutor, a parent can never perform too much research. Most parents who are beginning this step will approach generalized forums and or blogs pertaining to tutoring to get a good idea as to what things to look for in an effective tutor over one that is not. Upon finding and considering a few candidates, it is then good practice to research those candidates, whether online or through provided sources to ensure everything looks viable before making a final decision.

Filed Under: Teaching Tips & Tricks Tagged With: Child, Education, Tutor

Teaching Children with Dyslexia

Dyslexia is a learning disability and, while it cannot be cured, early diagnosis and treatment can be integral in helping children become successful in school and in life. Most dyslexics benefit from help from a teacher, therapist or tutor specially trained to teach using methods that utilize multi-sensory techniques.

Modifications to a student’s academic program can help dyslexics succeed. Using teaching methods that involve different senses such as hearing, touch and sight simultaneously help children with dyslexia to better understand and recall the material they learn. At school, allowing students with dyslexia additional time to complete assignments, providing help with note taking and even giving taped tests can provide students the help they need in order to succeed.

Dyslexic children often have difficulty with auditory processing, visual processing, or both. They might also have difficulty understanding how sound functions in the way words are put together. Rhyming, blending sounds and segmenting words can be difficult. Dyslexic children often have problems learning the sight words taught in early elementary grades.

Effective Instruction for Children with Dyslexia

Dyslexia cannot be cured, but proper teaching methods can improve a student’s success and minimizes many of the problems associated with dyslexia. For example:

Teaching skills explicitly using techniques that might be considered “old school” but directly instruct students on reading, writing and spelling.

Using logical systems for introducing new concepts so that information builds on what is learned before.

Following step-by-step methods for introducing, reviewing and practicing concepts.

Simultaneously engaging visual, kinesthetic and auditory channels when teaching concepts. This kind of teaching links these pathways enhancing memory and learning.

Filed Under: Children With Learning Disabilities Tagged With: Dyslexia, Education, Learning disability

Special Education

Special education has gotten a face lift in the last 20 years or so through the revision of the IDEA format, Individuals with Disabilities Act. This change was prompted by parents of children with disabilities that felt that it was unfair for their children to be segregated from the rest of the school because of their disability. This was also made visible with students that had reading difficulties that were combined with severe Down Syndrome students. The problem was that the students with the mild to moderate learning disabilities were feeling severely disabled because that was the group they were placed with. According to the revisions made on IDEA one of the key revisions was that a student was going to have the least restrictive environment possible. This is where No Child Left Behind, or NCLB, was developed.

The least restrictive environment means that a child is to be with other students, and if help is needed, an inclusion teacher assigned to that student will offer help in the classroom. This also meant that the mainstream teacher, and special education teacher were to work hand in hand in developing proper workloads for particular students, based on the provisions of their IEP, Individual Education Plan. This has inclusion model is a nationwide model, and is used in every school in America. The idea behind the model is to eliminate as much one on one special education time, which in the past was making students feel defeated rather than empowered, and allow them the opportunity to learn the same information with their peers. This has been highly successful, and many are considering a new over haul of special education that would consider mainstream teacher be licenced for accommodations to help eliminate the middle man in their classrooms.

Filed Under: Teaching Tips & Tricks Tagged With: Disability, Education, Special education

IEP Writing

IEP, or Individual Education Plan, is a process that allows educators, parents, and the student come together to discuss the plan on how to handle the disability that is presented. Their is a stringent process on this plan, and its contents, progress, and reports are all protected by law. The first step to getting to the IEP stage is for the teacher to recognize that a student may have some challenges. The teacher will notify the Principal, who then meets with the teacher to organize some observations. After observations are concluded, and the staff agrees that there might be a disability present, they approach the parents with the idea to test the child for a disability. The testing is not intended to hurt the child or concrete a disability, but rather find what the disability is. If a parent feels that their child is suffering from a learning disability he or she can also request testing; this does not have to be a school directed step. Once the testing is complete, and they get the results, the staff meets to review the results. Further testing may be needed in order to see the severity of the disability, but the initial testing will at least identify the initial problem.

The parents will be notified after the testing is completed, and the results will be relayed to them at a meeting. The meeting will consist of the Principal, discovering teacher, and other teachers that help to collaborate on the issue. This is where the group comes together for the development of the IEP. This document is what will be the framework on how to help assist the student with his or her needs throughout the school year, and what will be included as far as accommodations to assist with as much mainstream classroom time as possible.

Filed Under: Learning Theories Tagged With: Education, Individualized Education Program

Learning Difficulties

Learning difficulties can be manifested in many different ways. There are approximately 25 areas that are identified for students, and the struggle is that many of the issues tend to be combined with other difficulties. For instance, many children that tend to have reading disabilities also tend to have behavioral issues. This is probably the most common combination and mostly due to the fact that the student is frustrated with their lack of production and normalcy. The idea behind inclusion classrooms was to eliminate much of this frustration by allowing a student to be in a normal classroom setting with his or her peers. This has been very effective in the last decade, and many students are maintaining healthy behavioral habits as a result.

