Make a Difference: Tips for Teaching Students Who Have Learning Disabilities Video Script Executive Producers: Heidi Lefebure, Outreach Specialist, Project PACE, UALR, & Melanie Thornton, Director, Project PACE, UALR Producer/Director: David Weekley - Instructor, Radio, TV, and Film, UALR Field Production Assistants: Dallas Bagget, Joseph Emmel, Saori Kimoto, Chris Mansur, Dustin Tacker, Daniela Tamayo, Tanoyoka Williams Transcript Preparation: Valerie Flora Captioning: Computer Prompting & Captioning Special Thanks To: Betty Freeland's composition class [Music opener] Vince: Hi, I'm Vince Bailey. In this presentation, we'll be showing faculty how to better teach individuals who have learning disabilities. With us today is Susan Queller, and Susan is the director of Disability Support Services at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. Susan has worked with students with learning disabilities over the years and has been very instrumental in helping them get the accommodations they need for proper education. She's been very instrumental in helping us put this presentation together. Susan, could you give us a few opening remarks on why learning disabilities are an evolving issue that teachers in higher education need to know about? Susan: Well, one of the main things is that the number of students with learning disabilities has increased dramatically on our campus and nationwide over the last decade. Close to half of the students who have disabilities on our college campuses today are students with learning disabilities. Vince: Well, why do you think that number is increasing like that? Susan: Well, I think it may be more an issue of awareness and not so much an issue that more people are being diagnosed with learning disabilities. It may be some of both, but there's an awareness now that there are services for students with learning disabilities on our college campuses. Although it might not look the same as it did in K through 12 education, there are services for college students with learning disabilities that will benefit them and help them succeed. Vince: There are a number of students this affects. What are some of the students' concerns as far as disabilities go? Susan: One of the main concerns I hear students express is whether they want to identify themselves to their professors, versus keeping their disability hidden. They're afraid of the stigma that might be associated with having a learning disability, and that could prevent them from getting the services that they need. I think that, over the years, faculty have become more and more aware that students with learning disabilities are just as bright and capable and hard working as any other students, and because of that, the stigma has decreased over time. I do think, though, that this is still one of the most difficult disabilities for faculty to understand. Vince: Well, that's why we're here today to make this presentation. What is it that we want the faculty especially to know when dealing with students with learning disabilities? Susan: The main thing is that we want them to understand that students with learning disabilities can excel in college. They attend very selective universities, they get into graduate school programs and law schools. They are a very motivated and hard working bunch of people. They've had to be to get where they are today. So the main concern or the main concept here is that students with learning disabilities can and do learn; that this is not a disability that prevents learning. Vince: That's great. Again, Susan, we would like to thank you for coming in today and for all of your valuable input on this production. Susan: Thank you. Vince: Thank you. As faculty, we want to provide the best education available to all students. It is evident that every individual has a particular style of learning. Some are more verbal, some are visual, some work best on their own, and some work better in groups. Learning preferences also exist among students with learning disabilities. No two individuals with learning disabilities are exactly alike. Knowing that a person has a disability only tells you a little about that person. We need to ascertain the needs of that student, providing equal opportunity without compromising standards. There are many factors to be considered when you have a college student with a learning disability in your class. These pointers will introduce you to some ways of accommodating learning disabilities in your classroom with comfort and ease. We spoke with Dr. Jennifer Hune, a professor in special education at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. Her specialty is teacher preparation for students who have disabilities. She is dynamically involved in learning disabilities. Here's what she had to say. Jennifer: At the beginning of every course, I think every teacher should make the learning environment safe for her students - her students or his students - to come to them if they're having some concerns. That was what I learned as a brand new professor; that if I didn't tell someone, "If you have a problem, come to me," that many times the students waited until the very end of course when they were making a C and they wanted to make an A, and then they came. Or I've had students who waited until the very, very end of course, they made a C, and they got mad at me because they made a C. And after my first semester, I learned if - to tell my students, "If you have a problem, it's okay