Last week, in class, Dr. Lashley made the comment that "kids will meet the expectations you set for them!" This led me to think about my interest in learned helplessness. In my research, I understand that parent and teacher expectations play a huge role in how students live their lives. If they believe that they will not be successful no matter how hard they try, they eventually give up on trying.
If teachers and parents convey the attitude that the student is unable to do things on his or her own, the student will eventually come to believe the same thing. When a student does not believe he or she can be successful, he or she may not develop self advocacy skills and may become dependent on others. According to Test, Fowler, Wood, Brewer, and Eddy (2005), self advocacy pertains to four domains: (a) knowledge of self, (b) knowledge of rights, (c) communication, and (d) leadership. The first domain of self advocacy listed above is knowledge of self, which is also an important domain in self-determination. Royal (1992) states that evidence indicates self-determination is altered by events or contexts. A person’s past experiences, whether successful or not, may affect whether or not he or she engages in goal-directed or self-regulated behavior.
Self-determination enables a person to engage in goal-directed behavior which may in turn cause that person to utilize self advocacy skills. For example, a student, who needs extended testing times made available to him or her, would like to pursue a goal of passing a test. The student will likely take the necessary steps to achieve that goal. The student will study and prepare for the test and be cognizant of the fact that he or she needs to ask for additional time to successfully complete the test. The student will make arrangements for extended time with the teacher before the day of the test by using the self advocacy skill of talking with the teacher about testing needs. By taking these steps, this will help the student to be successful in the testing environment and ultimately, to pursue the goal of achieving a good test score.
The example above illustrates a student who successfully uses self advocacy skills to compensate for learning needs. Students with deafness and hearing loss need to display these same self advocacy skills by being proactive in setting themselves up for success in the general education setting. If we, as a society, place low expectations on a certain population due to stereotypes or misconceptions, we run the risk of causing more failures than successes to occur. Some of us need to make a mental shift and change our paradigms or ways of thinking.
We need to raise the bar and hold higher expectations. While some may need adaptations or may take longer to complete a task, we should still expect for the task to be completed. I think that sometimes people are quick to overcompensate, especially in the field of disabilities. Think about when the American with Disabilities Act (ADA) was passed in 1990….a flurry of accommodations and changes were put in place to provide equal access to public buildings, etc. I’m not disagreeing, by any means, with the importance and need for having equal access but at the same time, we need to be realistic about our expectations and what we’re implying by our actions (i.e., is it necessary to have Braille on a drive up ATM at a bank???). If you’ll recall one of my earlier blogs, I mentioned after school jobs….well, take a quick break and watch this 3 minute and 33 second video that talks about the ADA and some of the consequences it has had on employment…. http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/201009020003
References
Royal, C. (1992, Fall). The road to personal freedom. OSERS News in Print, 5(2), 9-12.
Test, D., Fowler, C., Wood, W., Brewer, D., & Eddy, S. (2005). A conceptual framework of self-advocacy for students with disabilities. Remedial and Special Education, 26, 43-54.
No comments:
Post a Comment