High-incidence disabilities make up the other 80% of students with disabilities. High-incidence disabilities include: learning disabilities, emotional disturbance, and speech or language impairments. Three important characteristics of students with high-incidence disabilities to remember:
1. Students with high-incidence disabilities are often hard to distinguish from students/peers without disabilities.
2. Students often have a combination of behavioral, social, and academic problems.
3. Students with high-incidence disabilities benefit from systematic and highly structured classroom environments.
“The most important reason students with high-incidence disabilities are grouped for discussion is that whatever behaviors they exhibit and whatever the possible causes of these behaviors, these students benefit from the same instructional practices” (Friend & Bursuck, 250). A serious weakness in students with high-incidence disabilities is learned helplessness. Students learn to blame their failures and success on outer forces, not themselves. If they succeed, it’s luck; if they fail, it’s because they can’t do it.
People and children with high-incidence disabilities often have problems communicating their ideas or opinions and facts in general. People with communication disabilities need accommodations to express their feelings (expressive language) and decipher what is being communicated to them (receptive language).
Understanding speech problems:
- Speech articulation is the inability to pronounce sounds correctly (commonly f, v, k, g, r, l, s, z, sh, ch, and j) after the developmentally appropriate age.
- Voice problems: excessive hoarseness, excessive or too little volume, too nasally, lacking inflection.
- Fluency problems: stuttering, slow, uneven or jerky speech.
“For students with speech and language problems, note especially any areas in which students are required to understand oral language (for example, listening to a lecture or a set of verbal directions) or to communicate orally (for example, responding to teacher questions or interacting with classmates when working in cooperative groups)” (Friend & Bursuck, 245).
- Teachers may intervene to help students in the classroom in terms of both academics and socialization. Students will often need help with classroom conduct, interpersonal skills, and personal and psychological adjustment.
o Make students feel accepted with their peers: let them communicate without worrying about their mistakes. Be non-judgmental and minimize peer pressure.
o Wholeheartedly listen to your students, lean in and get engaged!
o Model speech through repetition.
o Allow for meaningful context and educational purposes for discussion.
- In order to address student needs:
o Make a behavior contract.
o Have social skills training.
o Have self-control training.
o Have attribution training for students with learned helplessness.
§ Help your students set reasonable goals, help them attain those goals, and maintain progress.
[Speech problems often lend to social problems.] “Evidence for these problems comes from more than 20 years of research showing that these students have fewer friends, are more likely to be rejected or neglected by their peers, and are frequently rated as socially troubled by their teachers or parents” (Friend & Bursuck, 261).
- misunderstanding spoken context
- difficulty taking turns
- recognizing if someone does not understand what they are saying
- or simply being a considerate conversationalist
Students with learning disabilities achieve less academically than typical students.
- Mild intellectual disabilities
- Emotional disturbances
Students with learning disabilities suffer from:
§ Reading problems:
i. Decoding: identifying words accurately and fluently (dyslexia)
ii. Accuracy: mispronunciation and substituting words.
§ Writing problems:
i. Handwriting
ii. Spelling
iii. Overall process: difficulty of putting words on paper
§ Math problems:
i. Spatial organization
ii. Problems with visual details
iii. Procedural error
iv. Trouble moving from problem to problem.
v. Difficulty forming (writing) numbers
vi. Difficulty remembering
vii. Reasoning
viii. Understanding the language (regroup, place value, addition, minus)
§ Learning skills
i. Attention deficit
ii. Understanding tasks and lack of persistence
iii. Memory problems
iv. Organizaztion
v. ** ACADEMIC SURVIVAL SKILLS
** Academic survival skills are crucial to a student’s success. This refers to attending school, knowing what to bring to class, being prepared & organized with schoolwork, being independent in general. If a student cannot take responsibility for themselves and the tasks at hand, it makes for a difficult situation and the unlikelihood of progress.
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