In the recent past few weeks our class made two observations, each time to different schools. It was our objective to watch the classes at these schools for children with special needs. The purpose of this paper is to explain to you what our observations were and the impact they have made on me. .
The first school which I visited was L which was in a very remote area. When we first entered the classroom we were able to talk with the teacher, Ms. Hunter, about the different students in the classroom. Of the eight students, there were four or five children with attention deficit disorder (three were on medication), two other children were borderline ADD, and one child was autistic with slight mental retardation. All of these children are within two years of their grade level reading.
Of the other students in the school there are 11 children in the 1st and 2nd grades with special needs, and 10 children within the 3rd and 4th grades. Ms. Hunter is the case worker/teacher for all the children in the building with mental disabilities. All students with special needs come to her sometime during the school day and spend a period in her classroom where she teaches language arts. For the rest of the day they are in regular classrooms with children of normal abilities. Ms. Hunter also moves through the regular classes helping the special needs children with their math and social studies.
Ms. Hunter is very straightforward with the children. She tells them exactly what their problem is and what the child needs to do to accomplish the goals she has set for them. She talks to the parents as well and explains to them what their child needs to do, and that if they don't their child will be trapped into a vocational diploma which will get them nowhere in life. All the children with mental disabilities are offered occupational therapy, and five children in the school are given speech therapy. L tries to keep the kids as much as possible with the regular classes.
