WHAT’S A PARENT TO DO?
Parents need guidance on how to help their disabled learner at home. You don’t get courses on parenting, and you don’t get special courses for parenting those that learn in unique ways. Here are some tips for parents helping their learning-different children at home:
BEFORE YOU START:
1) Get “Unfinished Business” out of the way.
2) Make a Plan.
- Written plan or picture for visual learners
- Oral agreement for auditory learners
- Have an agreed-upon endpoint.
- Feel guilt-free about bribes
- Have a Preferred Activity as “intermission” between activities requiring high sustained attention
- Vary input, pace of activities
3) Clear the Area
- Not a grey isolation chamber with grey walls
- Only one task on table at a time
- No background conversation
- Soft, non-repetitive music (not pulsating) may help: classical, New Age
- Change of seat or environment with each activity is o.k.
- Be accessible, not hovering
BEGIN!
1) Encourage student to rehearse, preview, walk through assignment.
2) Allow (even encourage) child to “talk through” his/her
assignment. This develops strategic thinking and reflective
behavior.
IF HE/SHE NEEDS YOUR HELP:
1) Tell him as you show, write as he says it, say as he points to it. This “crosses the midline” to the other side of the brain.
2) Direct their eye contact by saying, “Watch my mouth.” As soon as they do, begin speaking.
3) Use proxemics (positioning of your body, hands, and mouth) to direct attention nonverbally.
4) Talk task; Leave ego out of it. Say “This three (point) needs to be a four “, not “You forgot to carry the one so you got the wrong answer “.
5) Avoid the pronoun “you”–make observations of the symptoms of attention.
6) Praise reflective thinking whenever you see it. Say, “You’re keeping your finger on the next problem. That’s a good strategy.” Catch them doing something right. Use their name when you tell them.
7) Personalize for high impact! Use their name in math word problems. Connect their interests to the concept being taught. If they’re interested in bike racing and the lesson is ratios, talk about gear teeth!
8) Try to connect the task with life. Show relatedness, cause- effect.
9) If you know he can follow a one-direction command, give a command with two directions (“Divide the next number, then subtract.”). If he can do two, try for three.
10) Be playful. Keep it upbeat. Sometimes I use 2 different voices when comparing two things, or “sound effects” when editing punctuation.
11) Ask if they’d like to finish alone an assignment they’ve begun with you. Invite risk-taking, but stay available.
12) To build a higher success set (90% a good rule), provide forced choices: “Will the answer be higher or lower? Lower, you’re right, Henry. Is the answer three or four? Right, four. Do I put it in the ones’ place (point) or the tens’ place (point)? Right; the four goes in the ones’ place.”
13) Use cueing words: “Look. This word is–say it-received. To yourself: received.”
14) Use incomplete sentences to get the ______ (learner) processing as you _______ (say it). Repeat the correct ______(word or words) after they have ______ (said it/them).
15) Know what to overlook! Is the fact that he is standing really reducing his attention?
16) Preserve their self-image, but definitely tell them when their answer is wrong. “No” is not as devastating as you’d think. Say: “No, Spain’s main seaport is Barcelona.” Don’t get wordy.
17) When you’re being firm, don’t smile! When you’re amused, laugh! Reading nonverbals is hard for many disabled learners.
18) Occasionally make a positive observation about any symptom of reflective behavior or attending that you see. Don’t overdo this! Say: “I noticed you repeated the question, and then you closed your eyes. I bet that helped you focus on the question and kept distractions out.”
19) Once a night, preferably near the end of the lesson, ask, “How’d you get that right?” This is a powerful question that gets kids metacognitive; they think about their thinking.
IF YOU’RE NOT WORKING DIRECTLY WITH THEM:
1) If your learner likes the idea, play a tape on which are recorded beeps at random intervals (5-75 sec. apart, lasts for 15 minutes). They are to mark a piece of paper “Y” if they were on task each time they heard the beep, “N” If they weren’t. They reward themselves if they tie or beat their “record”.
2) Videotaping a child during five minutes of a tough activity, then re-playing it for them to give a “play-by-play” narration of how they did it, to be particularly insightful for them and for me (I do not save the tapes; in fact I record over the same tape again and again). You and your child would have to decide if you and your child could profit from this.
3) Time management is crucial, especially with evening activities such as scouts, concerts, karate, gymnastics, etc. Allow a 5 to 20-minute “de-briefing time” before beginning homework on these nights.
4) Communicate with the teacher in some pre-arranged way. Most backpacks have an extra pocket, which could be used for back-and-forth notes. This could be via assignment notebook, e-mail, a prearranged weekly 5-minute “drop-in” time, or a weekly note relaying info about current on-task performance, long-range assignments and reading. Follow through.
5) Keep abreast of the technology available. Co: Writer SOLO (www.DonJohnston.com ) is an excellent software program for PC’s which predicts what word the writer wants to say next. Digital tape recorders, or minicassette recorders that play/record using standard-size cassettes (GE, Radio Shack and Panasonic are two good ones), can substitute nicely once the student sees it as a tool and not a toy.
