Blog 2 & Online Module in Lieu of Class

I think that as educators we need to remember that sometimes students are not "acting" out, they are "crying" out for help. We are too quick to judge a student sometimes because they are having difficulty learning and they do not want to ask for help because we have stigmatized people with any disability, not just learning disabilities. Emotional implications for students with learning disabilities are things such as feeling a sense of loneliness or isolation and anxiety. Life is found to be more difficult for students who have an LD even to the point where they can even become assaulted. With these emotional issues brings along the social issues, it is one big vicious circle. If a student is isolated or withdrawn, they may be tagged as the "weird" kid or the kid who always tantrums when there is a test. These social implications can have long lasting effects on the students.
I remember when I was in middle school and there would be students acting out in class. I fondly remember teachers putting those students acting out, out in the hall, so they would not disrupt the rest of class. At the time, I think that the rest of the class probably thought that "Ooooooohhh so and so is in the hall" and we all thought it was pretty funny. Now that I am older and work with special needs kids, I think back and realize that it was mean to snicker at the kid sitting in the hallway. I know now, that it was easier for the teacher to remove the problem than to deal with the problem. After you were in the hallway, you were most likely sent to the principal's office for them to deal with you. If I were that child with a learning disability and got sent to the hallway and then to the principal's office I would be mortified. I guess we as a society, are just too quick to judge why others are behaving the way they are instead of focusing on the underlying problem.
As a future educator, I believe that I will try to incorporate a social story time daily into the class's routine so that all would benefit from it. Not all student's are the same, therefore we need to bring awareness that we are all different with different learning styles.

Research has given us the opportunity to use medical technology to show where the problem may lie within the brain area. With the use of fMRI's, we can pinpoint where the brain is functioning and where it is not. This technology is exciting because it may allow us to catch a reading disability before the child is non eligible for early intervention. The technology will also help with teaching strategies and instruction because it may be able to tell us just where the student is having the difficulty and more intense instruction may be implemented.

We are also seeing that technology (fMRI's) can help us as educators seek a better understanding what typical readers look like while developing reading habits.

Congress reviewed the research from the brain MRI's in 2000 and found that these tests can be helpful to identify children who may have a potentially difficult time with reading. Although these tests are not going to help everyone. There are other issues that may impact a child's reading level. Things such as how the child grew up, or the environment in which the student learned could be factors in why children have learning disabilities. These tests could help, we as educators, make our own instruction better and to keep our curriculum up to par.

Some of the disproportions surrounding culturally and linguistically diverse children are that the drop out rate is much higher than for white students, many ELL students are tagged as "special education" students. Some cultures are also deemed "serious emotionally disturbed" also. Some students, when being tested for special education, were being tested in English, instead of their native tongue. This seems absurd to me, why would anyone even look at the results as accurate? Legislature is attempting to alleviate this problem by mandating monitoring on dis-proportionality in all states. Legislature is also trying to get to the underlying problem : the opportunities that exist for some students is much less than it is for others, especially when the student has a cultural or linguistic barrier.

The problem that I see is the assessments of these children. Like I stated above, why would someone think that it is appropriate to test a student in any other language than their own. I also do not believe that there is a cut and dry definition when working with learning disabilities. I also believe that a child with cultural or linguistic deficits should not be tested for special education until their English has passed a certain test. The assessment tools seem to be too generic or aimed at one target group and not taking into consideration anything else that can happen in a child's life.

I think that I am finished!!!

Misunderstood Simulation Blog

After reviewing the videos for all of the components, I felt very irritated and actually a bit sick to my stomach. I got especially irritated with the auditory simulation with the shapes. I was totally distracted and did not score very well at all! When I did the Math simulation and tried to add the numbers, I did not get any right, in fact it asked me how I got the answers that I did, wasnt expecting that one!

I think that one of the biggest insights that these simulations gave me was to always take into consideration what is being offered to the student. With this I mean, when a student voices their concern that something is bothering them, we need to not shrug it off and look into it further. If they are having trouble hearing the directions, we need to think about moving their seat closer to the teacher or positioning ourselves closer to those children who do have a harder time listening to directions.

The above could also be an implication for teaching too. As educators, we should never infer that a child understands what we are talking about. We need to teach them to understand the meaning of what is being taught.