I’ve decided to create a Twine activity based on my experiences working at a private school for students with learning disabilities. Check out my twine on What to do if your student refuses to write.

I have to admit that my Twine was not created as smoothly as I’d like it to be. I wanted to bring in my experiences working with young children who have difficulties expressing themselves and I realized that may not be the right topic for a Twine activity, but I think it has a strong tie to this week’s focus.

A couple of years ago when I first started teaching, one of my first jobs was working in a private school for students with learning disabilities. Not all of the students at that school were diagnosed with learning disabilities. Some students were either suspected and are undergoing assessments, some students were in between schools due to behaviour issues, and some were there because of safety or family issues. What I quickly learned was that writing and sharing thoughts and connections were a huge problem among these students. Aside from the obvious challenges such as some students with visible physical mobility issues that required full-time one-on-one support, or some students with lower capabilities and were unable to speak or express themselves cohesively. The students that were able to hold a pencil but unwilling to write usually shared some common traits. They have reasons leading to the refusal of expressing themselves through the traditional paper and pencil method, we just needed to understand why and how to proceed with the learning without pencils.

The great thing about private schools is that it caps the total amount of students in a class and almost every student is able to have their own educational assistant. This way, learning can be modified to meet each student’s needs.

Meanwhile, with the advancement of technology, these young learners could learn to express themselves through different venue and media. As Bolter noted, “In using these facilities, the writer is thinking and writing in terms of verbal units or topics, whose meaning transcends their constitu­ent word” (2001, p.29). By allowing these students to express themselves using iPads, voice-to-text tools, and various mediums to express themselves, they were able to create wonderful presentations and stories that were previously unheard of by parents and caretakers. They were given the opportunity to speak on their behalf and to express themselves freely because they were no longer restricted to using a pencil. Leaving the traditional learning method behind, “we can rethink information beyond material constraints” (Wesch, 2008) and allow for more room for ways of expression to making connections.

I had a wonderful year of great opportunities to learn from these students and these experiences were unforgettable. I do think we can apply these learning methods to our mainstream classrooms; however, the lack of funding for public schools dampers opportunity of many who are unable to afford to experience various technologies for creative expression. Some schools were fortunate enough to receive funding for the year but do not guarantee the students will be able to continue using those technology year after year.

References

Bolter, Jay David. (2001). Writing space: computers, hypertext, and the remediation of print. New York, NY: Routledge.

Wesch, M. (2008, October 12). Information R/evolution [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4CV05HyAbM&feature=emb_logo