Presentation Outline from the Foreign Language and Disability TeleTraining

i. Learning Disabilities Overview

a. definitions (National Joint Committee on Learning Disabilities)

Learning disabilities is a general term that refers to a heterogeneous group of disorders manifested by significant difficulties in the acquisition and use of listening, speaking, reading, writing, reasoning, or mathematical abilities.

• due to central nervous system dysfunction
• may occur across the life span.
• problems in self regulatory behaviors, social perception, and social interaction may accompany LDs.
• although learning disabilities may occur concomitantly with other handicapping conditions (for example, sensory impairment, mental retardation, serious emotional disturbance)
• extrinsic influences (such as cultural differences, insufficient or inappropriate instruction), they are not the result of those conditions or influences.
• LDs cannot be cured or treated with medication, only rehabilitated through remedial, teaching, compensatory strategies, and accommodation

ADHD Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder is a neurologically based disorder present at birth that is caused by a deficiency of a specific neurotransmitter in a specific set of brain circuits. Symptoms: easily distracted, impulsive, extremely fidgety. If symptoms are situation or appear later in life, they are probably linked to anxiety or depression.
ADHD can be treated with medication that raises the level of that neurotransmitter.

b. prevalence in our college classrooms:

• about 1 in 9 students entering college today disclose a disability of some kind;
• a very high percentage of those disabilities disclosed are LD, although the percentage varies depending on whether ADHD is included in that category

• Sally Shaywitz, author of Overcoming Dyslexia (2004), estimates that 1 in 5 people have significant difficulty reading & processing phonological systems (this holds true across cultures)

c. language learning continuum:

• not all students w/LDs manifest their disability in the same way in the foreign language class
• students w/ LD and students who do not have LD may struggle equally in a foreign language class
• students with LD shouldn’t be assumed to group at the lower end of the language learning continuum
• Ann Sax Mabbott has provided case studies of several students with LDs who are successful language learners and who, in some cases, even became foreign language teachers

• foreign language anxiety is a different issue (according to Elaine Horwitz, as many as 1/3 of FL learners have “anxiety”) that puts students on the same continuum

ii. Complications

a. manifestation of learning disability in college foreign language class

• student may never have been tested because of:

1) gender

2) family attitudes

3) resources, etc.

4) faster pace of college course reveals LD that student is unaware of

b. lack of self advocacy skills or unwillingness to register for approved accommodations

• many students w/ disabilities do not have self advocacy skills
• Keeping the range of students in my classroom in mind, I most often offer an “accommodation” measure to everyone.

c. differing “expert” perspectives:

Shaywitz seems to consider any FL requirement undue hardship for students w/ dyslexia and heartily recommends the substitution of “culture courses”

• something to her argument: good learning cannot “cure” these students and depending on the severity of the disorder, asking a student to learn, articulate, and recall a new phonological system is tantamount to asking someone with a mobility impairment to climb ten flights of stairs
• some larger schools (CU BoulderSpanish, and now several others) are able to offer a distinct track with slower pace and modified curriculum for students diagnosed with dyslexia most of us are probably faced with either granting substitutions and exemptions or learning how to teach these students. This approach is certainly the most inclusive, given the numbers of students who struggle in our classes but are not legally eligible for accommodation

iii. Foundations for Success

a. offer a clear and detailed statement on syllabus inviting collaboration (with examples of possible arrangements)what would you be willing to do to enable the success of any student, a particular struggling student

• extended test time
• common set of class notes (either student generated or teacher generated)
• extra review sessions before exams
• extra credit for sessions with tutors, attendance at extracurricular, cocurricular events

 
b. build a respectful, collaborative relationship with individual student who is struggling

c. listen: ask them how they have succeeded in other courses, but be ready for an incomplete answer; they may not be the experts we hope they will be in this collaboration, and we have to manage a very delicate communication process and be open to experimentation

d. offer advice: how might similar strategies or technologies enable success in the foreign language classroom?

e. enable autonomy: help students build partnerships across the campus (DSS, Computing Services

iv. UDI strategies in the classroom (Universal Design in Instruction) certain instructional principles improve learning outcomes for every student

a. brain network à UDI principle

• enhance discussions of the four modes of FL encounters: listening, speaking, reading, and writing, with discussions of brain networks as described in “New Technologies and Universal Design” by Strangman, Meyer, Hall, and Proctor at the Center for Applied and Special Technologies (www.cast.org)

• recognition networks (receive and analyze information, recognize patterns, concepts, and relationships: what? )

1) offer multiple, flexible methods of presentation strategic networks (problemsolving, strategies for action: how?)

