Term Paper (inclusion).docx

Term paper Topic- Problems of children with Hearing Impairment in understanding social science subject. Submitted to: Dr.Vandana Saxena Submitted by: Priya Arora M.Ed (2nd yr)

Contents 1. Introduction

2. Methods 3. Findings 4. Discussion 5. Conclusion References.........

Introduction Millions of children attend elementary, middle and high schools throughout the country to be instructed by teachers within six major subjects. Out of six main subjects taught in academic schools, social studies has been proven as one of the most difficult yet complex subjects among students especially the deaf and hard of hearing students. It has been noted where social studies, elaborate and diverse as it may be, have created an environment where most students have the tendency to associate this subject with negative attitude and experiences. Critical factors contribute to the overall decline interest in socials studies such as lack of strong teacher to student relationship, the complexity of materials, and/or the constant repetition of old information.Social Studies courses aimed to promote the development of critical thinking skills in students. This study focused on the problems of students with hearing loss in understanding social science subject in an inclusive learning environment of ITL International School Dwarka Sec 9. A considerable data were collected through observations and interviews. The issue of disabilities has been gaining recognition worldwide. This is due to the fact that the levels of disabilities appear to be on the increase in most societies. Students with hearing impairment are more vulnerable to a number of problems that hinder their learning capability. Most of them suffer from social maladjustment, psychological problems, emotional disturbances, and difficulties in interpersonal relationships, having poor selfconcept and personality problems(Heward,2006).Students with hearing impairment, therefore, need special education that will address the student individual differences and needs. Ideally, this process involves the individually planned and systematically monitored arrangement of teaching procedures, adapted equipments and materials, accessible settings, and other interventions designed to help learners with special needs to achieve a higher level of personal self-sufficiency and success in school and community than would be available if the students were only given access to a typical classroom education (Heward, 2006).The right to education is universal and extends to include all children in spite of their sex,color,ability, disability or their social status.These principles of social justice, equity and basic human rights were advocated by various international declarations including the World Declaration of Education for All (EFA) of 1990, the Salamanca Statement of 1994, and the Convention on the Right of Child (UNESCO) of 1989. Since the 1990’s inclusive schools movements have become the basis for educational reforms in many countries in the world. For the last two decades international policy on development has turned focus on providing quality education for all learners within the mainstream classes, thereby removing the stigma and stereotyping of learners with barriers to learning (Prinsloo,2001).This significant shift from special education to inclusive education around the world both developed and developing countries aimed at including the children with special needs into mainstreams classes rather than educating them in an isolated environment (Chalmers, 1998).Therefore,in order for children with special needs to enjoy the same access to education like the other children is to enroll them in the inclusive classrooms.Special education has however different approaches such as inclusion approach whereby students with special educational needs spend all, or at least more than half of the school day with students who do not have special educational needs. Because inclusion can require substantial modification of the general curriculum, most schools use it only for selected students with mild to moderate special needs. Such approach is accepted as a best practice specialized services may be provided inside or outside the regular

