Quite often, people with disabilities are treated as if they are retarded, child-like, or incapable of taking care of themselves. This is incorrect almost all the time! Most people with disabilities have or would like at least some degree of independence, and many disabilities have little or no effect on mental processing. There is a severe stereotyping problem with people with disabilities. During this summer semester, I’ve worked with children with and without disabilities at the Early Learning Center in Pullman, Washington. Early Learning Services provides quality childcare in an interactive, nurturing environment. They believe that early intervention helps to improve a child’s opportunities for success and that providing least restrictive environments improve children’s social skills. Peer modeling is encouraged amongst the children and classes are fairly small with multiple teachers/caregivers. While at ELC, I mainly worked with two children who had disabilities. One was a six year old boy who had a mental disability and the other was a little girl who was about a year old and had a club hand and facial deformities. They were both fun and unique as well as being quite different from each other, so I enjoyed getting a varied experience working with them. The boy whom I shall call Michael, was extremely energetic and social. The classrooms at ELC are completely integrated so he participated in all activities. Michael was treated the same as everyone else by the teachers and was not given special treatment or privileges because of his disability. He was required to behave and participate just like everyone and unless you spent much time in the classroom, you wouldn’t even notice that he was any different from anyone els... ... middle of paper ... ...hallenge to one’s humanity – for both the stigmatized person and the stigmatizer.” (Crocker, Dovidio, Major (2000) Very often stigmatization is a result of people not being properly educated about people with disabilities and letting themselves be brain washed by Hollywood and the media. Since the majority of people don’t often come into contact with people with severe and deforming disabilities, they’ve not had any personal experience to help share their beliefs and opinions. When this is the case, it’s very easy to fall back onto what society and the media teaches. As students who have now been educated about people with disabilities, it’s our responsibility to help educate other people and to dispel stereotypes about disability. Moreover, we should be model examples in how to treat a person with a disability – as a human, the same as we would want to be treated!
As human beings, we like to make sure never to offend or judge anyone. We even have sayings like “never judge a book by its cover”. A metaphor that is often said whenever trying not to judge someone based on their outward appearance; however, it is not often that people practice what they preach. We judge people based on external factors within seconds. Even though we know what people see on the outside is not a defining factor or who we are as people. Nancy Mairs, author of On Being a Cripple, has to live through this every day. She knows this truth very well, and lives proudly with the fact that as she is disabled. Mairs is admirable for choosing to call herself a “cripple” and not be ashamed of it. Though the word is derogatory and a word that is avoided by society, Mairs identifies herself as a cripple because that is what she is. In explaining her disability, she says, “I haven’t always been crippled, ... to be whole of limb is ... infinitely more pleasant and useful. and if that knowledge leaves me open to bitterness … the physical soundness I once enjoyed is well worth the occasional stab of regret” (Mairs 186). What really
The Moving Beyond Pity & Inspiration: Disability as a social Justice Issue by Eli Clare took place on April 16, 2014. Thinking about disability before this lecture I feel like I had a general idea of the things Eli spoke about. I attended a school were more than half of the students had a disability. The terms and stereotypes he mentioned I ha heard since sixth grade.
I decided to focus my plunge on adults with mental and physical disabilities, because I had no prior experience with this group. Coming from an able-bodied family where no one has significant handicaps, I was generally shielded from people with disabilities. Over the years, I grew to associate dangerous stigmas with these people, even though they have no control over their circumstance. The
Disability in our day in age is seen as being worse than death. People with disabilities should not feel like they don 't belong. They are just like everyone else and want to be treated like everyone else. Many without disabilities think that it can be contagious and stray to even look at people with disability. This is not the case for it 's not contagious and one should not be seen as a different person just because of their disability. They didn 't choose that life and shouldn 't be mistreated for what they are. “People with disability should be treated equally to everyone else.”
The human race is rather ignorant. We give a label to people that we think are challenged because they are not like the majority. The people that do label, are the ones who are truly blind or deaf. They see nothing, they hear nothing except what they want to hear or what they think they want to hear or see. For you see the "handicapped" can do things that non-handicapped can not. If one really thinks about it, they are not handicapped. If any one is handicapped it is the
Unfortunately, it is not uncommon for children with disabilities in a Least Restrictive Environment to not have their needs met adequately. Some parents think that teachers do not have the proper skills to help their child with disabilities flourish in the classroom. Two concerns/challenges are that typical developing students will imitate inappropriate behaviors made by students with disabilities and students with disabilities could potentially get teased about their disabilities and inappropriate behaviors. As said by Virginia Buysse and Donal B. Baily, Jr. (1993) “… the opportunities for young children with disabilities to interact with peers in integrated settings must be carefully
Two years ago, I embarked on a journey that would teach me more than I had ever imagined. As a recent college graduate, I was thrilled to finally begin my teaching career in a field I have always held close to my heart. My first two years as a special education teacher presented countless challenges, however, it also brought me great fulfillment and deepened my passion for teaching students with special needs. The experiences I have had both before and after this pivotal point in my life have undoubtedly influenced my desire to further my career in the field of special education.
