Файл: Учебник по английскому языку.doc

Teachers of children with behavior disorders or autism can teach self-management skills to both abled and dis­abled students. Self-monitoring and other self-control pro­cedures not only help regulate the behaviors that occur in the classroom, but they also help each student feel better about the ability to be in control of his or her own life. Self-control and self-esteem go hand in hand and enhance each other.

The first selection in this unit defines and discusses children with autism. The unusual behaviors are de­scribed along with some possible explanations for them. The second unit article addresses the problem of stu­dents with work inhibition who could learn but do not have any interest in educational performance. Their withdrawal and passivity are put in perspective with suggestions for what teachers can do to alter the behaviors. The next selection discusses the placement of children with behav­ior disorders or autism in regular education classrooms. Who is severely disturbed? What special services are required? Where should they be provided? When? How should "severe" behavior disorder be assessed? The fourth article discusses discipline from a cultural perspec­tive. Behaviors deemed appropriate or inappropriate vary by culture. Assessment procedures and teaching meth­ods should be sensitive to differences in behavioral pat­terns in culturally diverse groups.

Looking Ahead: Challenge Questions

What is autism? How can one work with an autistic student?

Why do some students have school work inhibition? How can a teacher empower an inhibited child?

Can public schools fulfill their obligation to serve behav-iorally disordered students and also provide appropriate education to nontroubled students simultaneously? De­fend your answer.

How can teachers show sensitive discipline for cultur­ally diverse students with behavioral disorders?

CHILDREN WITH VISUAL IMPAIRMENTS

Students with visual impairments are one of the smallest groups of students being served by special educational services in the public schools. However, they are increas­ingly being served in public schools rather than special schools. Their numbers in public schools increased from about 10 percent to almost 90 percent between 1950 and 1990.

The definitions of legal blindness and low vision are based on measures of visual acuity and field of vision. Low vision is defined as acuity from 20/70 to 20/180 in the best eye after correction and a field vision from 20 to 180 degrees. Legal blindness is defined as 20/200 acuity or less in the best eye after correction and/or a field of vision restricted to an area of 20 degrees or less (tunnel vision).

These definitions are useful for assessment of needs for special services. They do not specify actual vision. One must consider the amount of vision in the worst eye, the perception of light, the actual field of vision (if it is between 20 and 180 degrees), and visual efficiency and functional vision. These last two terms are used to de­scribe how well a person uses whatever vision is avail­able.

Visual impairments may be separated into the catego­ries of blind or low vision based on visual efficiency and functional vision. A child with so little functional vision that he or she learns primarily through the other senses is assessed as blind. A child with enough functional vision to learn primarily through the visual channel is assessed as having low vision. About 80 percent of the visually im­paired students who attend public schools are assessed as having low vision rather than blindness. Children with refractive errors (nearsightedness, farsightedness, and astigmatism) are rarely assessed as low vision students in need of special services. This is because refractive errors can usually be corrected with glasses.

The causes of legal blindness and low vision are not always easy to determine. About 15 percent of blindness is due to unknown factors. Heredity and prenatal factors (maternal illness, drugs, prematurity, low birth weight) are believed to contribute to more than one-half of all visual impairments. Other known causes of blindness or low vision are diseases, injuries, poisonings, and tumors.

Depending on the nature and the degree of the visual impairment, a teacher may need to become acquainted with a wide variety of special services used to assist in appropriate education for blind or low vision students.

Most children who are blind are taught to read using their sense of touch. Braille is a form of writing using raised dots that are "read" with the fingers. It takes many years to learn to read braille. Most braille readers read considerably slower than print readers. Their individu­alized education programs (lEPs) may include braille books and braille reading, and writing braille with a slate and stylus or brailler (six-keyed device like a typewriter). Most children who are blind also use Optacon scanners, talking books (books on tape), speech plus talking hand­held calculators, closed-circuit television, typewriters, and/or personal computers with special software. lEPs are specifically designed and annually updated to meet the unique and changing needs of each child who is blind.

Most children with low vision are taught to read using their residual vision. Their lEPs usually include the goals of using low vision aids and large type to read print. They also may use felt tip pens, wide-lined paper, or typewriters for writing, and personal computers with special software for both reading and writing.

