Translator: Chelsea Esterline Reviewer: Mile Živković
Close your eyes and picture the typical high school classroom.
What do you see?
Probably something like this:
with diverse students, educational posters on the wall,
desks in rows or pods, and books or computers lining the walls.
Now, humor me and picture a special education classroom.
Can you?
Do you have any sense of how your peers with a learning disability are taught,
what their academic lives are like?
Well, CI, or Cognitively Impaired classrooms at Skyline look like this:
with educational posters
and a kitchen setup for teaching students life skills.
Also, these classrooms have books, computers, and reminders of the schedule.
Remind you of anything familiar?
So why was it so hard for you to picture this classroom?
Possibly because it's labeled "special ed."
At Skyline, we have a program called Peer Connections.
This program integrates fully abled students
into classes where the majority is composed
of special needs or partially abled students.
These academically diverse classes exist to cater to the learning styles
and specific strengths of students who struggle in everyday classes
by placing mentors, such as myself, into CI - Cognitively Impaired,
DHH - Deaf and Hard of Hearing, or recovery classes.
Sorry.
These classes exist, not only for the good of the students,
but for the good of the mentors.
Now let me explain.
Tracking is when a specific group of students is together
throughout multiple classes in the entire day.
This is destructive, not only because it limits the students' ability
to branch out and make friends,
but because it also limits the ability to learn from diverse teaching styles.
So, let me tell you more about Peer Connections.
The Peer Connections team at Skyline
is derived from numerous department heads,
gen ed, special ed, and counselors who work together to identify KNOTS.
KNOTS are Kids Needing Opportunities To Socialize.
They are identified by the staff to become mentees in the Peer Connections program.
These mentees not only come from the self-contained classroom,
but from recovery and gen ed classes as well.
As a peer mentor, I was able to serve as a classmate
to Julia, a special needs student, for the entire trimester.
While I am unaware of her specific diagnosis,
I am aware of the hardships she faced
during our third hour reading recovery class.
The atmosphere in the classroom was chaotic,
with some students refusing to stay seated
and quite literally bouncing off the walls.
Julia and I were equally overwhelmed.
With staff nearly equalling the number of students,
you'd think this would be the calmest class in school, but no.
Julia struggled to even copy items off the board due to her impairment
and the constant clamor emanating from behind our third row desks.
Julia, a very bright and charismatic freshman,
who is significantly challenged at turning her thoughts into words
and computing written words, found herself unable to think
due to the constant conversations exploding throughout the classroom.
Now I know what you're thinking, "Where was the teacher?"
But don't get me wrong, Ms. J, the teacher of this class,
is the most level-headed lady
and best suited teacher to wrangle this group of kids,
who I've ever had the pleasure of learning under.
But even she was no match for this melting pot of mayhem.
I truly believe that this is because of the vast range
of ability and disability of the students who populated her class.
Had Ms. J been teaching only those on the autism spectrum,
or just those with debilitating ADHD,
or even a class solely devoted to those with a cognitive impairment,
her teaching style and coursework plan would have been much easier to execute.
But, since she was presented with the challenge of teaching
to all these ranges of abilities and more,
it's no wonder that her classroom was, at times, uncontrolled.
Now don't get me wrong,
I'm the largest advocate for diversity that you'll ever meet,
but when I say I'm an advocate for diversity,
that does not mean that I support diversity when it's destructive
to the learning potential for a student or group of students.
The students in the Peer Connections program and Special Education Services
deserve equal education to those in the gen ed population,
and having a system of shoving all types of learners and abilities together
is subpar compared to the education received by fully abled students.
Think of AP or AC classes.
Said simply, it's distracting
to have so many types of learners and abilities together,
especially when those students are tracked together throughout the entire day.
To create an environment more inclusive to those with special needs,
I hope to one day see classes based and taught by learning style,
as opposed to segregation based on ability or disability.
Tactile learners of varying academic caliber
could be in classes where lectures were infrequent, but projects, labs,
and hands-on learning experiences were commonplace.
Visual learners could be in classes taught by slides hows and presentations,
expected to demonstrate their knowledge by labs and projects.
Think of the possibilities.
This would eliminate the tracking of students
because each subject is comprehended differently.
This would also solve the problems of Ms. J's class
because she could cater and adapt her coursework
to fit a specific type of student.
As eloquently put by Ms. Misty, the deaf and hard of hearing teacher
here at Skyline,
"You don't have to ignore a strength to develop a weakness."
Thank you.