for you to come and tell me about it; if I don't know about it, there's nothing I can do about it. Please, don't assume that I know everything there is to know about you, how you learn, and about your life. So if there's something that is happening that I can assist you with, that I can refer you to someone, just come to me in the privacy of my office. I will even make time for you. If you have email, email me, just communicate with me what your needs are in order to support you in this - in this class." Ludwick: I've been Golden Key Honor Society, Who's Who among American Universities. I've served in student government, lived a very active campus life and have enjoyed it. The one concern I would say is, be patient, you know. Understand that you may not be able to see the learning disability or be able to tell any difference, but sometimes, you know, extra time is what's needed to have an equal playing field. Vince: So what is a learning disability? It is a disorder in one or more basic processes involved in understanding or in using language, spoken or written, which may manifest itself in the imperfect ability to listen, think, speak, read, write, spell, or do mathematical calculations. Brain injury, minimal brain dysfunction, and developmental aphasia may also result in a functional learning disability. Now, a learning disability is not the result of vision, hearing, or motor disabilities, of mental retardation, of emotional disturbance, or environmental, cultural, or economic disadvantage. Cindy: I'm sure she probably didn't intentionally try to humiliate me, but she would sit me at the front of the class while everybody else was taking their test, right next to her like a child, and she would say, okay, she would read the first question, I would answer it. And it was, you know, she usually had me in a shorter chair, you know, which put her at the dominant level, and I would sit there embarrassed with, you know, 30 or 40 people out there watching me, you know, take my test. But I also had a lot of professors that were very good. I also had some instructors who felt that I should not go into anything in the medical field, and I had to fight that. Disability Support Services has come along way because, when I went to college, you were forced to take math if you had dyscalculia. Cindy: Okay, you ready? [Singing - graduation march] I think we all want to get - you know, be something better than we are, and I still strive for that. But when it's the hardest thing that you've ever done in your life and you know you probably only got one chance at it, it's pretty scary when somebody with such power, they have the ability to stop you. Vince: The difference for a person with a learning disability is that one or more of these modalities may be impaired, making the ability to attend to tasks unreliable. This causes the learning process to become scrambled and can trigger a scrambled response or output. As a consequence, the brain may not store information in a customary manner, particularly when moving input between sensory, short-term, and long-term memory. This results in difficulty using information quickly and/or in its complete form. Viki: Working in therapy, you enter in the units of how many hours or minutes you have worked with that patient, and the numbers were coming across backwards. Some fours, some sevens. And when I questioned who did this and what it was, that's when I found out that Cindy had dyslexia. Chrissy: She had entered, you know, a 40-minute treatment session on a patient three days in a row, and it was "40, 40, 40." And since she wrote her fours backwards, the occupational therapist came up and said, "What's this 'ho, ho, ho'?" So that was kind of a cute thing I remember. And I said "Oh, that's my dyslexic PTA." Ho, ho, ho. Cindy: We are proud to bestow you with the diploma that you have successfully completed Paragon Rehab's physical therapy, and you are of the class of 2000. Cindy & Patient: ..11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20. Patient: If I can count by twos, it'll go quicker. Cindy: [laughing] I know! Vince: Since this disability affects the way a person processes information, it's not readily visible. Students with learning disabilities not only have to deal with their limitations, but often also deal with the frustrations of trying to prove that they do in fact have a disability. It is important to remember that students with this more hidden disability compensate by gathering and communicating information in ways that work best for them. They may need to adapt to different ways of learning, but that does not mean that they are unable to learn. Betty: This is not a situation where people are - are stupid, it's not a situation where they're lazy, and it's not a situation - oftentimes where there's been no family support or recognition. All of the studies now that are talking about it refer to the fact that it really is just faulty wiring in the brain. Vince: Verifying a student with a learning disability can be difficult at times. There are characteristics that may help you to detect this condition. Students with learning disabilities may be affected in one or more of these areas. Betty: If you could imagine having a full text of paper there - a page in front of you and you have to read it and you know that you haven't been successful in the past, and so you dread it and you've put it off, and finally, you have to do it. And you sit down to read it. And as you