Children who are blind or have low vision need to learn to use their other senses to provide information they miss through their eyes. Listening skills are especially impor­tant. Blind children are not born with better hearing. Their hearing may be normal, below normal, or they may be hearing impaired or deaf. If they have any hearing ability they need to learn to use it as efficiently as possible. lEPs usually include the goal of teaching discrimination of near-far, loud-soft, high-low, and of ignoring distracting back­ground noises.

Children who are blind or have low vision usually have more difficulty with orientation of their bodies in space and movement in their spatial environments than normal vision children. Most teachers need to include lessons in orientation and mobility (O&M) to the lEPs of visually-impaired students. These lessons are usually given by trained O&M instructors in conjunction with regular edu­cation teachers. The long cane used in O&M both serves as a probe and bumper for its user, and also signals sighted persons that its user is visually impaired. Only a very small percentage of visually-impaired students use guide dogs. If a student has a guide dog, the teacher and sighted student must learn to treat the dog as a working guide, not as a pet. Most persons with visual impairments occasionally use sighted persons as guides. Teachers and sighted students need to learn how to guide their blind or low vision friends with a few simple dos and don'ts.

Each child with low vision needs to feel accepted by his or her more visually abled peers. The teacher plays a major role in encouraging positive interactions between children with and without visual impairments. The teacher should discuss each child's special visual needs with the class. Having one's very own personal computer, televi­sion, talking calculator, or other intriguing piece of techno logical equipment may be viewed as favoritism. The need for the equipment should be explained fully at the begin­ning of the school year and whenever questioned during the remainder of the school year. With each new school year, and with each technological change, more explana­tions are required to help children without visual impair­ments understand the special child's needs.

The first article selected for this unit examines the efficacy of classroom special services for low vision stu­dents. In most classrooms, the use of technological equip­ment lags behind the students' needs. The next article suggests an efficient way for public schools with blind or low vision students in regular classrooms to utilize the services of schools for the blind. Residential schools can provide a wide range of services to mainstreamed chil­dren on an intermittent basis. The last article in this unit addresses the education of children who have hearing impairments in addition to visual impairments. Children who are deaf-blind have many special needs. This selec­tion is concerned with teaching students who are deaf-blind to make choices and develop independence.

Looking Ahead: Challenge Questions

How many low vision students who qualify for special educational services are actually receiving them, accord­ing to the article "Efficacy of Low Vision Services for Visually Impaired Children"?

Is it possible for public schools and residential schools for the blind to collaborate? Can children in inclusive education programs be pulled out to residential schools for occasional hands-on instruction?

How can choice making be taught to students who are deaf-blind?

THE CONTEMPORARY HEREDITY-ENVIRONMENT CONTROVERSY

As we have just seen, Sandra Scarr believes that heredity plays a powerful role in children's development. Her theory of genotype → environment effects essentially states that genotypes drive experiences. Scarr also stresses that unless a child's family is specifically abusive or fails to provide what she calls "average expectable" conditions in which the species has evolved, parental differences in child rearing styles, social class, and income have small effects on differences in children's intelligence, personality, and interests. Scarr also has presented the provocative view that biology makes nonrisk infants invul­nerable to lasting, negative effects of day care. In sum, Scarr stresses that except in extreme instances of abused and at-risk children, environmental experiences play a minimal, if any, role in determining differences in children's cognitive and socio-emotional development.

Not surprisingly, Scarr's beliefs have generated consider­able controversy in the field of child development. Among Scarr's critics, Diana Baumrind (1993), Eleanor Maccoby (1992), and Jacquelyne Jackson (1993) point to a number of loopholes in her arguments. They conclude that Scarr has not adequately defined what an "average expectable" environment is, that good parenting optimizes both normal and vulnerable children's development, and that her interpretations of behav­ior genetics studies go far beyond what is possible, given their inherit limitations.

Scarr (1993) responds to such criticisms by arguing that understanding children's development requires describing it under the umbrella of evolutionary theory and that many de-velopmentalists do not adequately give attention to the impor­tant role that biology plays in children's development. She, as well as other biologically-oriented theorists (Goldsmith, in press; Wachs, in press), feel their critics often misinterpret what they say. Scarr says that social reformers oppose her ideas be­cause they believe they cause pessimism for social change. She responds that she is simply motivated to discover the facts about the roles of genes and environment in determining human de­velopment. Scarr says that all children should have an oppor­tunity to become species-normal, culturally appropriate, and uniquely themselves—their own versions of Georgia O'Keefe and Martin Luther King. She continues that many children in today's world lack those opportunities and that their needs should be addressed. However, she concludes that humanitar­ian concerns should not drive developmental theory and that developmental theory has to have a strong biological orienta­tion to be accurate.

