I'm in this class, Teaching Students with Mild Disabilities, and I've got project this month on preparing a class on instruction. The class revolves around students with physical, mental, emotional, and behavioral disabilities.

I have quite a bit of experience with emotional disabilities, but little with the others. There are resources in our text, but I was hoping to get some responses of first-hand experience.

Do you or does someone you know have any type of disability? How has it affected your school work, social situations, and home life? How can schools better accomodate students with needs like these? How do you learn things the best?

One of the biggest issues we discuss is full-inclusion versus isolation (being in a resource room or with a regular classroom). Do you have any experience or ideas about this?Please share anything you'd like that you think would help.

Wow, thanks you guys! I'm actually working on my project right now--it's due at midnight on Thursday (well...Friday, I suppose). I have to compose a two-hour presentation on implementing strategies to work with students with disabilities into the classroom. The main objective is to foster activities that can work for everyone.

I love your stories, esp. the whole idea of individual vs. group. I've been arguing with some classmates over this for some time! The fact is, everyone is different, and sometimes you'll just have to try out different strategies before you find one that works.

Thanks again!

This is all very interesting, as I write novels and short stories, and have some characters who have some of these problems.

Well, I personally don't have any disabilities. I'm very fortunate. However, I can give "out-siders view-point" on some things. In my family, the only disabilities are that my sister and my dad are manic-depressive (which is like bipolar mood swings) and my dad, my sister and my brother are dyslexic.

Dyslexia was probably hardest for them, especially my dad, as when he was growing up, dyslexia hadn't been discovered, so it was just thought that he was just stupid or something. It was puzzling to them, as he had an IQ of around 180, but couldn't read, no matter what they tried. He actually failed the 2nd grade because he couldn't read. My sister and my brother had troubles because the teachers were treating them as though they were retarded, not like they were dyslexic.

For some background, dyslexia, it's common that they mix up letters and see mirror images, or those kinds of things, but to be required dyslexia, you have to have not been able to read after three years of trying, and have a higher than average IQ. Dyslexic people are just geniuses with numbers and such in there head, but they can't get the concept of letters meaning something.

My sister is only mildly manic-depressive, and medication keeps my dad's under control, so I don't really have anything to say about those.

Oh, yeah, and my other brother...well he's a genius. End of story. However, because Elementary Schools are so revolving around "How did you get your answer?" these days, he had a lot of trouble. They gave him a math exam when he was in second grade, and they'd ask him a question well beyond second grade expectations. He got the answer. They'd ask him how he got and he'd say, "I don't know. I just did."

I think it just makes it difficult for out of the box students, as school boards and teachers are so involved in "in the box students" that they fail to recognize the exceptions.

quote:

I'm in this class, Teaching Students with Mild Disabilities, and I've got project this month on preparing a class on instruction. The class revolves around students with physical, mental, emotional, and behavioral disabilities.

I have quite a bit of experience with emotional disabilities, but little with the others. There are resources in our text, but I was hoping to get some responses of first-hand experience.

Do you or does someone you know have any type of disability? How has it affected your school work, social situations, and home life? How can schools better accomodate students with needs like these? How do you learn things the best?

One of the biggest issues we discuss is full-inclusion versus isolation (being in a resource room or with a regular classroom). Do you have any experience or ideas about this?Please share anything you'd like that you think would help.

"The end of the human race will be that we eventually die of civilization." Emerson

Well, I have no clue as for how people, children, and the like do with ADD, ADHD, and the like, but I personally can say that as the only disabled kid in my high school, no. We are not treated right. I have Degenerative Disk Disease and a really rare disease called Mast Cell Hypersensitivity (mouthful...) I am not allowed to carry my meds with me, even though if I were to have an attack, I would die within two minutes of the reaction. It sucks. As per school work, I carry a 4.0 no prob, but socially? I'm more of a fly without wings than a butterfly. Home is always tense because my bro and sisters say that I'm treated better because of my disability. My school was built in the fifties, so they don't have to be completely on code for kids with disabilities. There are only two wheel chair ramps to enter the school, and no one is there to help if you have trouble. There are some things they do to help, but most of it is pointless and stupid. I need to go... I'm making myself angry... goosphraba!!!
becca

I don't know if this would directly apply to classroom stuff, like aspergers or ADD/ADHD would, but I have a personality disorder called histrionic personality disorder. This often does ruin friendships, because I feel as if I am in constant competition and I see myself as better than others. I am jealous if a friend is flirting with a guy-because no matter who he is, he should like me, because I see myself as "the best" the best-looking, most interesting...talented. etc. I always feel the need to be the center of attention and will go to extreme measures to get that attention. If people are not paying me as much attention as I want, I will sometimes cry and make up overtly-dramatic stories about what is wrong with me, and tell people that no one likes me even though I know that they do. I also self-mutilate myself and say extremly provacative things in order to get attention, and I dress and act very sexual. It causes problems because my best friend is now saying that she feels like no matter how much attention she gives me, it is never enough. My boyfriend showers me with attention, but I still feel like I love him more or something. I find relationships to be a lot more than they really are, and I take things too seroiusly. Now, I don't have an extreme case of histrionic personality disorder (HPD) but I do have most of the symptoms in a way that most people would not have. I hate how I need attention. I wish I could be a more giving, selfless person, who does good things. I wish I did not see myself as "the best" because I don't really even believe in authority.