classroom, depending on the type of service. Students may occasionally leave the regular classroom to attend smaller, more intensive instructional sessions in a resource room, or to receive other related services that might require specialized equipment or might be disruptive to the rest of the class.The study concludes that hearing impaired students are a special population within the school who require accommodations especially in the class that would ease their learning experience and providing opportunities for class participation, encouraging turn taking during class discussions and allowing extra time during examinations. The main aim of the Social Studies course is to prepare students for social life.Social Studies courses sought to raise citizens who act democratically within the society and make decisions based on knowledge and logic (Zarrillo, 2012). To realize these aims, students need to improve their critical thinking skills, reflect on the discovery, research and inquiry. As a result, students do not remain within their limits and can attain objective thinking skills enriched with new ideas (Levstik and Barton, 2001). In this study, the focus is critical thinking skills, which is one of the aims of the Social Studies course. Critical thinking is a way of thinking that enables the association of connections established between events and facts in mind, by combining experiences and knowledge attained (Ennis, 2011). Critical thinking promotes the use of processes that involve classifying, analyzing, summarizing and synthesizing knowledge. Within the critical thinking process, it is essential to recognize and answer the relevant questions, as well as use these questions effectively (Browne and Keeley,2007). Students with critical thinking skills are able to question the reliability of sources they access rather than just accepting knowledge directly. They can make transfer knowledge more easily and think metacognitively through finding solutions to the problems they face(Bransford,2000).There are a number of key points that should be considered in the Social Studies course for the improvement of critical thinking skills. Teachers are required to prepare activities that involve using multiple strategies, provide students with adequate time to think about the answers to the questions, ask questions and present activities that require the combination of knowledge and experience, model students in ways of thinking (Zarrillo, 2012). In this way, teachers can create active learning environments that ensure continuous student participation. Active learning is a process that select the strategies they will use to attain knowledge (Gagné and Driscoll, 1988). Many studies emphasize the contribution of critical thinking to educational environments (e.g., (Ikuenobe, 2001; Karabulut, 2012)). Given the benefits of critical thinking, research into critical thinking in the field of education has become more popular in Turkey in recent years (Polat, 2015) but critical thinking among students who need special education like students with hearing loss is little investigated. In Social Studies classes, as well as the other classes,strategy teaching should be applied to realize critical thinking. Strategy teaching fosters using knowledge and experience, reaching and understanding the knowledge, promoting autonomous learning in students by allowing students to evaluate themselves and changing their opinion when necessary (Jones et al., 1987). Thus, the following strategies are taught in the Elementary School: (a) identifying and using reference sources (b) organize information usable forms (c) chronology and perception of space (d) interpret of table, diagram and graph (e) comparison (f) critical reasoning (g) decisionmaking and (h) use library, online, or other search tools to locate sources (Ministry of Education, 2016).Many researchers emphasized that using more written, audio and visual documents - along with information and communication technologies in Social Studies classes - is essential for understanding the texts within the course content, as well as for the development of critical perspectives (Buchanan, 2015; Alongi, 2016). Perception of chronology requires important historical events to be approached in a chronological order and for the concepts of past, present and future to be objectified. As a result, the connection between the present and the past can be observed, along with the similarities and differences between events (Obenchain and Morris, 2011). The topics studied in Social Studies courses are related and have effects on each other. Students make use of their past knowledge and experience when interpreting new experience, and they need to establish critical reasoning to analyze the effects of historical events (Steele, 2008). Various studies have emphasized that, in Social Studies classes, there is a tendency among teachers to use traditional methods, to teach topics directly, to secure limited student participation, and to allocate insufficient time to discussions (eg. (Hess, 2002; Seyihoglu and Kartal, 2010; Aksid and Sahin, 2011)). The concepts that are explained through verbal definitions and limited examples thus tend to be memorized without comprehension by students, which leads to a perception of Social Studies being a boring course unrelated to real life (Bailey et al., 2006). In Social Studies classes, reading, analyzing, and making judgments concerning information are all used simultaneously (Sievers, 2005; Steele, 2008). Because of its role in preparing students for life, concepts and topics within Social Studies classes are related to adult life. Thus, students tend to have difficulties in learning the concepts, most of which they are coming across for the first time (Woolsey, 2009). The fact that the time allocated to Social Studies is less than the time allocated to language and mathematics classes, as well as the fact that there is insufficient emphasis on the strategies required for knowledge acquisition, limits students‟ critical thinking skills, which are required for metacognitive thinking and solving real life problems (Fitchett and Heafner, 2010; Hawkman, 2015) In addition