In conclusion, virtually all developmentalists today are interactionists in that they believe heredity and environment interact to determine children's development. However, in their effort to more precisely determine heredity's and en­vironment's role, Scarr argues that heredity plays a power­ful role in heredity-environmental interaction, while Baumrind, Maccoby, and Jackson believe the environment is a much stronger influence on children's development than Scarr acknowledges.

Conclusions About Heredity-Environment Interaction

In sum, both genes and environment are necessary for a person to even exist. Heredity and environment operate together—or cooperate—to produce a person's intelligence, temperament, height, weight, ability to pitch a baseball, reading talents, and so on. Without genes, there is no person; without envi­ronment, there is no person. If an attractive, popular, intelligent girl is elected president of her se­nior class in high school, should we conclude that her success is due to heredity or due to environment? Of course, the answer is both. Because the environment's influence depends on geneti­cally endowed characteristics, we say the two factors interact.

SOME GUIDELINES FOR SEEKING THERAPY

WHEN AП ADOLESCENT SHOWS PROBLEM BEHAVIORS

Determining whether an ado­lescent needs professional help when she or he engages in problem behaviors is not an easy task. Adolescents, by nature, tend to have mer­curial moods and engage in behaviors that are distasteful to adults and ran counter to their values. In many cases, though, such behaviors are only part of the ado­lescent's search for identity, are normal, and do not require professional help. Too often when an adolescent first shows a problem behavior, such as drinking or stealing, parents panic and fear that their adolescent is going to turn into a drug ad­dict or a hardened criminal. Such fears are usually not warranted - virtually every adolescent drinks alcohol at some point in their transition from childhood to adulthood, and, likewise, virtually every adolescent engages in at least one or more acts of juvenile delinquency. By overre­acting to such initial occurrences of ado­lescent problem behaviors, parents can exacerbate their relationship with the adolescent and thereby contribute to in­creased parent-adolescent conflict.

What are the circumstances under which parents should seek professional help for their adolescent's problems? Laurence Steinberg and Ann Levine (1990) developed five guidelines for de­termining when to get professional help if an adolescent is showing prob­lem behaviors:

• If the adolescent is showing severe problem behaviors, such as depression, anorexia nervosa, drug addiction, re­peated delinquent acts, or serious school-related problems, parents should not try to treat these problems alone and probably should seek profes­sional help for the adolescent.

• If the adolescent has a problem, but the parents do not know what the problem is, they may want to seek professional help for the adolescent. An example is an adolescent who is socially with­ drawn and doesn't have many friends, which could be due to extreme shyness, depression, stress at school, drug in­volvement, or any of a number of other reasons. If parents do not know what the adolescent's problem is, how can they help the adolescent? Professionals can often make specific diagnoses and provide recommendations for helping the adolescent.

• If parents have tried to solve the adolescent's problem but have not been successful and the problem continues to disrupt the adolescent's life, then parents may wish to seek professional help for the adolescent. Frequent truancy, chronic running away, or repeated, hostile opposition to authority are examples of such problems.

• If parents realize they are part of the adolescent's problem, they may wish to seek professional help for the family. Constant, intense, bitter fighting that disrupts the everyday living of the fam­ily is a good example. Rarely is one in­dividual the single cause of extensive family dissension. A therapist can objectively analyze the family's problems and help the family members to see why they are fighting so much and to find ways to reduce the fighting.

• When the family is under extensive stress (from the death of a family member or a divorce, for example) and the adolescent is not coping well (for example, becomes depressed or drinks a lot), professional help may be needed.

