1. Learners with Exceptionalities

2. Learners with exceptionalities
More than 6.5 million students are diagnosed as having exceptionalities – learning or emotional needs that result in requiring special help to succeed & reach full potential
95% general education classrooms (2009)
Gifted and talented – learners with the abilities at the upper end of the continuum
Intelligence – ability to acquire & use knowledge, solve problems & reason in the abstract and adapt to new situations in our environments
You will encounter students with various degrees of intelligences

3. Howard Gardner
Multiple Intelligences – overall intelligence is composed of eight relatively independent dimensions
Linguistic - words/language
Logical-mathematical – reasoning/patterns
Musical – sensitivity to pitch, melody, & tone
Spatial – perceive the visual world accurately
Bodily-kinesthetic – fine-tuned ability to use body/handle objects
Interpersonal intelligence – other people
Intrapersonal intelligence – knowing one’s self
Naturalist – knowing the physical world

4. Emotional Intelligence
Ability to manage our emotions so we can cope with our world and accomplish goals
Students who can manage their emotions:
Happier
Better adjusted
Better able to make & keep friends
Better students – focus their emotions of the learning task
You can help!!!
Openly talk about emotions & discussing strategies for dealing with them
Literature – read & discuss stories –
Goals – students to become aware of their emotions , how they influence behavior & learn how to control them

5. Learning Styles
Our preferred way learning, studying or thinking about the world

6. Special Education & the Law
Historically, students with exceptionalities – separate classes
U.S. Congressed passed Public Law , the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) in 1975
Guarantee of a free appropriate public education for all students with exceptionalities was central to this act
This act (combined with later amendments)
Guarantees an appropriate education for all students with exceptionalities
Identifies the needs of students with exceptionalities through assessment that doesn’t discriminate against any students
Involves parents in decisions about each child’s educational program
Creates an environment that doesn’t restrict learning opportunities for students with exceptionalities
Develops an individualized education program (IEP) of study for each student

7. Special Education & the Law
The move toward inclusion
Main-streaming – practice of placing students with exceptionalities in general education classrooms, often for selected activities only, was their first effort
Usually without adequate support & services
Unsatisfactory
Inclusion - a comprehension approach to educating students with exceptionalities that incorporates a total, systematic and coordinated web of services
Support of special educators to assist you students

8. Individualized Education Program (IEP)
An assessment of the student’s current level of performance
Long and long term objectives
Strategies to ensure that the student is making academic progress
Schedules for implementing the plan
Criteria for evaluating the plan’s success
Provides sufficient detail to guide general education classroom teachers & special education personnel

9. Individual Family Service Plan (IFSP)
Provides the same type of planned care as an IEP, but targets developmentally delayed preschool children
2 big differences:
Targets the child’s family & provides supplemental services to the family as well as the child
Includes interventions & services from a variety of health & human services agencies

10. Categories of Exceptionalities
Learning Disabilities
Difficulties in acquiring & using listening, speaking, reading, writing, reasoning or mathematical abilities
Communication Disabilities
Interfere with students’ abilities to receive & understand information form others & to express their own ideas or questions
Intellectual Disabilities
Limitations in intellectual functioning & problems, as indicated by difficulties in learning & problems with adaptive skills (communication, self-care, & social interaction
Behavior Disorders
Display of serious and persistent age inappropriate behaviors that result in social conflict, personal unhappiness, & school failure

11. Students who are Gifted & Talented
Over 3 million students (slightly more than 6%)
Early identification & instructional modifications
Programs have declined over the years
Acceleration – keeps the curriculum the same but allows students to move through it more quickly
Enrichment – provides richer and varied content through strategies that supplement usual grade-level work
Failure to provide for:
Gifted underachievers
Social & emotional problems linked to boredom & lack of motivation

12. More demanding, but one of the most rewarding experiences
You as the TEACHER
Identify students you suspect have exceptionalities
Collaborate with other professionals
Modify instruction to meet students’ needs
More demanding, but one of the most rewarding experiences

13. Identify students you suspect have exceptionalities
You work directly with them therefore you are in the best position
Discrepancy model
Response to Intervention (RTI) model of identification
Early screenings
What should be done to correct it
Teacher adapts instruction to meet student’s need
Working with student one on one
Small-group work
Developing strategies (reading material aloud)

14. Collaborate with other professionals
Involves communication with parents and other professionals (special education specialist, school psychologists & guidance counselors) to create the best environment for students
Work closely with special education teacher to ensure learning experiences are integrated into the general education class

15. Modify instruction to meet students’ needs
Not than different as far as teaching method – you simply do it better
Small steps, detailed feedback on home work
Calling on students as often
Carefully model solutions to problems
Provide outlines, charts, rubrics
Increase time
Use technology
Teach learning strategies
Provide additional support
SUCCESS – essential for struggling learner
Positive reinforcement & support
Peer tutoring
Home based tutoring

16. Assistive technology
Set of adaptive tools that support students with disabilities in learning activities & daily life tasks
Required by IDEA