Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Assessment 2- Report
During my observation on the first day, there is one child who has taken my interest.
The child name is Hamad, he is four years old and from the UAE. I observed Hamad for
one month and I have reached some information about him of the possibility of having
autism.
In my opinion, he has autism. The reason why I think that he is autistic is because I
tried to talk to him but he did not response my instructions which made me think that
he has hearing impairment but after observing him I noticed that he is repeating some
words and songs which assured me that he can hear but my words are not important to
him. Also, I tracked his eyes and I realized that he doesnt have any eye contact. All of his
behaviors are associated with the definition of autism as Autism Speaks website
Autism?," 2017).
There are two different ways the teacher can use it to help people with the
determination to learn better and to ease their learning. First, the accommodation that
means providing supports for the people of determination to help them to learn without
changing the curriculum. Such as, changing the environment. Second, the modification
that means removing some of the curriculum (General Rules, p. 29, n.d.). For Hamad
who is possibly autistic, I suggest two accommodations. First, seating him beside the
teacher on the carpet or on a chair so as not to distract the attention of other students or
to be distracted by them. Second, picture the rules and the schedule. An autistic child
needs a visual representation to understand the instructions and to know what is going
to happen because they don't pay attention for what we are saying ("Accommodations
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and Supports," 2014). For example when Hamad was eating and he wanted to play we
showed him a picture of a boy eating food and a picture of games and we kept pointing
on the pictures to understand that first he should eat then he will play and it worked
with him. Also, I suggest two modifications. First, I would modify the tasks in the gym
class according to what he likes to do. For example, Hamad like to run in circles more
than walking between the cones thats why I would let him run and skip the task where
he's required to walk between the cones. Second, I would require the student to cover
less complex tasks in the classroom activities students are required to cut the pictures
and to stick them or do whatever the activity requires but for Hamad he must do
something that is less complex such as tearing the papers and sticking them instead of
cutting on the line because he is not ready yet to use the scissor.
There are many strategies that a classroom teacher can use to help her in classes that
include an autistic child, such as, reinforcing the positive behavior. I noticed that Hamad
sit in his place and behave when he sees the teacher is choosing children to put stickers
beside their names which strengths skinners method. According to skinner (1904-
individual finds rewarding"(McLeod, 2015). The second strategy is to model what she
wants the autistic child to do. For example, if the teacher wants him to clean up she must
hold his hand and show him that he should clean up (Flynn, n.d.). Also, the teacher
should provide a manipulative such as play dough or a small ball to keep the autistic
child busy squeezing the ball and playing with the play dough instead of touching the
other materials and disturbing other children and its helpful to strength his hand's
muscles as well.
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Every special needs child should have an IEP that stands for Individualized Education
Program. Its a document includes information about the special needs student such as,
his strength and weakness, the goals that he is required to meet, what he needs to meet
these goals and a method to assess his development ("Individualized Education," 2016).
The IEP includes Piagets four domains of development, which they are: cognitive,
motor, social-emotional and linguistic (Bartolotta & Shulman, p. 35, n.d.). The learning
objectives that I would include in the IEP for the autistic child are meant to support the
four domains.
Cognitive: Students will be able to sort the objects according to their colors.
Activity: Button sorting. The child will sort the buttons on the colored baskets according
to their colors.
Motor: The child will be able to perform movements using his hands and fingers
Activity: Music and movements. I will play 'Baby Shark' video song and the child will
Activity: Facial expressions. I will show the child the flashcard that includes a facial
Activity: Flashcards. I will show the child a picture of a color and I will ask the child, is
this your favorite color? If the child did not give me a verbal answer I will repeat the
question and I will reinforce his answer to encourage him to talk and answer my
questions.
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Classes with autistic children should be provided with assistive devices to ease the
learning process. In my teaching practice this semester I did not see my MST using any
assistive device that made teaching the autistic very difficult for her. In my opinion,
teachers should use a variety of assistive devices such as speech-generating devices. Its
a tablet that has been designed to develop language and communication skills. Its
include an app called "matrix training" children can select images and the app will say
what they want to say. In taking into account that autistic children have difficulties with
their fine motor skills, writing words might be exhausting because their hand's muscles
are weak. By providing the portable word processor device it would be easier to them to
write and it would make it easier for the teacher to read what they have written because
this device will help them to correct their writing (Morrissey, 2017).
disorder that I think that Hamad has it because of his characteristics and the way he is
acting correspond to the characteristics of children with autism. On the other hand, I
think I failed in making a variety suitable and interesting activities for Hamad when I
taught the class because he was not interested in most of them. He was doing the
activity for one minute and he is moving because he is done with it. Although I failed the
whole month, I kept trying and I succeed in engaging him one time by grabbing his
attention with the music. According to Montessori (1870-1952), "every child has
musical potential and all children are able to learn and express themselves
musically"(Burns, 2017). Her words worked with me because when I applied her
method by playing The phonics song' Hamad was engaged and he was doing the hands
movements. Which also helped to develop his fine-motor skills by moving his fingers
and gross-motor skills by moving his body part. This strategy worked well for me
because the song attracted his attention and instead of running and hitting his friends he
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wanted to complete listening to the song and doing the movement until the end. Every
child has the ability to learn, applying different strategies and using the assistive devices
will help the teachers to run their lessons smoothly without difficulties.
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References:
Individualized education plan (IEP). (2016). Retrieved November 18, 2017, from
http://www.autism-society.org/living-with-autism/autism-through-the-
lifespan/
school-age/educational-mandates/individualized-education-plan-iep/