I was talking to the husband of a ex-colleague of mine, asking about how his eldest son was doing, when he told me how frustrated he had been with the education system and how he felt that his son had been cheated out of the education he deserved.
Remember, I had worked with his wife, and I knew a little about how his son was struggling in school but I assumed that his mother, a teacher, was able to handle the system and get her son the support he needed.
Seems that it hadn’t happened that way.
Despite having a mother who is a well qualified and experienced teacher and a father who is willing to go to bat for his child, this boy still did not get the education he needed to become all that he could be.
This boy, let us call him John, had difficulties learning to read and to write. I suspect his language development was delayed for some reason. His visual and motor skills are excellent and, given a broken computer he can soon work out how fix it. However, his poor language development led to problems when it came to spelling and writing and as a result, he found it very difficult to pass tests and exams.
John is doing well. He has found a job where he can use his practical skills and his future looks bright.
What had caused his father to express his frustration with the school system was the news that, because of education spending cuts, parents of children with special educational needs were complaining that services to their children would be reduced. For some parents this meant that their child would get less time with an educational assistant, or getting speech therapy.
John’s father did not object to these children getting these extra services, but he wondered why his son did not get the special support that would have helped him with his learning problems. He wondered why being designated as in need of special educational support meant that a child could get the help he or she needed while his son, not thought of as being in need of special support was left to struggle in the classroom.
These were my answers, see if you agree with me;
1. The students who stand out in class for some particular reason, they are bright, or handicapped, or way behind their classmates, become eligible for the kind of assessment that gives them access to extra funding and extra support. Those children who are struggling in class may never get on this list and, therefore, never get close to getting the support they need,
2. If a student is good in one area of work- in John’s case fixing things- it is assumed that he or she has the ability to be good in other areas and that they will probably catch up given time.
3. Teachers are not trained to understand why students have learning problems. They are only aware of the children whose learning problems are so great that they cannot be ignored.
4. Teachers are expected to be able to teach all students in their class. If a child is struggling to learn they are expected to know what to do to help that child overcome their learning difficulty. But they don’t. See # 3 above.
5. Grey area students – those who are having learning difficulties – tend to blame them selves for their issues. They know that they are clever in some areas of learning and wonder why they struggle in others. They tend to keep quiet and to put up with what they are given in terms of teaching support. From the teacher’s perspective they are easy to ignore!
6. Parents don’t know how to express their concern about their child’s learning. I have come across this situation time and time again. A parent is worried about their child’s progress in school but, rather than go to the teacher to ask for information and advice, the parent tries to help with homework, or gets a tutor or buys some workbooks in an attempt to help their child become a better learner. This may work, but why not make sure that the teacher knows your child is having difficulties doing school work then he or she can do something about it?
7. Education systems cannot fund extra support for all students who need it. They just can’t, there is no way any school system has the money to cover every child’s learning needs.
8. Neither do school systems have the funds to train every teacher in how to recognize children with learning issues and to know how to help them overcome them.
John’s father felt that his son had been short changed by the school system, and I agreed with him.
But if a school system cannot give s child the support he or she needs parents must.
Otherwise we are failing a large percentage of student.
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