My family and I are directly affected by my sister's Autism.

Christy has a somewhat severe degree of autism that makes it hard to take her places, but it has brought our family together...or those that care to be involved.

School is a mayjor problem because of funding and the lack of knowlege that some ppl. have. The boards generally create programs for the children according to the "average" instead of the children's needs. The truth is, all of the children have different needs that need to be taken care of as induviduals, not as a group.

So my advice is to not look as the chrildren as a "group", but as individuals. Some will be better of in a center-base program, and others have the great possibility of mainstream, but you must remember that they are all different just like you and me!

I don't know if this really qualifies for what you're asking but I'll respond just the same.

I have had ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) for all of my life though it was only diagnosed when I was around eight or nine. Back then, it was still fairly unknown and you had to research for yourself to diagnose the disorder. My mother discovered (after long, intense research from books and the Internet) that this is the same disorder she had and in turn took me to a psychologist partly to find out. As it turns out, I did.

Common symptoms: difficulty getting organized, chronic procrastination or trouble getting started, many projects going simultaneiously but trouble with follow-through, tendency to say what comes to mind without considering the timing or appropiateness of the remark, a restless search for high stimulation, a tendency to be easily bored, easy distractibility, trouble focusing attention, tendency to tune out or drift away in the middle of a page or a conversation, the ability to hyperfocus, often creative, intuitive, and highly intelligent, impatient (traits rather than symptoms), low tolerance for frustration, impulsive, tendency to worry needlessly, endlessly, sense of impending doom, insecurity alternating with high-risk taking, mood swings, depression (especially when disengaged from a person or a project), restlessness, tendency toward addictive behavior, chronic problems with self esteem, inaccurate self observation, and family history of ADD or manic-depressive illness or depression or substance abuse or other disorders of impulse control or mood

These are twenty symptoms, excluding the traits. Now I know many are going to say, "But everyone experiences at least one of these symptoms at one point at time." Yes, but not everyone experiences almost all of them simutaneously. I experience fifteen of the twenty, though I expect when I was younger (before I got a better control of it) I experienced all of them. But at the current moment I don't have problems with self-esteem or with being organized---in fact I am almost obsessive with organization. ADD is in fact associated with OCD and many ADD people exhibit traits of those with OCD (such as myself).

Now, before I go on, I would like to clarify something. Since a few years ago, when ADD and ADHD (I'll explain why I still separate the two in a moment) became popularized, many have written documents saying they do not believe the disorder exists because too many kids are mis-diagnosed. But this is not true. Yes, many kids are mis-diagnosed and their parents use the disorder they actually do not have as an excuse. But there is a clear difference between a kid with ADD/ADHD and a kid without. So, it does exist. But it is also not as prevalent as the statistics show.

That being said, I'll first say why I still separate ADD and ADHD. Most experts today just refer to it as ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder). I separate the two because I have never been hyperactive. That's basically the main difference in a kid with ADD and ADHD. The one with ADHD is much more hyperactive and therefore has more symptoms than the kid with ADD and his symptoms are more exaggerated.

I am 4th in my class of 364. So, obviously this disorder does not always affect school work. The only thing is that I guess we just have to work harder. I have to concentrate hard and I don't do well with just listening to instructions---I need something to see. Even at home, if my mom wants to read something to me, I don't get it the first time. I have to read it myself. And I'm a space-cadet ADD kid (some are hyper, some are spacy). I'll space out for 20 minutes or more at a time and by the time I come back to Earth, I've already missed half the lesson. Through process and elimination and studying up on ADD, I've learned how to control and manage this so that I still do well in school. But I still slip every once and awhile. I completely messed up two or three assignments in one class because I had to listen to instructions without writing anything down to do them. When I was younger, I also couldn't keep my mouth shut. I admit, I was a disruption in class. But my disorder has actually improved my knowledge. I thirst more for it and want it more. I used to read books for pleasure behind my math textbook in elementary school because I already knew how to do everything my teacher was teaching. Now, this is just me. There are some kids (particularly the ones who need medication to keep them going through the day) who do average or below-average in school because of ADD or ADHD. It's worse with those with ADHD because they cannot sit still (at least while unmedicated). It really depends on the person. For some, ADD actually helps them become smarter. For others, ADHD hinders this process.

I'm fine in social situations. In fact, ADD actually helps in social situations. We love to talk. And talk. And talk. We often have a good sense of humor and can come-back with one-liners in an instant. We're enthusiastic, especially about things we love. Usually, we're pretty flexible and work well in the face of problems. And the best thing I like in social situations is when I can listen to, process, and respond to three or four different people at once who are all talking about something different. That is a gift given to me by ADD. Some ADD kids, and especially ADHD kids, don't do as well because we have a tendency to want to interrupt and, while most can ignore it and wait their turn, we don't have that notion and just jump the gun. Interrupting is one of my pet peeves so I've taught myself to wait to talk but I still kinda have a mental struggle and sometimes I slip up. But since everyone slips up, it makes me feel more normal than to be the kid who always interrupts others. And sometimes that talking thing bores people or gets on their nerves. We also always want to be right and always want others to use our ideas. This kind of makes group work a little difficult. But since I haven't had many social problems, I can't really tell you much in this area.