get into it, you realize that, oh, on about two-thirds of the sentences in that entire text, you've had to stop, you've had to stop either for one word or two words in each sentence of that two-thirds of the text, and you've had to go back and try to sound it out so that you could understand it so that you could then go on. And you can imagine that, once you do that, the kind of frustration it's going to lead to. And then the most important thing it just makes comprehension so difficult. Heidi: This is - this is typical of what someone with a reading disability like dyslexia, what they might have to go through. They are so busy decoding word for word, that, you know, they'll read something and they've got - they finally gotten some of the words or most of the words, but they haven't gotten any content. Now, this sheet that you have here, what I would like you to do, Joanne, if you would - start with that first paragraph, please, and just read it aloud to the group. Joanne: In modern society of individuals - something - to be self-sufficient is usually encouraged in childhood. Melody: In - inde - indepembence is also comsidered a civic virtue. For self-reliance means pulling your own seu. Cheryl: This arrived puts tremendous pressure on the disabled - person -something. Vince: Able-bodied or not, everyone - everyone experiences - I'm sorry - something of independence. Illness and old age are undiscriminating. Moral independence, on the other hand, is - I'm going to have to stop right there. I don't understand. I can't get that word. Heidi: Okay. How - how were you all feeling when you started to read this? Cheryl: Frustrated. Heidi: Why? Cheryl: Because I know there's some good points there, and it - and I can't figure what they are, plus things are backwards, and I have to take longer to figure it out. And I was thinking, when Melody was reading, you can just see the professor teacher breaking out that red pen. Melody: Because I was trying to read it the way it was written, I couldn't tell you one thing that I read. It made absolutely no sense at all. Vince: When writing, sentence structure may be askew resulting in incomplete sentences, run-ons, a poor use of grammar, and missing inflectional endings. Spelling errors may abound, especially in specialized vocabulary, or for some students even in very common words. Copying accurately from a book or a blackboard may be challenging. The writing may be slow, and the penmanship poor. Heidi: You're going to write with that hand, the hand that you normally do not write with. What you're going to do is, we're going to make nametags. And you're going to write your name with the wrong hand, you're going to write from the end of your name to the first of your name, and you're going to write it up-side down, all the letters up-side down and backwards. [Chuckling and laughing] How do you all feel when everybody else is looking and laughing at your nameplate - name tag? Cheryl: Not very good. Heidi: What if you thought that what you had written was just fine, okay? Imagine that it was just fine and then everybody started laughing. How would that make you feel? Cheryl: Worse, especially if you still didn't understand what was wrong with it, you know. Heidi: This is an experience that kind of gives you a feel for what someone with dysgraphia might go through. Idorenyin: At the time I was struggling with my writing, and they had me to just to keep writing just different papers because I received a low grade on them. And I had stated to the teacher that I have a learning disability, and then the teacher kind of worked with me after a while. And I was getting Ds, I was getting Fs on the paper. Finally, at the end, I had rewrote all of my papers again. Then I received a B in the course. And then when the course was through, she had stated to me that I could have got an A that - if I just would have worked a little bit harder. Vince: Some will be unable to concentrate on and comprehend the spoken word. Expressing ideas can be equally frustrating. Telling a story in proper sequence and getting it grammatically correct can also be challenging. Those with oral language obstacles may be able to communicate much more effectively in writing, while those with visual difficulties may do better orally. When the disability affects mathematical skills, the individual may have never completely mastered the basics like multiplication tables. Numbers are easily reversed, operational symbols like the "+" or "x" and the ">" or "<" are confused, abstract concepts and word problems are difficult to understand and retain. The proper sequence of the operational process gets scrambled and gaps in reasoning make it hard to solve problems. Jennifer: They will say, "I see the numbers, I know what the numbers are, I know what the numbers mean, but when I go to do it, I just can't." And that's what you'll hear. You will hear more affect with adult students than you will - than you will opposition to trying to do it or noncompliance with attempting to do the work. They want to, they just have a breakdown in the neurological processes that keep them from doing it, and it's been a block for them all of their lives. And that's - that's a term that you will hear from them. "It's been difficult for me to do this all of my life." Vince: Organizational and study skills can also be impacted by a learning disability. Managing time, starting and completing tasks, following oral and written directions and organizing