Teaching for Inclusion

The article “Teaching for Inclusion” discusses which effective strategies are for teaching students with all different types of issues even including disability. I’m currently taking the class on teaching students with special needs. We were asked to reflect on an article of our choice and the article on which I reflected was closely related to many of the things discussed throughout this reading. The first thing discussed in the handbook for teaching for inclusion is getting to know your students on the first day. I think that every successful teacher needs to know their students. When I say get to know the students I’m not talking only their names, I’m talking about knowing their best suited learning style and where they are academically when they enter the class. I think that one key to having a successful student is maintaining a constant stream of communication with the students parents. Not only reporting negative feedback is important for the student’s progress but also reporting the good things. Explaining to a student’s parents that their child is showing sign of improvement can be extremely helpful in motivating a child to continue to show improvement, this is an example of positive reinforcement. By giving the child’s parents that positive letter the child might feel even more motivated to show good behavior and try their hardest on every single assignment because they like the praise that their parents are giving them for the good work. When teaching children with learning disabilities such as ADHD, there are other successful strategies which should be set in motion. Students with ADHD tend to learn better if they are given a lot of breaks in between assignments. It doesn’t necessarily have to be a long break, but letting them get water or maybe stretching in their seat can be helpful in getting them refocused on what they are learning. As a teacher one of the biggest issues we will constantly deal with is diversity. The teacher has to be aware of all the different types of children in the class and make sure that the curriculum they are using isn’t only focused towards one group in the class, this can be considered being ethnocentric. Another helpful thing I grasped from the reading is that setting rules for classroom discussion can be extremely helpful in the long run. The rules discussed in the handbook if used correctly, I think can prevent any miscommunications amongst students in turn helping avoid disagreements altogether.