Most educators will teach children with varying disabilities during their career.
Data obtained from the ABS 2015 Survey of Disability, Ageing and Carers (SDAC) estimates that around 7.4% (or 329,000) of Australian children aged 0-14 had some level of disability and 4.0% had a severe or profound level of disability. The proportion was higher among boys than girls (9.4% compared with 5.4%).
The most common disability type is intellectual, with an estimated 190,000 children (4.3%) affected, followed by sensory/speech impacting 140,000 children (3.2%).
Associate Professor Kathleen Tait from the Macquarie School of Education has dedicated her life to researching educational ways to enhance the quality of life of children with diverse abilities. We chat to Kathleen about techniques teachers should consider when educating children with intellectual disabilities.
1. What is the nature of intellectual disability?
Over the past two decades, new approaches have broadened the concept of disability to place increased emphasis on functional and environmental considerations and less emphasis an individual deficiency. These new approaches avoid sole reliance on IQ scores to define intellectual disability and rate its severity.
The key criteria for defining intellectual disability are: (1) significant impairment in intellectual functioning; (2) difficulties in adaptive behaviour; and (3) manifestation in the developmental period.
2. What should teachers be aware of when they are planning to teach a child with an intellectual disability?
Recent perspectives on the level of intellectual disability consider the level of support needed by an individual to participate in everyday life as a better measure of disability. This approach focuses on a student’s functioning within a particular environment and encourages teachers to think about changes that can be made in the environment to help a person be as independent as possible. One of the key considerations in working with students with moderate to severe intellectual disability is: ‘What should be taught?’ For children with intellectual disability, whose rate of learning and generalisation may be significantly slower than that of other learners, every instructional opportunity counts. The overall goal of education for learners with more severe intellectual disability is the development of functional skills that can be used in the immediate and future school, home and community environment.
Individualised planning and instruction means that curriculum and teaching are tailored to the student’s strengths, needs and individual characteristics. Individualised planning must not be confused with individual or one-to-one instruction. Individualised instruction is adapted to the student’s stage of learning for a given skill, and for their preferences, priorities and chronological age.
3. How can teachers work out what should be taught to children with an intellectual disability?
Developing an individual education program (IEP) or individual learning plan (ILP) is an effective way of providing meaningful individualised education with positive outcomes for students with intellectual disability. There is no one right way to write an IEP. The IEP is a significant education document, developed with the child, the family and other relevant stakeholders, which outlines the total educational plan for a certain period of time (for example, per term, semester or year). The IEP generally contains a number of priority programs. This document is meant to be a clear and transparent collection of information that specifically outlines what and how to teach a specific skill to a specific child at a specific time in that child’s life.
4. What information is in an IEP and how would a teacher go about preparing an IEP?
The details required in an IEP will be determined by their usefulness to whoever is implementing the program. An Individual education program (IEP) is a written statement outlining the educational program and goals of a learner with a disability that is developed and implemented according to the child’s individual needs. It is developed at an IEP meeting which should include all relevant stakeholders.
An IEP team meeting is a formal meeting between the teacher, the parent(s) or caregiver(s), and any other significant stakeholder involved in the education of the student (e.g., therapists, special education teachers and specialist teachers – physical education, music, etc.). At IEP meetings, goals are established, reviewed and modified for a particular student. It is from these goals that priority programs are developed, implemented and evaluated. The outcome of an IEP meeting is the development of an individualised program (an IEP or ILP) that has been tailored to meet a particular student’s needs at a particular point in time.
5. What do teachers need to be aware of when writing educational goals for children with intellectual disabilities?
Educational goals for any student need to be ongoing, strategic and purposeful. When designing programs for students with an intellectual disability, teachers should consider these questions about the skills, content and activities:
* Is it functional? Ponder the notion that unless the student can learn to do a particular task independently, someone else will have to complete that task for that child.
* Is it age appropriate? Programs should be similar to those undertaken by students of the same age. For example, instruction in recreational pursuits such as sports, hobbies or music-related activities would be more age appropriate for a 13-year-old boy than teaching him to play with toy cars and building blocks.
* How will the student participate? Providing that a task is functional and appropriate, opportunities should be considered to encourage the student to participate fully, partially or with support.
* Does it encourage decision-making? Programs should help the learner to understand choices and to decrease passivity or learned helplessness.
* Does it create opportunities for communication? If students are given opportunities to communicate, then their attempts to communicate are more likely to increase.
* Will it be useful in future vocational environments? Consider if the learner will eventually need this skill in the world after compulsory schooling.
* Will it be useful in leisure and recreational skills? Consider if the learner is ever likely to use this skill in the community.
6. Are there any teaching techniques that are particularly effective?
Students with intellectual disability who are learning academic skills are likely to benefit from direct, explicit, teacher-centred instruction to teach both basic academic skills and the use of cognitive and meta-cognitive strategies. Many students with mild to moderate intellectual disability can learn to read and master essential skills in literacy and numeracy, as well as curriculum content in other areas. They are also likely to need explicit teaching for strategies to support learning (such as strategies to use memory effectively), for reading comprehension and for problem solving.
7. What are some things about children with intellectual disabilities that perhaps teachers may not be aware of?
One of the most important aspects of a classroom environment for all children is the appeal that it can provide to young children. For example, children come to preschool classrooms from widely diverse backgrounds and home situations. Some children have homes that are plentiful, with stimulating toys, books and other items for them to manipulate. These children have opportunities to experience a great deal and learn from these materials in their homes. Other children may come from home environments that do not offer a great deal of stimulation in the form of items for them to manipulate. These children may have to find or make items to use for play.
In some cases, young children with intellectual impairment may feel overwhelmed by the vast range of activities on offer at their early learning centre and as a result they may find they are unable to make a choice. In such cases, their educational program is likely to require the setting up of opportunities for the student to select and then engage in learning activities via individualised, small group or class-wide peer instruction. If they are unable to self-select an activity, such children will need to be taught to use a method for choosing and planning their play activity schedule. Best practice is to limit the child to a choice of two activities that the child is known to like and to teach the child a precise choice-making procedure.
8. What else would you like teachers to consider?
Ultimately, it is the class teacher’s responsibility to design, implement and monitor an educational program for every child in their class and that includes children with an intellectual disability. There are usually supports available to assist teachers with this task. Many schools have a learning support team (LST), or a similar group, which is a group of school- or district-based professionals (for example, class teacher, specialist teachers, therapists and school counsellor) who assist classroom teachers to address the special educational needs of students. It is important to note that the child’s parents or carers also have a vital role to play in the work of the LST by assisting with the planning of their child’s needs.
If there is no LST available, then in order to ensure that a child’s educational program is being conducted consistently in a range of environments (home, school and community), teachers would do well to form a group of supportive allied health professionals and parents/carers as a collaborative team. In order to maintain a consistent approach to teaching a child with an intellectual disability, it is essential that everyone is using the same evidence-based teaching strategies, focusing on the same target goals and requesting communication responses from the child in the same manner. Frequent meetings and open communication will ensure a successful learning experience for children with intellectual disabilities.
University programs have the luxury to do things somewhat differently than is possible in the school or clinical practice setting. For many reasons, this is important because it allows for the establishment of foundational skills in a safe and non-threatening environment. The Macquarie School of Education post graduate courses and professional experience on offer at the on campus MUSEC School help tertiary students anticipate these challenges and to successfully cope with them in their workplace.
For more information about Macquarie University’s post graduate courses, chat to Service Connect.