Showing posts with label guidance. Show all posts
Showing posts with label guidance. Show all posts

Taare Zameen Par...
Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Most of us here must have seen Taare Zameen Par, a story of a dyslexic child and an art teacher. If the art teacher role played by Aamir Khan, would have not realised the problem of dyslexia in his student, the child would have never done something special and hence, accepted by the society. The teacher has recognised the child so well and soon not because, he was teacher, but because he himself claims that he was dyslexic too. That’s all about a movie which always has to have a happy ending and that’s why called as a beginning. But like this special need child, there are thousands of children who are having some or other (personal/family) issues that continuously bother them. However, we can understand the problem better if we have been anytime in our life, have came across with it.

The regular school teachers should know or understand a little about the early sign or so called ‘Red Flag Sign’ of conditions like Autism, Dyslexia and other learning disabilities and Mental Retardation especially the borderline cases or mild to moderate cases. It is not to blame teachers, but I think it is the system that has always trained them for the regular students only.

In our country given the paucity of trained resources in the rehabilitation field, it is impractical to think replicating developed world model of health care. So, we need to develop resources locally, which can be available by training and developing skills to enhance care level. Empowering teachers, educate them with the basic child development and psychology can help in identifying the problem areas earliest. Any ignorance or lack of knowledge can aggravate the problem. In India, majority of population is educated from the school run by Govt where in total they just get the basic education. Since, funds and resources are limited there are a few schools that can afford a child psychologist or a counselor.

Conditions like ASD (Autism spectrum Disorder), learning Disability, ADHD (Attention Deficit hyperactivity Disorder), mild/ moderate Mental Retardation; Family issues etc generally don’t attract attention early as the child grows physically normally. However, to handle the special need children the school may need the special staff if the child gets into inclusive education. Besides, family the teachers are the care takers and are considered to be the builder of a person. So, if the teachers are aware and educated about the above problems, they can help them by referring earliest. Hence, the child can get the benefits of Early Intervention. However most of teachers might feel uncomfortable to handle special needs children as they require more attention and effort.

Teachers can play an important role because:

Ø The parents think always optimistically and not ready to accept the problem or can easily be misguided by the surroundings. So, teachers should always be alert to notice the signs and then refer to further assessment and evaluation.

Ø Now days most parents are working so, they have little time to spare with their children. Maximum time of the children goes in their Pre schools with primary teachers. So, teachers need to be more prompt to realise the problems.

Ø Since, every parent wants their child to get proper education so they send them to the best schools as per their affordability. So, if teachers are aware that something is different with the child, they can inform parents and ask them to take professionals help.

The child development is flexible and its potential may vary with the environment. Every child is different and hence, special. The distribution curve shows that most children resemble with the average in many traits, but there are few children who deviate from the generally accepted norms in any one of many ways. These deviations may give rise to multifactorial problems of adjustment at home, school and social setting and thus, leads to addition of problems in deviation. Deviation can be in terms of physical, social, emotional and mental characteristics.

According to PWD ACT 1995, the differently abled children are to be integrated in regular school. Integration in regular school promotes personal, emotional and physical adjustment to establish healthy interpersonal relationship.

As very well said for teachers, "I touch the future. I teach." (Christa McAuliffe)

Teachers are one who polishes the child to diamond; otherwise no body can recognise the capacity of child. If the teachers are cooperative and encouraging, the slow learners and mild to moderate MR can learn in control and stimulated environment. However, the teachers have to bear the extra load of arranging the different curriculum and have to be creative. For these special need children, the teacher has to play a role of designer, instructor, motivator and trainer.


Posted byNeeti at 10:52 PM 4 comments  

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Learn to write...
Thursday, February 4, 2010


It has been seen that most of the children with developmental disability have some or other fine motor difficulties. The reason could be one or many of poor coordination between 2 brain hemispheres, poor eye hand coordination, poor muscle tone, poor dexterity skills and proximal stability. These children have poor grasp, hold and transfer activities in their early developmental period but later, his or her functional activities are effected which indirectly affects the academic progress. Poor hand functions leads to poor writing and copying skills which could be so severe, that some children withdraw themselves academically and socially.

Coordinated hand functions are important for ADL’s (activities of daily living). But sometime, especially in younger children, the importance of hand functions are missed which could be very difficult for care takers and children. Majority of caretakers have concerns of poor hand writing.

To improve the functions of hand, the child has to thoroughly assessed not only in hand functions like grip, hold and transfer but also to bilateral hand movements, tactile and Proprioceptive sensitivity, Visio-spatial ability, hand dominance, eye hand coordination, proximal and distal joints and their muscle functions and various functions of brain (laterality, focusing and centering).

The child can be prepared for hand writing by strengthening the muscles around distal and proximal joints, coordination exercises for brain and definitely lot of encouragement. Apart from exercises, the child should be taught to write on the sand, black board or on the wall for better understanding of strokes and movements or forming the letters. Later, he can be trained to write smaller on grids or on dots for spatial alignment. This should be done in graded fashion so that the child does adjust well. The child learns faster when writing is combined with auditory input like “up to down” is “one” and so on. Some times, the child has to assist with physical support or modifications like grippers or weights.

Physical activities concentrating on proximal stability and brain gym activities would be beneficial with other coordinated and strengthening exercises.
Both the parents and regular teachers should also understand the difficulties faced by the children. They should not burden the child with lots of activities and writing stuff so that the child gets frustrated and gives up. The teaching should be patient, playful and easy and graded for the child.

Posted byNeeti at 11:31 PM 0 comments  

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