The biggest problem with learning difficulties is not so much the identification of the issue, but rather the reception in which the student receives help for that issue. Many times students tend to fight the help because they feel out of place or stupid. This is a tragic scenario as it can take years before a student realizes that the intervention is not intended to harm, rather help. For some, this can mean that learned things can be missed, and students fall even more behind. This cycle can create an ugly situation for students and their families, and many times can result in being held back in a grade, or more one on one intervention to get the student caught up with the key concepts.

ADD/ADHD is not considered a diagnosable disability at this time in school, and there are efforts to try and change that. The problem with this difficulty is that many believe it to be strictly environmental and therefore highly preventable. The age old argument of Nature vs. Nurture is hot on this topic, and many educators hope to see a change in the near future regarding this particular aspect of noticeable difficulties that students face.

Filed Under: Learning Theories Tagged With: Education, Learning disability, Student

Parents Of Students With Disabilities

Being a parent of a child with a disability can be a difficult thing. As far as school is concerned, it can be scary trying to navigate the educational maze, and trying to find help for your child. There are laws and federal guidelines that have been put into place in order to protect your child, accommodate the needs that are present, and to ensure the best environment possible for your child’s learning. One of the key guidelines that have been established is the IDEA, Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, and it states a number of key requirements that schools must follow in order to provide a positive and conducive learning environment for your child.

Some of the key ideas with IDEA is that schools are to provide an environment that has the least amount of restrictiveness. This means that if your child can handle being in a mainstream classroom for Social Studies, English, and Science, but not for Math or PE, then the schools must make every effort possible to include your child in those classes, and to have the least amount of intervention from teachers as possible. This also falls in line with the NCLB, or No Child Left Behind act, that states that all efforts are to be made in order to include students in mainstream classrooms without it negatively affecting their educational progress.

Another provision of IDEA is that all possible accommodations are to be made, regardless of costs. It also states that schools are to have IEP, Individual Education Plan, meetings and committees assigned to your child for the duration of their inclusion in the special education department. For a parent of a child with special needs, this is a welcomed piece of news as there are many issues that you will not have to deal with because the school has ensured that they will handle many of the confusing issues that arise. Based on IDEA, parents are to be notified of changes and progress of the student. This eliminates much of the leg work that many parents have to be concerned with.

Filed Under: Children With Learning Disabilities Tagged With: Education, Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, Special education

ABA Therapy

When working with students with disabilities, there are many different approaches that teachers and other directing educators can take in order to provide a successful education. One of the new methods that is being implemented is ABA therapy. This is Applied Behavioral Analysis and it had its origins in working with severely autistic children as an early intervention therapy. It has been recognized by accreditation authorities as a valid educational approach, and the licensing that it is mandatory is either BCBA or BCaBA. The requirements in order to obtain a licensure for this field requires a graduate degree, and is mandatory in order to practice.

In some states, the therapy approach is completed with a tutor, and is paid through the county in which the student resides. IDEA ’04 mandates that all provisions be made in order to accomodate students with special needs. This includes in home tutoring or therapeutic care. ABA therapy is now part of those provisions, and students are receiving education and care in their homes. This has helped to enable many students that might otherwise be lost in the mix of a mainstream environment, and that is not a truly conducive learning environment for many children with special needs.

The therapy can begin as an early intervention for children as young as two years old, and can continue on until a student has aged out of the special services program provided by their school district. This age is set at 21, and ABA therapy can be provided, free of charge, until that time. The purpose of the approach is to teach students the proper behavioral reactions while dealing with social situations. This means that while a student is receiving help for reading, writing, or has a mental disability, they can function and be responsive to help and guidance without having an emotional break down. This has been proven to be the number one help for students in a special needs program.

Filed Under: Treatment Tagged With: Applied behavior analysis, Education

Step One: Believe in Yourself

If there is no other gift we can give to a person labeled as “learning disabled” then it should be the opportunity to believe in them self. If you are labeled as “learning disabled” there is no better time to start choosing to believe in yourself. The content of this message is to work toward your goals in the best way you can.

Many people may be concerned about the message they send to their loved one or anyone for that matter that they set them up for failure. One may be concerned that if a learning disabled person is allowed to have expectations they will only be let down and nobody wants to see anyone suffer. The message here is not to set up expectations but just to allow a person to set some goals, like anyone else is taught to do. The best strategy for dealing with any hardship or for attaining a goal is to accept where you are, but not to see it as all you will ever achieve. There are many possibilities for a person labeled as “learning disabled” and many ways to feel empowered that you are contributing to the world.

It is too bad that there is an all encompassing term like “learning disabled” for such a wide range of people, with a wide variety of opportunity and circumstances. So many people labeled as “learning disabled” are wonderfully contributing to society. Yet, society still likes to label the “learning disabled” as a burden to it’s growth. The strategy is simple. Believe in yourself regardless of the limits that others try to make sure you know. Don’t hesitate to take on a task nobody believes you an do and don’t hesitate to try again if you really want it. The only real limit, the only lack of success is never trying to achieve your dreams. Everyone contributes who tries.

Filed Under: Treatment Tagged With: Education, Learning disability

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