Blog 4: Considerations for Effectively Teaching Students with Learning Disabilities

            The Fat City video and Chapter 5 in our textbook address the topic of learning disabilities and how to effectively tailor instruction for students who have learning disabilities.  After viewing the video and reading the chapter, I have gained a better understanding of the struggles that students with learning disabilities face and how to create a positive learning experience for such students.  I intend to establish a welcoming and flexible classroom environment which incorporates many strategies from the FAT City video and the textbook to help students with learning disabilities achieve the learning goals.

             In order to create a learning climate which welcomes and accepts all types of learning styles, I plan to reduce the levels of frustration, anxiety, and tension in the classroom.  The FAT City video explains that teachers who fail to establish a classroom environment in which all students feel at ease and relaxed deprive the students from experiencing an advantageous schooling experience.  To help all students enjoy school and have a thirst for learning, teachers need to provide students with ample time to respond to questions and to complete assignments.  Additionally, teachers should ask students questions which they are able to answer and recognize correct responses.  This question asking and reinforcement technique will help the students become confident learners by raising their hands and taking risks in the classroom. 

            Additionally, the video and the text recommend that teachers incorporate UDL principles and direct instruction style into their lessons.  Crafting lessons which present the same material in multiple means, provide students with choices to demonstrate their learning, and engage them helps all students, with and without learning disabilities, master the learning goals.  Receiving the same information through videos, PowerPoints, demonstrations, and the like helps students process and comprehend the material.  Moreover, teachers should break the lesson into small steps to effectively help students with learning disabilities master the material.  This is known as direct/explicit instruction.  Students with learning disabilities benefit from explicit instruction because they are not overwhelmed with foreign material.  Instead, the material is presented to them in small steps and the teacher does not proceed to the next step until all students demonstrate an understanding of the previous step. 

            In my placement, which is a first grade Tier II reading support class, the teacher includes the mentioned strategies in her instruction.  The most important strategy that my cooperating teacher practices is modeling.  The teacher verbally models thinking processes to students.  For instance, to teach students how to think of the author’s purpose for writing a story, it is beneficial to verbally model to the class.  Talk to the students during a picture walk of the story.  Say, “On this page, I see a cat and a rat talking.  I think the author wrote this story to explain why a cat and a rat are friends.”  This explicit style of instruction shows students the steps involved in examining and evaluating a story to come up with an idea for understanding the author’s purpose. 

            Overall, the FAT City video, chapter 5 from our textbook, and observations from my placement all provide me with excellent ways to tailor instruction for students with learning disabilities.  I believe teachers need to establish a classroom in which all students feel comfortable and believe that they are part of a learning community.  Most importantly, teachers need to be fair.  The FAT City video defined the concept of fairness as providing students with what they need to succeed.  Fairness does not mean giving everyone the same thing because everyone learns differently.  As a future teacher, I will most definitely apply this concept of fairness in my practice.