to the traditional approaches in education, the fact that Social Studies requires the use of complex cognitive skills confines the development of critical thinking skills in students with hearing loss who are enrolled in public schools (Boucher, 2010). Along with these issues, inadequate use of the hearing sense in a child’s critical development period affects the functioning of all sense processes (Bolognini,2012). Restrictions on hearing and language input have a negative effect on the development of creativity, abstract thinking, event sequencing, interpretation, summarizing, understanding alternative perspectives, critical reasoning, and time perception (Mayberry, 2002; Eden, 2008). As a result, the conceptual development of students with hearing loss fails to comply with the conceptual development of students with a hearing ability (Geers, 2008; Punch and Hyde, 2010). This problem gives rise to complications in students in terms of critical reasoning between historical or economic events in the past and current events, as well as completing gradual projects (Woolsey,2009). Thus, it is notable that to learn the abstract topics of Social Studies classes, students with hearing loss require a more individualized education than their peers with regular hearing abilities (Shepherd and Acosta-Tello, 2015). Why Social Studies may be a challenge for children with special needs  Children with cognitive delays may not be able to orient themselves in terms of space and time.  Children with reading disabilities may find the content and vocabulary of Social Studies difficult to decode.  Children with a memory deficiency may have trouble retaining the information of Geography and History.

Objectives This study aims to find out the answers to the following questions:  

To examine the problems in teaching and learning of social science subject of hearing impaired students. To find out the practices to address these problems and the way they are carried out in the classroom.

Methods The data was collected from ITL International School Dwarka where students with hearing loss were observed during classroom observations and interviews were taken from teachers and students. One 4th grade student, Two 6th-grade students, and one 11thgrade student with hearing loss enrolled in inclusive School.The students did not have any disabilities other than hearing loss. Data Sources In this study, observations were done of those 4 students. Unstructured and semi structured interviews were done to discuss and analyse the results.(Hesse-Biber and Leavy, 2011).The observation was done in one week.In Social Studies classes, hearing impaired students encountered problems mainly associated with (a) acquiring the meaning of concepts,(b) perceiving time and (c) establishing critical reasoning. Findings are presented below regarding the problems students encountered and decisions regarding a potential solution for these problems. Results and Discussion The data gathered through direct observationand interviews were analysed to find out the problems in teaching learning process of hearing impaired students in understanding social science. To scaffold students to acquire the meaning of the concepts, they were encouraged to discuss the characteristics of the concepts and their places in our lives using photos, pictures, real objects, documentaries and movies. Students were seen to encounter problems in determining the concepts they did not