People that are seen as having a disability are often passed through the majority of their classes or are not properly taught. In other words, teachers and professors may expect less from them. This does not benefit the student nor does it show that the teacher is interested in trying to help students with such disorders. In what possible way does it make sense to send someone out into the world without teaching them to the best of their capabilities? The lack of effort in the teacher’s work ethic comes off quite arrogant and selfish. It is the responsibility of a teacher to prepare the student for the real world and give them every piece of knowledge they can
Katz, Jennifer, and Pat Mirenda. "Including students with developmental disabilities in general education classrooms: Social benefits." International Jornal of Special Education 17.2 (2002): 26-36.
In the essay “Disability,” Nancy Mairs discusses the lack of media attention for the disabled, writing: “To depict disabled people in the ordinary activities of life is to admit that there is something ordinary about disability itself, that it may enter anyone’s life.” An ordinary person has very little exposure to the disabled, and therefore can only draw conclusions from what is seen in the media. As soon as people can picture the disabled as regular people with a debilitating condition, they can begin to respect them and see to their needs without it seeming like an afterthought or a burden. As Mairs wrote: “The fact is that ours is the only minority you can join involuntarily, without warning, at any time.” Looking at the issue from this angle, it is easy to see that many disabled people were ordinary people prior to some sort of accident. Mairs develops this po...
Children with disabilities are more in the public eye than years ago, although they are still treated differently. Our society treats them differently from lack of education on special needs. The society labels them and make their lives more difficult than it has to be becau...
Every day in America, a woman loses a job to a man, a homosexual high school student suffers from harassment, and someone with a physical or mental disability is looked down upon. People with disabilities make up the world’s largest and most disadvantaged minority, with about 56.7 million people living with disabilities in the United States today (Barlow). In every region of the country, people with disabilities often live on the margins of society, deprived from some of life’s fundamental experiences. They have little hope of inclusion within education, getting a job, or having their own home (Cox). Everyone deserves a fair chance to succeed in life, but discrimination is limiting opportunities and treating people badly because of their disability. Whether born from ignorance, fear, misunderstanding, or hate, society’s attitudes limit people from experiencing and appreciating the full potential a person with a disability can achieve. This treatment is unfair, unnecessary, and against the law (Purdie). Discrimination against people with disabilities is one of the greatest social injustices in the country today. Essential changes are needed in society’s basic outlook in order for people with disabilities to have an equal opportunity to succeed in life.
I have always grown up in a more ‘normal’ setting and seeing people with disabilities was something that was rare to me. When I was younger, my thoughts on people with disabilities were that they could only be physically seen, nothing else (mentally, intellectually, etc.). As I reached middle school, I realized how broad the world is and how many ways people were affected by disabilities. Some of them led a more normal life and some have a harder time adjusting. Just seeing and reading how so many are affected and how harder it is for them really opened up my mind and allowed me to have a wider perception of how broad things are in the world.
There are numerous careers related to special needs, all of which require different schooling, training, mentorships, and other types of preparation. Any type of job working with children with mental and physical disabilities can be challenging but also very rewarding when one sees the child improve (Tyrer, 2007). Different types of careers affect special needs children in different ways. For example a teacher will help them thrive in school, while other careers may help the kids improve at home or in a public setting. Special needs workers should be creative, flexible, and personable to be able to meet the needs of the child and also provide useful information for the child’s parents. It is important for one to at least complete minimal required training so one will be fully prepared to work with a child with any type of delay. Often children in schools do not improve at a higher rate because their teacher may not have the necessary training to assist them (Marković, 2014). No matter what special needs career someone chooses, everyone should have one common goal: to help special needs children thrive. Marković from the article “Work with Kids with Special Needs” puts it perfectly when she states, “the main aim is that children with disabilities get the chance to grow, learn, and socialize with children with normal development, and that these children can adapt and learn together with children with special needs. In this way, they develop understanding, tolerance, and humanity” (Marković,
For my observation experience I went to Southern High School in Harwood, MD. Southern High School has a special education department for the students with disabilities. The teacher that I met with for this classroom observation was Ms. West. In the classroom there were at least four assistant teachers that helped Ms. West throughout the school day. The assistant teachers helped Ms. West co- teach the class and were there to help the students if they needed extra help. The school also has a couple of student aides that come in to help the teachers and the students in the classroom. There were at least twelve students in the classroom. The students in the class had many different exceptionalities such as learning disabilities, Down syndrome,