Helping Students with Learning Disabilities is Common Practice

       In my lifetime, the transformation in public schools towards helping students with learning disabilities has been incredible.  We've gone from self-contained classrooms--in which these students rarely or never interacted with their peers, to full inclusion--in which, today, it is rare for almost any classroom to not have a student with a learning disability.  We used to call it "Mainstreaming"; but now we just call it normal.  Teachers from the 1970's and 1980's would have never imagined a world in which this was possible.  They never had the training that our teachers have today.

       Teachers know that the sort of strategies that help our Special Education students are just good teaching strategies that help all students.  We are better (now) at teaching students who might be weak in reading or mathematics (and don't have a learning disability) than we were in the past because of our training for Special Education students.  Every school has a Special Education department chair or specialist that works with a team of teachers that assist students with learning disabilities AND help to train teachers on best practices.  These students have special learning plans that we call Individual Education Plans (or IEP for short) that give them goals to reach.

       Every year we look at data that measures the learning of our students with IEPs and we consider ways to increase their achievement.  Gone are the days when these students were made to feel that couldn't learn and they spent their days doing basic reading and math skills.  Companies outside of our public school system have developed software and resources and programs designed to help these students to reach their potential.

       The story of our special Special Education students is (indeed) a success story of our public schools.  It was a huge problem and we figured out a way to make it a much smaller problem.  There are lots of young adults in our society today that proudly hold their high school graduation certificate thanks to our public school's efforts to identify their learning disability and to find a way to help them to learn.

       This success story gives me hope that our public schools will solve today's issues:  increasing the achievement of our poor students, better education for our English Language Learners, raising the high school graduation rate without compromising our high standards, and eliminating the achievement gaps that exist between certain student groups.  These are huge problems and every one of them has a solution.  I believe that we have already begun to address these issues.  And I believe that when my students are my age they will look back on the early years of the 21st century be proud of the accomplishments of our public schools.

Students with Learning Disabilities Learn

     

       There was a time when students with learning disabilities were labeled dumb or weak or unmotivated or any one of a multitude of other names from people who didn't understand anything about learning disabilities.  Over my lifetime (I'm 51 years old), that has dramatically changed.

       I'm not a Special Educator, but today every educator knows something about students with disabilities.  This is because every single teacher in our public schools receives some training in working with students who have learning disabilities.  Over the past decade, schools have made an extra special effort to improve the achievement of students with learning disabilities because (under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 2001) schools were partially "graded" on their ability to educate students with learning disabilities.

       Today most schools have teachers who are specially trained to work with students who have learning disabilities.  These students are given Individual Education Plans that are backed up by federal law.  We now know how to diagnose specific learning disabilities and we are constantly getting better at addressing the educational needs of these special students.

       When we say, "All students can learn.", we mean "all students".  It is still a struggle for these students and a struggle for schools to find the best way to help them; but the successes of today are tremendous compared to the extremely few successes public schools saw decades ago.

       As a mathematics supervisor, I often say that it sometimes seems that we spend 90% of our time on 10% of our students.  And that "10%" is largely made up of students with learning disabilities.  Schools and school systems are always talking about strategies to help these students.  And when smart people get together and think together and share experiences, we usually end up with ideas that benefit students.

       The U.S. Department of Education has an office dedicated to helping students with learning disabilities.  In 1975, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) was passed by congress.  This law told our schools that students with learning disabilities are our students and it is our responsibility to teach them and to help them as much as we can.

     

       What's so good about public education in America?  Students with learning disabilities learn.  Everyday.

Meeting the Needs of All Students

     One thing that I have always been proud of about public schools is our desire and efforts to meet the needs of all students.  This seems like a natural thing for schools to do; but when we say "All", we mean "All".  While most students fall in the average category, some students are very strong academically and some struggle a lot with academics.  Public schools strive to help all of these students wherever they may fall on this spectrum.

     Probably the most difficult part of achieving this goal is reaching the students on the extremes.  For students who have severe learning disabilities, public schools have personnel trained in Special Education who work with teachers to help our weakest students to achieve.  Improvements in the education of our weakest students have been great over the past generation; and these improvements continue.

     For students who are significantly strong academically (able to understand work that is two and three--or more--grade levels above their current grade level) public schools look to make special arrangements.  This can be done via online courses, grade acceleration, and help from outside organizations.  Keeping these students challenged year after year is a challenge for our schools.  But we do our best to make it happen.

     As always, a good working relationship between parents and schools is the key to great outcomes for students.

Learning about People with Disabilities

When my daughter was in kindergarten, she had a classmate named Jack.  Jack was (and is) developmentally delayed.  Jack has an adult personal assistant with him all of the time when he is in school.  Jack doesn't talk.

My daughter's welcomed Jack to class in kindergarten in the same way that she welcomed all of her students.  Jack participated in all activities--as much as he could--just like everyone else.  My daughter and her classmates viewed Jack in the same way they viewed everyone else.  "He is a student just like me."  "We have the same teacher."  "We all do the same things."

My daughter is in eighth grade now, and Jack has been in her grade all along the way.  My daughter and her peers view Jack in the same way they did in kindergarten.  "He is a student just like me."  "We have the same teachers."  "We all do the same things."  Of course, as my daughter grew, she also grew to understand that Jack has learning difficulties that other students do not.  But since she knew him since kindergarten, she didn't view his "differences" as a negative thing.

Public education exposes our children to different people and it shows our children that differences are OK.  Students see how the school and the school system helps students with varying abilities.  I think that this helps our children to grow with a good understanding of the world that they will enter.

We all have disabilities of some sort.  Our students' experiences with peers that are learning disabled helps them to see the differences and to see how these differences can be addressed by caring adults.

Jack is part of our public education family and we are all so lucky to know him.