may all be difficult. A short time span in lectures and the inability to recall many things that are taught are also things that need to be addressed. Social skills can also be affected in many ways. A joking wink may be misconstrued as a disgusted glance. Just as people with learning disabilities may confuse symbols, they can also confuse body language. Auditory perception problems may make distinguishing subtle changes in tone of voice or between sincere and sarcastic comments difficult. Students may also have trouble meeting other students, working cooperatively with others, and making friends. Obviously, these challenging life situations can manifest a low self-esteem. It is important to note that a learning disability is often inconsistent. It may be diagnosed early on in life, then seemingly disappear, and then manifest itself in only one specific academic category, such as math or foreign language. Some learning disabilities may have a biological basis. It is common to find a learning disability tends to run in families. The cause of some learning disabilities may not be known. Or, a person may have another primary disability which causes some similar learning difficulties. Examples of this are a person with a traumatic brain injury, and a person with attention deficit disorder. There are many types of learning disabilities. The best way to identify a learn disability is through a psycho-educational evaluation done by a licensed professional. They're diagnosed by establishing a significant discrepancy between ability and performance. In other words, scores on tests of achievement are lower than expected when compared to scores on tests of intelligence. It is important to know that the presence of a learning disability does not necessarily guarantee protection under the Americans with Disabilities Act. The learning disability must present a substantial limitation to learning. The best way to determine if a student with a diagnosed learning disability is in need of an accommodation is to consult the disability support provider on your campus. They may consider the effects of the disorder to determine whether it results in a substantial impairment. Then they can recommend strategies and specific accommodations. With faculty input, the disability service provider can also help determine whether the accommodations would fundamentally alter the course of the program. When an accommodation does fundamentally alter the course, the law does not require that this particular accommodation be made. Betty: You want to try that a minute? I'll try not to breath down your neck. Dallas: Yeah, yeah, I can do that. Betty: And see what you're - see what you come up with. You want to look at what we got now? Dallas: Yeah. Betty: Okay. Let's see. Start - you want to read the new stuff? Dallas: Okay. Vince: A variety of classroom accommodations are sometimes made for college students with disabilities. Most accommodations help clarify course demands and content. These may include assistance with note taking, either through written copies of notes provided by a note taker or by you, or allowing the use of a tape recorder in the classroom. Some faculty members may express concern regarding the tape recording of their lectures. However, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and the Americans with Disabilities act of 1990 identify students with vision and other impairments as legally entitled to tape record lectures. If you're concerned that these tapes will infringe on your copyright privileges of course material, you may want to ask students to sign an agreement not to release the recording, and to use it only for the purpose of studying. Your institution's faculty handbook may include a copy of such documents. Many college students with a learning disability find it helpful to get a syllabus and reading list as early as possible. Students with a learning disability that affects reading may require books on tape, and these must be ordered or recorded as early as possible. Some students with a learning disability like to preview course materials, then organize and plan their study time well in advance. Providing a handout of new or technical vocabulary will help support your students' organization and note taking skills. Ludwick: ...take home classes, I found my grades grow substantially by reading the notes that I took, transpiring them, writing out the study guide, recording them, and driving in my car and listening to them on the way to school, on the way from school, on the way to class the week before the exam. And my test scores showed there 95, 99, et cetera. A lot of extra - a lot of extra work. Vince: Dyslexia describes a pattern of difficulties students may experience in learning. It commonly affects memory, organizational skills, and the acquisition and use of language. There's evidence to suggest that dyslexia has a genetic origin and is connected to how a person processes information. Supporting students who have dyslexia should involve a team approach, a process that involves the student, their lecturers, and the university support services with each party having specific responsibilities. Each student will need adjustments that may be unique to them. It is often helpful to provide some students with learning disabilities extended time to take a test and a distraction-free environment. It is important for students to have access to you for answering questions or clarifying material when taking an