How to Identify the Children with Special Educational Needs Effectively
23rd January 2021
We all know the fact that each and every child is special in its own way. Sometimes, a young learner may display some special educational needs that are essential to being identified in their early years. If we can identify the problems than we can get some help from different educational services as well as different voluntary organisations. With the help of the special needs education course program, the 21st century special needs educator can effectively help and assist the child in his/her class.
In order to identify the different special needs, we need to understand what exactly are the special educational needs. This may consist of:
- Behavioural or social difficulties, for example difficulty making friends, etc.
- Problems in concentrating or focusing on a thing, for example attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
- Reading and writing difficulties, for example dyslexia.
- The sensory or physical need which disturbs the child in school, for example being blind or deaf.
Please keep in mind, these challenges may vary in their sternness, or in how much they affect the learning development. Though by the law (most of the major countries), nurseries, schools and colleges must provide education to all special needs children or students efficiently. However, independent schools as well as academies, free schools, and private nurseries have their own plans (most of the time) which you can find on their websites.
The earlier special educational needs are being identified, the better your child’s probabilities of reaching his or her full developmental potential.
However, to do that, we must know and understand the causes of these children’s complications.
The different developmental special needs of children may be accompanying by a group of factors. Therefore, 21st century special needs education teachers should also try to gather information from different sources to understand every possible aspect that may affect the children’s behaviour. Teachers should also pay attention to the numerous factors while observing children’s performance.
The special needs education necessitates support that goes beyond the norm. There’s an immense necessity for the special needs education support. These support/s provide the students with targeted backing to allow them to meet age-appropriate instructive goals.
Identifying the Special Educational Needs in Young Learners:
Schools and teachers as well as parents can categorize when pupils are not making expected progress for their age. This may comprise a slower growth than that of the other children of the same age. This also includes the fact a child doesn't match or advance on the child’s earlier rate of development. Here, by the term growth or progress, we meant the progress might include different parts other than academic subjects like reading, writing or maths- for instance in social skills like making and keeping friends, or communicating with others.
Here are some ideas or plans that can be included as your teaching strategies:
- Involvement of parents or maybe a discussion with a caregiver to see if they have observed anything/have any apprehensions.
- Recommendations and commendations from some external agencies i.e. speech & language therapy, cognition & learning team, etc.
- Statutory Assessments results.
- Teacher’s enduring assessment and observation.
- Standardised screening or assessment responsibilities.
Well, the families of young special needs children can play a critical role in the early development of their children. Usually, a comprehensive early intervention program addresses 5 areas of growth:
The early years of childhood represent a crucial window of the overall growth and development of a child. Many times, parents can identify the difficulties of their child in a better way. They can have a discussion with teacher and if the teacher settles down with the information then their discussion can lead to an official assessment of the child. Nowadays, a lot of schools use screening tests to find out children who might have special needs.
We understand the fact that teaching the special needs children is not a cakewalk. Therefore, the special needs education course prepares the futuristic potential 21st century special educators. Not every student displays a particular symptom that will essentially be affected by a particular special need.
Thus, the obligatory learning arrangements can be organised in order to enhance the child’s learning potential.