I just wish school teachers would be able to realize and recognize when they have an ADD or ADHD student. I'll give what I have previously mentioned as an example. I did poorly on a handful of assignments simply because I had to listen to them and couldn't really write anything down. I wish she would've realized that not everyone (and especially not kids with ADD) can listen and process. Many need to read to process. I also wish that, instead of glaring at them, teachers would snap kids out of it when they can tell they're just staring into space. I mean, no big scene but, while they're walking around and teaching, I wish they would just snap their fingers in front of my face if they can tell I'm in another world. That's the only two problems I've faced at school because of my disorder so those are the only two things I would really like to change.

Like I said, I learn things best when it is fast-paced (one of the reasons why I'm in all honors and AP courses) and I have something to read or look at instead of just someone to listen to. I have a feeling I'm going to have to record my professors in college on tape in order to get anything out of their lectures.

Well, that's about it. I hope this was relevant. If not, I apologize for the long post.

I tend to join groups and other classes out of school of a specific interest to meet my social needs. I get a lot of security in myself knowing I've something to talk about in these groups, because at school I've never met anyone with my interests.

I do come online often, have a few friends online, but know that for my sanity I should also keep my other friends. So I've both.

The first paragraph being said, most people at the groups I join in are adults. I don't get along quite well with teens (as maybe immaturity makes them lack understanding), so a lot of my friends are in their 20's or more. My boyfriend is 22, for example.

Thanks, CelticNewAger, I really didn't know anything about Asperger's. We've been studying hormonal imbalances linked with depression, mania, etc, as well as learning disabilities (of which you obviously don't have problems with!). I wonder about doctors "overdiagnosing" kids and teenagers a lot, esp. with the booming drug industry.

For students with disabilities... especially social ones: how do social needs get met if not in school? Do you feel like you can make positive change--for you, your life, your community, etc--anywhere? Do you satisfy them online--like here at YouthNoise-- or do you have groups outside school? Do any of these groups help you feel more connected as opposed to how you feel in school/other social settings?

As a kid I spent quite a hell of a long time being told I had something "wrong". I was a good student at school but had odd behaviours, tendencies, sensitivities (my senses being overly stronger than other's), and obsessive interests. It was not till a few years ago that I was informed I had a mild (mild, I don't know what it would be like to have a severe form of Asperger's) form of Asperger's Syndrome.

My only problem with it is that I have a really hard time in social situations, and hate working for group projects (I am referring in school). Also, I have noticed as I became older that my views socially are extremely different, and of course that was blamed on Asperger's. In the other cases, I frankly don't understand why it's even called a "syndrome". I'm much more talented in some things (languages, literature, art, etc) than others normally would be. I've always been in the Honor Roll at school. I don't have to take medication or anything and don't need any form of therapy.

Some people think Asperger's is autism. Well, that's wrong. Whilst autism and Asperger's do share some common symptoms and some people think they are sort of "rooted" from the same place, I can tell you that if I was indeed autistic, I would not be typing this.

I don't know why Asperger's Syndrome was even "created" by doctors. If you get to know kids with Asperger's, you'll find that they are all extremely intelligent, but just eccentric. I don't think there is a problem with us, we're just different. It's not that we've a mental disease in which we compulsively want to murder people or anything, we're just a tad weird.

At home, everything is doing very well. No problems at all.

In school, well, we don't function very well in social situations. I have been in private schools, homeschooled, in a Warldorf School, and even abroad, and have found out that I function better in schools where I don't have 27 other students in the same classroom. In all schools, I have been in the Honor Roll and such, but I gain more out of my education when there are less students in each classroom.

I have had problems with teachers though. Not because of bad grades or interruptive behaviour, but because (unfortunately) most teachers today just expect a child to sit there, take notes, do tests, not question the education system, and go back home. I can't do that. I stand up, debate, argue about the inefficent education and learning system, and instead of listening to a teacher talk on and on about a subject, I gaze out the window and fantasize about any subject. I do not know if it is because I have a high IQ level or because of the Asperger's, but I learn extremely quickly at school and become bored easily and can even skip school for a few days but still keep my Honor Roll grades. Even with AP classes (as they are called in the US) and college courses, I still don't feel a challenge. I feel like everything I am taught I already know.

In non-school social situations, I'm still a pitiful wreck. I cannot, not in an eternity, look at someone in the eye. I just CAN'T. Don't ask me why, as I have no idea, but I all I know is that I can't. I also have a hard time reading body language in others, and people do not understand mine either. I'm also very very very quiet in person, unless I am doing a speech or debating of some sort; other than that I just sit down and observe and think.

One thing I do consider a problem for me (that is not related to Asperger's) is that I'm nearly completely deaf. It was bothersome to me as a child, but I have learned to listen more than others.