exam. Just for note, when a student requests clarification of test questions that involve rephrasing or substituting a less-complex word for another word without any substantial change, consider this a legitimate accommodation, and one that will best be done by you in order to not alter the essence of your test content. Sometimes clarifications are just a matter of helping the student figure out what the question is asking, or may be a part of the unscrambling process. Occasionally, we may all have difficulty sitting still, paying attention or controlling impulsive behavior. For some people, the problem is so pervasive and persistent that it interferes with their daily lives, including home, social, academic, and work setting. Attention deficit disorder, or ADD, is characterized by developmentally inappropriate impulsivity, attention, and in some cases hyperactivity. ADD is a neurobiological disability that affects three to five percent of school aged children, and approximately two to four percent of adults. Although individuals with ADD can be very successful in life, without identification and proper treatment, ADD can have serious consequences, including school failure, depression, behavior problems, failed relationships, and substance abuse. Early identification and treatment increase the likelihood of positive long-term outcomes. Vanessa: I have attention deficit disorder. A lot of times, they'll be talking and I hear someone outside and it's hard for me to maintain my attention span, so I have to really focus, because I can tell if somebody walks by the door, you know, or if someone says something out in the hall, I have to stay really focused. So what I have - I keep little ideas in my head by crossing my fingers. So what I do is, if they say something to me, then I - and they're talking, I don't want to interrupt them, because that's a habit of someone with attention deficit disorder - is that they will interrupt someone, and I know that. So I'm aware of that, so I try to maintain and I'll cross my fingers. And that reminds me to comment or say something about what they're talking about, you know, if they're saying something. Vince: Students often find the use of computer technology with relevant software useful. Some students may only need spell checker capabilities, while others benefit from using speech output, speech input, or organizational software. Vince C.: This is Kurzweil 3000. It's a program that can read electronic or scanned text in the form of human synthetic speech. Basically, this is like any type of word processor, except you can get definitions, synonyms, syllables, and use spell checker, use multiple documents at one time. That way you can look at both the definition, particular parts of the document, or even the syllables. Computer Voice: One of the features of Kurzweil 3000 is word prediction. Word pre-dic-tion. We are going to talk about obtaining workplace accommodation. Vince: Oral tests may be administered using a cassette recorded version of the test. A scribe or tape recorder can record responses if a student has difficulty writing. You may be asked to allow some students to use electronic devices, like calculators, electronic spellers, and spelling dictionaries during an exam. If you have a concern about equity issues or security, you may ask the student to show you the device and explain to you it's use from a functional perspective. Be sure to consider whether or not it will compromise what you're trying to test. And remember, pop quizzes, in-class writing, or other in-class assignments are performance measures just like tests. Students with learning disabilities must be afforded the same accommodations as those used for testing. Be encouraging and sensitive to the needs of individual students. Students with learning disabilities often suffer from a lack of self-esteem and confidence. Write clearly and provide handouts whenever possible. Copying for the student may be slow and difficult. Write key words or phrases on the board. Follow or provide an outline. Begin the lecture with an overview or end with a summary. Stress important words. Note taking is often a problem for students with some types of learning disabilities. Avoid writing in red. For some, this can be difficult to read. Some students with dyslexia have difficulty reading black on white. Handouts on pastel-colored paper can help. Highlight important items in book lists to help students select. Students who have dyslexia cannot skim, and reading can take a very, very long time. Reading, writing can be a laborious process, so be aware that course work may take students with learning disabilities longer than peers. And be prepared to clarify course work questions if requested. Don't ask people with a reading disorder to read aloud to a group. Many people with learning disabilities have strong, creative talents in the arts, design, computing, and lateral thinking. Be aware that such students will find information in a diagram easier to comprehend than text. Augustus: Whenever we get our students together in groups, we talk about time management techniques, study skills improvement, relationships with instructors. We try to have general sessions whenever we can get the schedules in time for the students to, if nothing else, sit down and talk with them about how things are going within their--within their academic lives. Vince: Auditory comprehension is not a problem for students with dyslexia, and their long-term