CEC+Standard+3


 * CEC Standard 3: Individual Learning Differences **

Special educators understand the effects that an exceptional condition can have on an individual’s learning in school and throughout life. Special educators understand that the beliefs, traditions, and values across and within cultures can affect relationships among and between students, their families, and the school community. Moreover, special educators are active and resourceful in seeking to understand how primary language, culture, and familial backgrounds interact with the individual’s exceptional condition to impact the individual’s academic and social abilities, attitudes, values, interests, and career options. The understanding of these learning differences and their possible interactions provide the foundation upon which special educators individualize instruction to provide meaningful and challenging learning for individuals with ELN.

Reflection: Families across different environments can display different values and believes. This can affect the way students learn or how they socialize with their peers or with school staff. As special education teachers it is our job to understand that student come from multiple background cultures. Throughout the program I learned that understanding the background of a student I can assist an individual much better than when I have just a vague image about who he is. For example, one of the students I taught was of Hispanic origins. Occasionally at home the parents would cook traditional Mexican food and since their son was not verbal they wanted him to learn signs for these meals. This helped him to better preserve his cultural believes as well as expend his signing repertoire.

Artifact: For this standard in particular I chose another intervention that I used with a 7th grade student. The goal of the intervention was to develop social skills by using peer interaction during lunchtime in the cafeteria. The instruction was delivered by using a task analysis and it included skills such as initiating, maintaining and ending contact.

[|Social skills training]

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