understand.Students in the Social Studies class were identified to describe various misconceptions. In subsequent interventions, students were observed to be able to express the topics and concepts they did not understand. Looking at the characteristics of the Social Studies course, it is seen that the course content was structured around 10 themes that improve critical thinking and that were identified according to National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) (1994) standards. It was seen that the course books prepared by the MoE (2016) according to these themes included visuals, knowledge and exercises, but they were insufficient for students with hearing loss. For example, there was a map to explain invasions during the War of Independence within the “War of Independence” subject. While this material was helpful for students with regular hearing abilities in understanding the topic, the map was insufficient for students with hearing loss. When discussing this subject, the locations of the invading countries were shown using recent maps and photos taken during the invasion were examined. Events were identified on the timeline and explained through informative texts. This could have stemmed from the delay in the development of linguistic skills due to hearing loss. Punch and Hyde (2010) finding that the conceptual development of students with hearing loss was slower than their peers with regular hearing supports the results of this study. Along with the delay in linguistic skills and the restrictions of the course books, the main problem encountered in the study was the difficulty that students experienced in understanding Social Studies concepts. This problem is in line with the findings of Woolsey,2009). In their study, Woolsey reported that students with regular hearing abilities have difficulty in attaining meanings to concepts, as it is the first time they have heard many of the Social Studies concepts. Consistent with this finding, Bailey (2006) state that when the Social Studies concepts are not associated with real life, they are memorized without comprehension. Furthermore, the delays experienced in linguistic skills due to hearing loss have a negative effect on imagination and abstract thinking. They, therefore, restrict the sequencing and interpreting of events, as well as the critical reasoning and perceiving time (Eden, 2008; Punch and Hyde, 2010). It is well-known that all these skills have an essential role in learning concepts. Hence, two main elements could be cited as causing problems for students regarding acquiring the meaning of concepts and critical reasoning. One of these elements is the fact that Social Studies concepts are abstract and multidimensional and they also have associative characteristics. The other element is the fact that hearing loss restricts abstract and relative thinking (cited from Mortarella by Doganay (2008).students with hearing loss were identified to have problems in acquiring the meaning of concepts in Social Studies classes, perceiving time, and critical reasoning. For the development of these strategies, materials and repetitions are believed to be essential, and this requires more time. Because of the limited number of participants, the results of this study could not be generalized.Recommendations on various interventions for students with hearing loss could be as follows: Increasing the duration of support services could enable students to use the strategies more frequently. To improve critical thinking in support services, interventions could be made based on student research on the concepts. The development of students with support service interventions could be assessed through formal or informal tools and systematic intervals. The study also found that the curriculum was not only unfavorable to children with disabilities (hearing and visual) but was also unfavourable to those without disabilities as it does not acknowledge diversity of the students as expected in a normal inclusive school system.These findings are consistent with those by Mpofu (1999) and Zingoni (2004) who found that most teachers in Zimbabwe mainstream education system are inadequately prepared (cannot read braille, materials, cannot use sign language, etc.) to teach students with special needs. such teachers may obviously do not hold professional aptitude (not trained) to modify the curriculum. Moreover, the new policy of inclusive education has failed to uplift the performance of the hearing impaired students in regular schools compared to special primary schools for the deaf where pupils of the hearing impaired performed much better and led them to join secondary schools.These responses reveal that there is a need of addressing the challenges of teaching and learning of students with hearing impaired enrolled in regular primary and secondary schools in order to find alternative ways to enable them to perform much better academically. The teachers’ responses showed that they faced a number of challenges. Lack of proper syllabus, teaching and learning facilities, lack of in service training for the teachers of special education and the knowhow to facilitate learning of hearing impaired students in inclusive education were at different times mentioned to be the main challenges affecting hearing impaired students in their learning process. The most significant challenge was the lack of teaching and learning facilities for the new syllabus of inclusive education.Lack of teaching facilities based on the hearing impairment was a setback to students’ performance. Moreover poor performance is caused by the lack of sign language during the instruction time, whereby most teachers use normal language such as English making the students of the hearing impaired learners to misunderstand the topics during class .For example, one of the students said: This system of inclusive education does not achieve its intended objectives academically because the schools lack competent teachers in sign language which lead to the use of

