Children With Special Needs

CHILDREN WITH
SPECIAL NEEDS
Key Concepts
 Teachers’ roles
may include identifying and
working with children with special needs.
 Specialneeds may include hearing, speech,

language, vision, and health disorders;
physical and cognitive disabilities; social or
emotional impairments; and giftedness.
Objectives
 Describe methods of integrating children with
special needs into a typical program.
 Explain the special needs of children who are

gifted and how these needs can be met.
Guiding Children with
Special Needs
 Individuals with Disabilities Education Act
(IDEA): federal law requiring all states to provide
education for children who have developmental
disabilities
 Inclusion: placing children with special needs in
regular classrooms
 Previously referred to as mainstreaming
Individualized
Education Plans
 The purpose of an Individualized Education Plan (IEP), is
to ensure that each child with a disability receives an
appropriate education
 By law, parents are allowed to take part in designing their

child’s program
 A copy of the plan is given to the parents
 An IEP is usually written for a 12-month period

Individualized
Education Plans
 Specific services that will be provided with a time
line noting the dates services will begin and end
 Evaluation criteria that will be used to decide if
educational objectives are met
Individualized
Education Plans
 Individualized Family Service Plans (IFSP) include
 the family’s needs in regard to enhancing the child’s
development
 goals for the child and resources to achieve them
 services to be provided
 how the child is learning
 a plan for transitioning to other services
Teacher’s Roles
Teachers need to
take part in identifying children
with special needs
work with other specialists and
resource persons to design
individual programs
Teacher’s Roles
 teach children who have special needs and
nondisabled children in the same classroom
 share information with parents and make suggestions
for referrals
 base program decisions on input from several
resources including parents, other professionals, and
personal observations
 encourage parents to participate in their child’s
education
Identification
 Earlyidentification of special needs is key to
promoting the child’s development
 If special needs are not identified early, children may
go through years of failure
 A number of techniques can be used to collect data
 Observe unusual social, cognitive, emotional, or
physical development
Referrals
 Referral: the suggestion of a specific professional
for a child to see
 Hearing, language, or speech problems may be
referred to a speech clinician
 Learning and behavioral problems are often referred
to a school psychologist or local agency
 Depending on the state, Department of Social
Services
Hearing Disorders
 Hearing impairment: a problem in one or more
parts of the ear that prevents the child from
hearing adequately
 One of the most common congenital disabilities
(present since birth, but may not be hereditary)
 A child who is hearing impaired can often be
identified by his or her lack of vocabulary and
overall delays in language development
Hearing Disorders
 Hearing loss may range from
mild to profound
 A child with moderate hearing
loss will also have trouble in
large group situations
 Hearing aid amplifies and
magnifies sounds
Teaching Suggestions
 When approaching a hearing-impaired child,
 get down to the child’s eye level
 get the child’s attention before speaking
 speak in a normal volume and speed
 speak clearly and distinctly; maintain eye contact
 use the same sentence structure as you would for other children
 pause and wait for a response after you speak
 if the child does not understand you, repeat,
rephrase, or demonstrate
 encourage other children to imitate you when they
communicate with the child
 use gestures and facial expressions to reinforce the
spoken word
 let the child sit in front of you in a group situation
 Visual skills are important for these children
 Use concrete materials to demonstrate abstract concepts
 Provide a variety of games and puzzles for the children to
practice visual perception skills
 Label classroom furniture and materials
 Select books with illustrations
 Use visual cues to teach safety and daily routines and to notify of
upcoming activities
Speech and Language Disorders
 Identification
 Articulationproblems
 Voice (phonation) disorders
 Stuttering
Identification
 Speechimpairments are interference with specific
sounds or sound blends
 Identify the speech impairment before altering your
program
 Informal observations most common method
 Listen to speech patterns in a variety of settings
 Thedirector or teacher will determine whether a
parent conference should be scheduled
Articulation Problems
 Articulation problems are most often omissions,
distortions, or substitutions of vowels or
consonants or both
 Certain speech sounds are left out in an omission
error
 Substitution is when an incorrect sound is used
 After a child has been diagnosed as having an
articulation problem, a speech clinician should be
consulted
Voice (Phonation) Disorders
 Voice characteristics include pitch, loudness,
flexibility, and quality
 A good speaking voice during routine conversation
uses a variety of pitches and loudness levels
 Harshness, hoarseness, breathiness, and nasality
are all voice-quality disorders
Voice (Phonation) Disorders
 Tohelp prevent or correct voice disorders,
promote voice control
 Encourage children to use the correct voice volume
during indoor play
 Discourage children from screaming or yelling too
much during outdoor play
 Model good voice characteristics
Stuttering
 Stuttering in young children is
characterized by repetition, hesitation,
and prolongation
 Many children experience stuttering in
the early stages of language development
 Most often occurs when they feel
pressured
Stuttering
 If you have stuttering children in the classroom,
 focus on creating good speaking conditions
 plan activities so children experience success
 provide children with enough time to say what they
have to say
 listen closely; do not focus on the stuttering
 avoid rushing children through a task
Vision Disorders
 One of the smallest groups of children
with special needs is the visually
impaired
 To understand visual impairments,
you need to understand how a healthy
visual system works
Early Identification
 Certain symptoms may suggest vision problems
 Excessive rubbing of the eyes
 Clumsiness and trouble moving around
 Adjusting the head in an awkward position to view
materials
 Moving materials so they are close to the eyes
Early Identification
 Squinting
 Crust on eye
 Iris on one or both eyes appearing cloudy
 Crossed eyes or an eye that turns inward
 Red, encrusted, or swollen eyelids
 Excessive blinking
Types of Visual Disabilities
 Amblyopia
 Glaucoma
 Nearsightedness
 Farsightedness
 Colordeficiency
 Uncorrectable conditions
 Visual needs of the children affect your classroom
 Always create a need to see
 Include a study unit on sight to help all the children understand
vision
 To reduce glare, use chalkboards with dull finish and colored
markers on whiteboards
 Hang children’s work at their eye level
 Ensure safety by putting toys away
 Because auditory clues are important, keep noise level low
 In the reading area, always have a number of large print books
with clear, simple pictures
 Use touch, smell, and sound clues
 Use auditory reminders for transitions
 Encourage children to use their senses
THANK YOU FOR
LISTENING😊

Children With Special Needs

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Children With Special Needs

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CHILDREN WITH

 Specialneeds may include hearing, speech,

 Explain the special needs of children who are

 By law, parents are allowed to take part in designing their

 An IEP is usually written for a 12-month period

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