My Child Learns Differently

Sample Chapter

When special education is done correctly…

it embraces those students who struggle to learn and those who learn differently.  The public education system and many private schools embrace a one size fits all model of education.  Information is presented to the whole class, using multiple modalities, students are expected to attend to instruction and convert information into knowledge.  Most student do this at an average level.   Some excel with this model, but others struggle.  It is this latter group that special education is charged with accommodating and modifying instruction and providing additional services.   

Special education assists these students by discovering how they learn.  After understanding the student’s unique learning style, teachers move away from the “one size fits all” and toward techniques individually tailored to guarantee student success.  Anything short of student success indicates a misunderstanding of the student’s learning style, the failure to implement accommodations, modifications, and interventions correctly (perhaps due to a lack of training), or the use of a “one size fits all” special education approach.  This latter situation is often the case. 

Does a special education student have the right to fail?  No.  Children learn, it is what they do.  Like a magnet pointing north, they are pulled toward curiosity and discovery.  Leave them be and watch, your son or daughter seeks knowledge and understanding.  This discovery may not be academically directed and may have little discernible social value, but they learn.  Remember what happened when s/he learned the question, “Why?”