2) offer multiple, flexible methods of demonstrating what they know affective networks (motivation, establishing priorities: why?)

3) offer multiple, flexible options for engagement to help students get motivated

b. many things an engaged foreign language teacher already does reflect these principles

• creating predictable lessons (for example: warmup, review, new vocab, new
• grammar, synthesis activity)
• engaging multiple learning modes: combining visual, aural, oral, written, and
• kinesthetic modes of learning
• recycling material in new contexts; embedding new material in the familiar
• scaffolding: completing tasks incrementally

• using technology in meaningful ways
• storing lessons and realia in format that students can access outside of class
• using color coding to cue differences in morphology and syntax
• fostering metacognitive skills: checklists, timetables, explicit
• instruction of study skills and learning styles
• encouraging immersion experiences

c. more innovative strategies

• using modular grading rubrics (that is, let students decide how they wish for their grade to be calculated); may wish to let them choose at the beginning of the semester or let them change as they progress through the semester and discover their FL strengths

1) 40% written exams, 30% oral exams, 30% writing assignments

2) 20% written exams, 50% oral exams, 30% writing assignments

• invite good tutors or learning specialists to your class to share good study skills
• and introduce “real” peer tutors to your students to alleviate the stigma that may surround asking for help
• bridge skills: offer assignments that link a strength to a more tenuous skill. Allow a student (or all students) to produce an original movie and add text or subtitles to it using Windows Media Player
• building websites
• (continuing to) engage students personally in material to build confidence: use of journals = more regular writing, lower register perhaps, yes, but also much higher yield (in terms of quantity); occasional assignment to select an entry and formalize it for submission for a grade

v. Accommodations Tailored to Student

a. extended time

b. allow student to dictate written work to a (student) scribe

c. tests in alternative formats (delivered or completed orally, eversion that allows spell check

d. alternative assignments

e. ask the student if she or he would prefer not to be called on to read aloud or speak in class; instead, allow the student to prepare input in advance

f. make use of technology

•  audio books
•  for students to access work: Kurzweil 3000: reads French, German, Spanish well—program that converts printed test to an audio file: must simply select language to be scanned in the OCR box and language to be spoken in the speaker box
• for students to produce work: FL version of Dragon Naturally Speaking: buy the foreign language version of the software ($200 for the preferred version in French or Spanish)

1) Train yourself in the use of these technologies to better help the student learn their use but also so that you understand the extra time and work that may be required of students using various programs to produce work

2) Most students need your guidance and gentle leadership throughout this process

vi. Conclusion

We all perceive the world around us through our deficits; we cannot cure a student with learning disabilities, and a student cannot reasonably be expected to overcome an impairment in a few semesters. We can, however, work together to build skills the student can and will want to continue to develop in order to have a lifelong relationship with another language and culture.

Resources cited

LazdaCazers, Rasma and Helga Thorson. “Teaching Foreign Languages to Students with Disabilities: Initiatives to Educate Faculty in Worlds Apart? Disability and Foreign Language Learning. Ed. Tammy Berberi, Elizabeth Hamilton, and Ian Sutherland. Yale University Press, 2008.

Strangman, Nicole, Ann Meyer, Hall, and Proctor. “Technologies and Universal Design for Learning in the Foreign Language Classroom,” in Worlds Apart?

Shaywitz, Sally. Overcoming Dyslexia. Alfred A Knopf Publishers, 2004.

Web site for National Joint Committee on Learning Disabilities http://www.ldonline.org/about/partners/njcld (accessed 2 November 2007)

DISFL listserv for ongoing discussions of effective teaching strategies: DISFL@lists.umn.edu or email Tammy Berberi to subscribe (see header).