As part of my teaching assignment, I frequently attend IEP and 504 meetings with parents, students, teachers and counselors.  I use IEP goals to make instructional decisions for students with the help of the student’s special ed teacher.  However, before taking EDSP6644 Educating Exceptional Students, I had a limited understanding of specific disabilities and while I modified assignments and followed IEP/504 guidelines for extra time and support, I had a narrow range of ideas for accomplishing this.  In this class, I learned about specific disabilities and how I could help students with these disabilities better access the information.  This course focused on Standard 8 Exceptionality which states, “Addresses the unique learning and behavioral needs of all children, collaborating with other educators and professionals where necessary” (Curriculum and Instruction Program Standards, 2012).

One disability that I was very interested in and chose to study in more depth while taking this course was autism.  My interest in autism has been peaked over the last couple of years because there is a high number of students who are on the autism spectrum at my school.  “Autism is a developmental disability described as significantly affecting verbal communication, non-verbal communication, and social interaction, thereby influencing the child’s educational performance (Lewis & Doorlag, 2011, p. 265).  1/110 of people between the ages of 0 and 21 has been diagnosed with autism; however half of these cases are mild forms of the disability (Isbell, 2011).  This year my 7th grade LA/SS students read a book called Rules in which the main character has autism.  Before we began the book, we explored autism through videos, articles, personal experiences and the autism specialist from our school district came and spoke to my class. Please take a look at this artifact to see some of the activities that my class participated in before beginning this unit.  This course helped me be prepared to lead a discussion like this in my classroom.

I also learned how important it is to consider student’s development and how it affects instruction.  Jean Piaget researched and developed a theory about intellectual development and the stages that people move through.  He found that children move on at different rates of development, but there is an order to the progression.  He created a list of stages that each has natural distinctions (Crain, 2011).  “Piaget believed that at each period there is a general correspondence between scientific and social thinking” (Crain, 2011, p. 133).  Because students move through these stages at different paces, it is important to be aware of this as a teacher and work to meet the needs of individual students.  This will help to make students aware of what they need and what their reactions mean to help them understand and maintain control of themselves.

Evidence of my understanding and growth through this course can be seen through an example of the work that I have done with a student who has a 504.  Earlier in the year, I attended a 504 meeting with her mom, her counselor, and her other general education teachers.  This student has been diagnosed with ADHD but does not take medication.  She has trouble with concentration, task completion and organization.  I had offered her a variety of supports but I found that she was often resistant to work during class.

I anticipated that she may have problems with the most recent essay in which students were to describe an upcoming break or holiday and what they were going to do during that time in French.  I predicted that she would have trouble generating ideas and organizing her ideas into sentences and paragraphs, but I wanted her to begin on her own.  I allowed her to begin with the prewrite and as I circulated the room, I noticed that she was having trouble coming up with ideas.  I sat down with her and asked her some questions to help her get ideas flowing but most questions led to dead ends and I noticed that the noisy environment of the classroom was distracting for her.  Before beginning this project, I created a paragraph helper to help students like her come up with ideas and organize their essays.  I presented this to her and her spirits perked.  I found a quiet place for her to work and she quickly began to work on this, filling in the blanks with a great sense of accomplishment.  She completed this and was able to create a rough draft and final draft and submit it on time with the other students.  I could sense that she had great pride in her work.  “The major approach to adapting instruction for students with ADHD is to increase the structure of the classroom learning environment.  In addition, the teacher attempts to decrease the source of distraction within the room, and at the same time, make learning maters and activities more powerful so they will attract and sustain the students’ attention” (Lewis & Doorlag, 2011, p. 207).  This is a model that I will continue to use with this student as we work through the next chapters.

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