First day I was placed in the St. John's School for the Deaf Home science class where students learn how to sew and kitchen and nutrition basics. Neither classroom nor teacher and the students were not very busy. There was a teacher who teaches kitchen and nutrition basics to girl students. Basically she writes the words or sentences related with kitchen and nutrition on a blackboard and teach the girls in sign language. There is a man who is a tailor boy students help him for basic things such as hand stiches and seam ripping. They were lacking many basic supplies in the classroom I was expecting that, however, I was also expecting more a classroom environment. During the classroom time other teachers come and go to the classroom and they
What were your reactions? The teacher cares about the emotional well-being of her students. Several students have learning disabilities and she makes accommodations for them. For example, students that are diagnosed with ADHD have preferential seating. Students that have sensory needs are situated in the periphery of the room so that they
Have you ever felt like there was nothing that you can do for your child? In this book, Deaf Like Me, by Thomas S. Spradley and James P. Spradley, I can see the journey that Lynn’s parents took to get her help. (Spradley & Spradley, 1978). This book was an excellent read. I really liked the way that they described the ways they tried to help Lynn to understand the world around her. The book, is a great asset for any family that might be unexpectedly put into a situation that they know nothing about such as a deaf child.
As I carry on my studies in Elementary Education, The field experience assignment has been a learning and growing experience for me. This semester I did five hours in a physical education class and during my experience I learned a lot. As I spoke to the Physical Education teacher Ms. Hines, she informed me that this school year was a tough year for her. From all her classes she had two classes were a couple of kids who had disabilities and the rest of the students were only Spanish speakers. The teacher only spoke English, which caused some difficulties describing her lesson of the day to her students.
It was my pleasure to be able to experience children with these disabilities. A day spent at Westgate was aery active one, I always was able to write plenty of notes from my observation. When the English language students were peer mentored with their 4 grade class, they had to write an autobiographical poem. The fourth grade students had to help their first and second grade ELL students write this poem. When the poem is all written out the students will then type up the poem on word and create a PowerPoint. After the poem was finished they would then present the poem in front of the whole class. This activity was pretty challenging for the fourth grade student because they had more reading and writing skills then the first and second graders. Ms. Lewis; the class teacher had to always redirect the ELL students because they did not understand what to do or what some of the questions said on the organizer. The next day I was in I was able to experience working with three students that had learning disabilities in the classroom. The teacher would separate the children in to groups, the learning disability children were paired up with me and they were given different book pages and problems to work on. Since these children were struggling in math I was able to help them comprehend. I was asked plenty of questions on how to do the problems. Usually Ms. Lewis is paired up with these students but today instead of me just observing them she wanted me to be hands on with the students and be able to interact with them. The next day I went I observe the boy with ADHD. It was very interesting to observe him. I was able to see him use assistive technologies to be able to focus. He also was seated on the outside of the desk range right by the teacher’s desk. I believe he was by the teacher’s desk and on the outside so he was
I was assigned a student that is deaf and has a learning disability, Kerri. Kerri struggles with understanding what she needs to learn in class and has to have all of what is said typed out in notes for her to go through later on at home. While helping her, at first she was extremely resistant to having me as her aid, after the first week she was excited to see me which was something enjoyable for myself. I spend an hour each day in class with her and an hour out of class with Kerri. During our time outside of class I was asked to try to connect on “at home issues” with her since she struggles to care about her
There were 45 children in my class. At that point of my life, I had a stutter, a lazy eye, and buck teeth with an overbite. The school provided me with an adult to help me with learning how to communicate, interact with other, learn to read aloud, and teach me some techniques to help me control my stutter. I had trouble with reading comprehension, math, and all the other subjects because my stutter affected the way I learn and process information. Even though I experienced a lot of diversity the teacher that I had did not have enough time to interact with me one-on-one which I needed to strive to my highest potential. My parents and I decided that I needed a smaller class size in order for me to be successful. My parents when searching to find a the perfect school and they found Woodcrest Schools. Woodcrest Schools is a small, private school in Tarzana, CA. The school went from preschool to fifth grade. I started Woodcrest in second grade. There were twenty-one students in my class. Woodcrest Schools provided me with the attention and help I needed. My teacher helped me before school, during school, and after school when I needed help. She always asked me if I did not understand the material. I in second grade also had trouble with math, reading comprehension, and writing. When it came to math, I did not understand the difference between multiplication & addition and division &
When I walked into the school, I was greeted by the receptionist who kindly showed me where to sign in and then directed me to the teacher I would be observing for the day. The staff was dressed very appropriate for the day and on Friday they were able to wear pink because it was October. Although I did not see much interaction with factuality with each other, I was able to witness when the teachers of a certain grade would come to pick up their students. I saw how the teachers interacted with Mrs. Lee and they were very respectful. The student’s behavior varied from class to class. Most of the classes were well behaved with only a few students causing disruption. Mrs. Lee had warned me that the kindergarten class is normally noisier than other classes, but to her surprise the students were very quiet and did their work independently with no interruptions. Mrs. Lee did a wonderful job at keeping the students disciplined within the classroom. She would give positive re-enforcement and correct students when they would do something incorrectly. She worked really well with the students and they students responded in a respectful manner to Mrs.
“Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see” – Mark Twain.
From antiquity, being deaf was looked upon as an undesirable and a culture which was disconnected with the rest of mainstream society. Often members of the community found themselves ostracized by members of other cultures, who viewed them with suspicion, and were thought to be possessed, or in communion, with undesirable “spirits”, particularly during the advent of the Christianity that was in practice during the Middle Ages. During this period, before the advent of Gutenberg’s metal, movable type printing press, the populace was mostly illiterate and religious texts and spiritual obligations/instructions were verbally transmitted to the people by the literate clerics of the day. Thus, the deaf were believed to have no access to “Fides ex auditu,” which was the primary way, and often thought to be the only way; one could reach spiritual fulfillment and salvation. (Lane, 1984)
My achievement of becoming literate in both English and Spanish, after overcoming a myriad of obstacles distinguishes my literacy history. Writing was one of the things I didn’t like to do as a child. I always thought writing was a waste of time and that I wasn’t going to need it in life. Even though I didn’t invest much time writing, I was one of the best writers in all my classes, probably because I was very dedicated in the other subjects and I loved reading adventure books. I learned how to read and write by the age of four, since in my native country “the Dominican Republic”, kids are enrolled in school at the age of three; usually parents start their child’s education at home before that age.
All I could remember on my journey to literacy was my concern over my brother and sister’s ability to read and write including solving math problems. That did not really motivate not to become literate; I was extremely playful as a child. What I am able to remember is my first day of school, I cried like a baby when my mom dropped me off. I soon began to grow out of my baby stage and school became really interesting. Even though it was not as hard as it is now, the value that pushed me to be literate was how my teacher was able to discipline students if they didn’t give the best to their education.
When it comes to the planning and preparation at Carson- Valley the teachers would come to together while the children would watch a movie on Friday because Friday was the children’s movie day. I would see teachers writing lessons plans and cutting out activities for their arts and crafts. I saw teachers printing worksheets that they were going to do. When I was a Carson Valley they gave me a template of a lesson plan but never an actual lesson. I observed two different lessons in the classroom one was with the letter “T” and the another one was the children learning their names. I found the lesson on the letter T interesting because the teacher made the class so involved with the lesson. Instead of the teacher giving the children different
the classroom were not great either. The desks were very old and in need of repair. The
Another area of trouble D/HH students come across while being mainstreamed in education is that teachers are often unaccommodating. Not all teachers are willing to go the extra mile to make their D/HH students feel welcome in the classroom. One reason that this could be is because able bodied people often feel that people with a disability, such as deafness, are seen a lesser human beings, thus that some people do not believe that they should be mainstreamed. Some people believe that by creating a D/HH inclusive classroom, students will not get as good of an education, but “the ‘problem’ is not the person with disabilities; the problem is the way that normalcy is constructed to create the ‘problem’ of the disabled person” (Davis 1). The idea that D/HH students are lesser people because they are not “normal” is absurd. D/HH students can learn just as well as a student that is hearing, the only difference is that negative attitudes that surround disability.
For my observation experience I went to Southern High School in Harwood, MD. Southern High School has a special education department for the students with disabilities. The teacher that I met with for this classroom observation was Ms. West. In the classroom there were at least four assistant teachers that helped Ms. West throughout the school day. The assistant teachers helped Ms. West co- teach the class and were there to help the students if they needed extra help. The school also has a couple of student aides that come in to help the teachers and the students in the classroom. There were at least twelve students in the classroom. The students in the class had many different exceptionalities such as learning disabilities, Down syndrome,