Institucional
Institucional - Intitutional
Institutional
I am certain, in part because I’ve been through it,
but also because of what I see every day, that educational institutions are not
prepared for anyone that is born facing a significant obstacle. We see children
bear the brunt of this from the time they start kindergarten until the end of
primary school: they go to different shifts in special schools, depending on
the degree of disability they have. But in some cases, with the end of primary
school comes the end of special needs school, and they start to walk a more
independent road like secondary school and other activities.
In some cases, with the end of primary school comes
the end of special school, and there begins a more independent journey like
high school and other activities. In some cases, when primary school ends, the
special school continues to assist the individual, but more remotely, not so
much in the day-to-day. Finally, for some, their disability is so limiting that
they have to learn the basic contents of primary school in the special school
they go to (two or three times a week, or daily), depending on the kind of
activities they have at their school
Then comes high school, which can be very difficult to
navigate a lot of the time, for many reasons. One reason is that adolescence is
the most difficult period, when prejudices against the special needs person
arise from schoolmates and teachers alike.
Before I go further down the line, I want to mention
that primary school is a more flexible environment for a special needs person
to adapt or integrate into. Teachers are more collaborative, and children,
while more naive, want to help their schoolmates who need it and want to make
friends to play with. Besides, we must also mention that during primary school,
there’s generally a teacher from the special school who goes to the ‘regular’
school to adapt the study material and help the special needs child to have a
better education, despite having a significant obstacle, to be able to connect
with others and learn the establishment’s required materials with their
schoolmates on a daily basis.
In high school, adapting is more difficult, but then
again adolescence is difficult for everyone. It’s a time of rebelling, of new
bursts of development, for boys and for girls, and that’s why they don’t realize
that special needs teenagers, while they may have a dissimilar lifestyle, are
not different. They can do the same things any other kid their age can do, but
with some limitations, some adaptation. For this reason, a lot of the time,
special needs kids are shunned and discriminated against, because other kids
don’t understand what they’re going through or what they feel, so they don’t
approach them out of fear of hurting their feelings, and they don’t invite them
to activities out of fear that they may trip and hurt themselves.
A lot of the time, the pace of high school is too fast
for special needs kids, but some minor modifications could be made so that the
special needs teenager could keep up with time-sensitive tasks. However, here’s
where the relationship between the teacher and the special needs teenager comes
in. Teachers are usually used to having different classes with different grades
made up of 25 or so students who can easily keep up with their pace, but when
there’s a special needs student in the classroom who does their best but
struggles to keep up with the pace… that’s the major obstacle for anyone with
special needs who wants to finish their high school education. Many times, the
teacher doesn’t know how to help these students, either because they have no
experience with special needs students, or because they’ve never dealt with a
special needs student before in all their classes. We must also keep in mind
how a teacher relates to a student and understands them. Sometimes, the teacher
doesn’t know how to help a special needs student, so they turn a blind eye to
the issues of adapting the tasks for them and integrating them with the group.
This makes it very difficult for the special needs student to stay in school.
At university, it’s safe to say that something similar
to the high school experience takes place, unless the people that make up the
environment of the special needs student are more understanding and can help
them overcome their obstacles with another point of view.
All this being said, it’s not that we expect the
special needs student to do everything, or to get grades they didn’t earn, or
to be coddled through tasks. Special needs students need to be evaluated for
their knowledge, their abilities, and of course, their limitations too. We
can’t ask them to do a task they know they are unable to do, like for instance
differentiating pictures when they are colorblind. But we can ask them instead
to differentiate, say, shapes and sizes: we must try to adapt activities
according to each person’s capabilities. Otherwise, we’re treating them like
they can’t do anything, they can’t work at any profession, and that’s how we
end up ostracizing special needs people from society by not giving them a
chance, and by letting ourselves be influenced by the prejudices of
“able-bodied” people.
Totalmente de acuerdo. Aún llegará el día que el mundo estará más preparado para incluir a todas las personas con sus diferentes capacidades.
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