normal language in such a way that the hearing impaired students fail to understand. Moreover, the inclusion examination also contributes to such poor performance because the markers and those who set up the examination base on normal language which is not well understood by the hearing impaired students (Discussion with hearing impaired students).Therefore, it can be argued that teacher education needs to equip them with profound conceptual understanding of what is going to be taught in primary and secondary schools. A wrong assumption is that student teachers are competent in subject matter area. Where by such teachers need in-service training in order to come up with competence in sign language and total communication on how to facilitate learning of hearing impaired students in order to have good performance in the new system of inclusive education. The findings have pointed out that the idea of inclusive education system came from above, as there was no study done to support such a claim. Cook (2004) has noted that in several countries in the world, teacher education is not only being called more fully to account for itself, but policies are being drafted which impose particular views of professional development on the way teachers are trained.From the respondents’ point of views, teachers’ incompetence in sign language led to the hearing impaired student’s failure to understand the instruction in the class. In that case they are depended on asking other students of what the topic was all above and what is needed. By the teachers some ordinary students however had low skills and knowledge in that case failed to help them and sometimes misled them. In the same way those specialist teachers for the special need education concentrated in the use of normal language which benefited the normal students while hearing impaired students remained without receiving direct knowledge and skills from their teachers. In order to facilitate learning of hearing impaired students, it is better for those teachers to have in service training in sign language so that they can use total communication at the same time in the class during instruction time and others can interpret when other general teachers are teaching.Based on the findings, it can be argued that teachers for example do not have adequate academic knowledge of sign language.It is worth to note that the best teacher is the one who has good mastery on the subject matter content and has skills to enable him/her to transfer or induce that knowledge of the subject content to learners. (Nydal, 2008). In the 2nd observation (interaction with teacher and all students in social science classroom) The teacher first gave an introduction to all the students in general irrespective of the students’ abilities and needs. In a way, he hasn’t given an adapted education to the diverse ability of the students in introduction part. The teacher created a situation to break the abstract concept into a concrete concept, when he connected the theoretical framework of the problem with practical examples from the students’ daily life. By his way of explanation some students in the class understood the concept. When he explained from simple to abstract he reached more students in understanding the steps to solve the problem. In introduction part the teaching style is less inclusive way but when he went to the students to clarify their doubts then it is more of inclusive class than before. This may be because he might have thought that the introduction part is more general to all and then for the explanation part he had adopted the ability to cater to the diversity of the students because he had to meet their individual needs. At some point he couldn’t reach the children with special needs because the students hadn’t come out with their special needs and because of that he wasn’t able to solve their needs. It is also difficult for a teacher to reach all the students with diverse needs in an inclusive classroom with traditional teaching methods. On the other hand, he also needs some special education techniques to solve the diversified needs of the students in an inclusive classroom. It is evinced in this observation that there is a lack of special education techniques to promote an inclusive classroom. It is a need of an hour to develop certain techniques among teachers in these traditional classrooms with such special teaching techniques. Hence successful inclusive education should engage diverse students with diverse instructional methodology, curriculum materials and assessment methods (Bateman & Bateman, 2002; Hitchcock, 2002).

Conclusion In conclusion we all want same basic things of life, decent and comfortable place to call home, something meaningful to do during the day, some close with whom to share the good times and opportunity to make our own decisions about things that will affect our personal lives. Students with disabilities also wants the same basic things and increasing speaking up for themselves about the state they want and staff, family and states

agency professionals are beginning to listen so that they feel empowered in improving their lives.You can create an inclusive setting for students with intellectual disabilities by using a variety of instructional methods to meet the needs of your diverse learners. This is not only beneficial for students with special needs; it benefits all students by providing different ways for students to succeed. Varying instructional methods can mean changing the way the material is delivered, what materials are used, what end products are created, and how students are assessed.Young learners with special needs are due the benefits of a full education, including social studies. The impact of not meeting this goal can affect their abilities to become participatory citizens in our democratic society. Just as students need instruction in learning to read and perform math computations, they also need guidance in effective social studies instruction. Although educational legislation requires that students with special needs be given the benefits of a full education, many teachers continue to struggle with implementation. Diversity in today’s classrooms, as well as the lack of intensive professional development on differentiation techniques, is a challenge that often impedes implementation. Reform in education is a slow process resulting in few good models of differentiation implementation. We also hope that the instructional strategies, lesson plans and other resources provided will be the impetus for teachers to try new differentiation techniques in an effort to include young learners with special needs. The window of opportunity to impact students’ values, beliefs and skills is at early ages and is often not regained once lost. Recognizing the importance of social studies instruction for all students is a gift that teachers can give young learners with special needs as well as society as a whole. Teachers are encouraged to share ideas and techniques that they have tried to increase the body of knowledge for those interested in social studies instruction for young learners with special needs.Many of the challenges are out of reach by students and classroom teachers thus, raise a government concern to address the issue with total vigor. In terms of limitations they are so many but the significant ones are inadequate of qualified teachers in sign language, lack of learning and teaching facilities, lack of funds and overcrowded classrooms which set back the consideration of special needs student in instruction time. Unless these limitations are dealt with amicably, otherwise students cannot learn as required.

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