Hello Jay,
It has been my experience that the greatest challenge to working with students that have a learning disability is their confidence. When an instructor can break through and give them the confidence that is needed (through trust and understanding) the students possibilities are endless.
My greatest challenging is finding a way to be most effective with my teaching to help them learn the material. Due to all the different type of learning disabilities AND student poor self esteem due to learning disabilities the challenges seem to multiply. I sincerely reach out to the students, give my extra time , give them extra time and communicate with these students to find out what is working and what is not. Refining the technique of what is working is what I strive for.
Hi Keith! It's good to see use of these different methods. When you have a moment, could you give us a little more information on your use of the MP3 player as a resource?
Thanks!
Jay Hollowell
ED106 Facilitator
To me the greatest challenge is to get my students through the tests. We use many different teaching tools like the MP3 player to test,and longer testing times with oral testing also. Most of the disabilities are in the cognative domaine, so usually they do real well in the labratory setting with hands on.
Hi Barbara! These are excellent approaches and very personalized. I hope that all of our course participants review them.
The "old" instructional advice in the field of education was to "teach to the middle." This was, in fact, dangerous because it did not take into account the many student learning styles and levels of comprehension. We as instructors, to your point, need to get to know our students professionally - their modes of learning, challenges, motivation.
Thanks for you input,
Jay Hollowell
ED106 Facilitator
It is hard to stop the class and have the patience to slow everyone down to help the one person who is constantly having problems with learning the material. First, I try to stay in email contact so that if there is a problem that person will know I will try to help as soon as possible. Second, I try to help the person a little more before class and during breaks in a way that is not embarrassing to them. I ask the person that is having a lot of problems a lot of questions during the first few classes and that really helps me get an idea of what support the student may need from me. By general conversation I usually find out if they have had learning problems in the past or some type of medical problem. During the time period of asking class questions, I find out how motivated each student is and how much I’ll have to light the fire of learning for them.
