Tuesday, August 5, 2014

My Piece of Advice - for Parents and Carers

Beware the assessments of High School - this seems to be an area where even sensible and caring teachers lose perspective. If your child has an intellectual disability - then ALL tasks should be adjusted in some way. A simple clear task may need extra time to complete or greater adult supervision/assistance to help the student. A breakdown of what the student needs to do should be provided - a scaffold. As the curriculum gets more complex (stage 5-6) then alternate tasks may well be needed. INSIST on them!! Please! Too often a student has to 'make do' with a task that doesn't test what they know, that doesn't provide the student with a valuable learning process. Instead it seems as if sometimes our kids are dragged through tasks by parents and learning asssitants who feel trapped by the system and the task rigidity.

BEWARE these tasks. Refuse to accept reports based on non adjusted tasks.

Adjusted tasks require teachers to have a clear idea of what is the essential skill/information that students need to know/demonstrate and a good working knowledge of what their special needs students can/can't do. Surely that is not an unreasonable demand. It's inclusive education.

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