STRESS MANAGEMENT

Because many people have difficulty in managing stress them­selves, psychologists have developed a variety of stress manage­ment programs that can be taught to individuals. Stress man­agement programs are often taught through workshops, which are increasingly offered in the workplace (Taylor, 1991). Aware of the high cost of productivity lost to stress-related disorders, many organizations have become increasingly motivated to help their workers identify and cope with stressful circumstances in their lives. Some stress management programs are broad in scope, teaching a variety of techniques to handle stress; others are more narrow, teaching a specific technique, such as relaxation or assertiveness training. Some stress management programs are also taught to individuals who are experiencing similar kinds of problems—such as migraine headache sufferers or individuals with chronically high blood pressure. Colleges are increasingly developing stress management programs for students. If you are finding the experience of college extremely stressful and are hav­ing difficulty coping with taxing circumstances in your life, you might want to consider enrolling in a stress management pro­gram at your college or in your community. Let's now examine one of the techniques used in many stress management programs—relaxation training.

How relaxed are you right now? Would you like to feel more tranquil and peaceful? If so, you can probably reach that feeling state by following some simple instructions. First, you need to find a quiet place to sit. Get a comfortable chair and sit quietly and upright in it. Let your chin rest comfortably on your chest, your arms in your lap. Close your eyes. Then pay atten­tion to your breathing. Every time you inhale and every time you exhale, notice it and pay attention to the sensations of air flowing through your body, the feeling of your lungs filling and emptying. After you have done this for several breaths, begin to repeat silently to yourself a single word every time you breathe out. The word you choose does not have to mean anything. You can make the word up, you could use the word one, or you could try a word that is associated with the emotion you want to produce, such as trust, love, patience, or happy. Try several different words to see which one works best for you. At first, you will find that thoughts intrude and you are no longer at­tending to your breathing. Just return to your breathing and say the word each time you exhale. After you have practiced this ex­ercise for 10 to 15 minutes, twice a day, every day for 2 weeks, you will be ready for a shortened version. If you notice stress­ful thoughts or circumstances appearing, simply engage in the relaxation response on the spot for several minutes. If you are in public, you don't have to close your eyes, just fix your gaze on some nearby object, attend to your breathing, and say your word silently every time you exhale.

Audiotapes that induce the relaxation response are avail­able in most bookstores. They usually include soothing back­ground music along with instructions for how to induce the re­laxation response. These audiotapes can especially help induce a more relaxed state before you go to bed at night.

ADOLESCENT PROBLEMS AND DISORDERS

What are some of the major problems that adolescents may en­counter? They include drug and alcohol abuse, delinquency, adolescent pregnancy, suicide, and eating disorders.

Drugs

The 1960s and 1970s were a time of marked increases in the use of illicit drugs. During the social and political unrest of those years, many youth turned to marijuana, stimulants, and hallu­cinogens. Increases in alcohol consumption by adolescents also were noted. More precise data about drug use by adolescents have been collected in recent years. Each year since 1975, Lloyd Johnston, Patrick O'Malley, and Gerald Bachman, working at the Institute of Social Research at the University of Michigan, have carefully monitored drug use by America's high school seniors in a wide range of public and private high schools. From time to time, they also sample the drug use of younger adolescents and adults as well.

In the most recent survey, a downward trend of drug use by adolescents in the first several years of the 1990s was reversed. In 1993, adolescents showed a sharp rise in marijuana use, as well as an increase in the use of stimulants, LSD, and m-halents. An increase in cigarette smoking also occurred. A special concern is the increased use of drugs by young adolescents. Also, it is im­portant to note that adolescents in the United States have the highest rate of drug use among the world's industrialized na­tions. Let's further examine the use of alcohol and cocaine by adolescents.

Alcohol

Some mornings, 15-year-old Annie was too drunk to go to school. Other days, she'd stop for a couple of beers or a screw­driver on the way to school. She was tall, blonde, and good looking, and no one who sold her liquor, even at 8:00 in the morning, questioned her age. Where did she get her money? She got it from baby-sitting and from what her mother gave her to buy lunch. Annie used to be a cheerleader, but no longer; she was kicked off the squad for missing practice so often. Soon, she and several of her peers were drinking almost ever}' morn­ing. Sometimes, they skipped school and went to the woods to drink. Annie's whole life began to revolve around her drinking. This routine went on for 2 years. After a while, Annie's parents discovered her problem. Even though they punished her, it did not stop her drinking. Finally, this year, Annie started dating a boy she really liked and who would not put up with her drink­ing. She agreed to go to Alcoholics Anonymous and has just successfully completed treatment. She has abstained from drinking for 4 consecutive months now, and she hopes that her abstinence will continue.