memory is often very good. However, their short-term memory may be poor. Encourage students to write down dates, times, and instructions. On the other hand, an auditory comprehension may be a weakness for students with other types of learning disabilities. Many students require specific tutoring from a specialist tutor to help them overcome the difficulties they experience from having learning disabilities. Yvonne: Primarily what we do is a lot of drill and repetition. If a certain problem-solving technique doesn't seem to be catching on, we'll try another method and just kind of see what clicks best with the individual student. It's really different for each student. Also, sometimes using different colored markers, a technique like that might help to kind of emphasize different parts of the problem and how it fits together. We also have--actually, this is for any student--most of the textbooks provide videotapes that are key to each individual section. Vince: The use of a note taker can be helpful for students who find it difficult to take notes. Other accommodations that you might want to consider are: Provide students with a detailed course syllabus. Make it available before registration week. Clearly spell out expectations before the course begins, such as grading, materials covered, due dates. Speak directly to students and use gestures and natural expressions to convey further meaning. Give assignments both orally and in written form to avoid confusion. Announce reading assignments well in advance for students who are using taped materials. Students using books on tape are generally asked by disability support offices to have their requests in two months before the start of the semester. Facilitate use of tape recorders for note taking by allowing students to tape lectures. Provide study questions for exams that demonstrate the format as well as the content of the test. Explain what constitutes a good answer and why. If necessary, allow students with learning disabilities to demonstrate mastery of course material using alternative methods such as extending time limits on oral exams, taped exams, individually proctored exams in designated alternate locations. Permit use of simple calculators, scratch paper, and speller's dictionaries during exam. Speller's dictionaries do not include definitions. Provide adequate opportunities for questions and answers, including review sessions. If possible, select a textbook with an accompanying guide for optional student use. Encourage students to use campus support services, pre-registration, assistance in ordering taped textbooks, alternative testing arrangements, specialized study aids, peer support groups, study skills courses, and academic tutorial assistance. Yvonne: With 4.4, which is kind of hard. I mean, you can't exactly identify 4.4 off the picture. It might be 4.3 or - what you do notice is that it's a little bit more than four. It actually looks like it's about half way between four and five. Vince: There are many factors to consider in the educational process for students with learning disabilities, but there is no need to feel uncomfortable or inadequate when teaching these individuals. With proper instruction and classroom and testing accommodations, we can make the student-teacher relationship a rich and rewarding experience. When in doubt, get advice. Contact your disabilities support services office at your college or university for information on helpful resources. Remember, the extra effort that you make in the development of each and every individual in your sphere of experience will help to insure a rich, rewarding, satisfying, and productive life for your students. I hope you continue to work diligently with your students and start to apply the tips we have presented to you in this presentation. Thank you for your time. [Closing music] (page 32) References ABCs of LD/ADD - Learning Disability (LD) and Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD). (n.d.) Retrieved November 13, 2000 from www.ldonline.org/abcs_info/articles-info.html Arkansas Department of Workforce Education, Adult Education Section; and Arkansas Adult Learning Resource Center. (2000). Learning disabilities training and dissemination workbook. Association on Higher Education and Disability. (2001). College students with learning disabilites. Brochure. Coordinated Campaign for Learning Disabilities. (1998, Summer). Overview of assistive technology for learning disabilities. Retrieved November 13, 2000 from www.ldonline.org/ld_indepth/technology/ccld_assistive_technology.html Day, S.L. & Edwards, B. J. (1996). Assistive technology for postsecondary students with learning disabilities. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 2, 5, 486-492. LRP Publications. (2001). Teaching students with disabilities, 2, 2. National Adult Literacy and Learning Disabilities Center. (1999). Bridges to Practice: A research-based guide for literacy practitioners serving adults with learning disabilities. National Information Center for Children and Youth with Disabilities. (2000). General information about learning disabilities - fact sheet #7. Retrieved November 13, 2000 from www.ldonline.org/ld_indepth/general_info/gen-2.html Thornton, M.P. (2000, June). Disability highlights: Key strategies in teaching students with learning disabilities. PACESETTER Newsletter, 2. (back) This handbook is available in alternate formats by calling 501-569-8410 (voice) or 501-569-3143 (voice/tty).