The 40 Best iPad Apps for Young Learners

by Staff Writers

January 16, 2012

The best way to get your parents to buy you expensive gadgets has always been to really sell the educational value. “But Mom, if you buy me a Nintendo, think about how much my spelling will improve playing Wheel of Fortune.” Of course, these days it’s all about the iPad. For every Angry Birds there’s an educational game out there to improve your child’s mind. Here are 40 of the best apps for your young Einstein. Most of them are paid apps, but if you’ve got $500 to drop on an iPad, we’re thinking you won’t mind.

Math

1. Math Evolve: Nominated for “Best Educational Game of 2011,” Math Evolve teaches the math basics through gameplay involving a dolphin shooting lasers at sea creatures.
2. MathBoard: MathBoard works because of its highly-customizable features, like creating timed math quizzes or making quizzes out of questions answered incorrectly.
3. Motion Math: “Putting the action in fraction,” Motion Math has players put fractions in order to help a fallen star move back into the sky.
4. PopMath Basic Math: Match pairs of balloons that have the same value, using one of the four basic math skills to deduce the answer, and be treated to a very satisfying “pop.”
5. Math Ninja HD: You know you’ve interested the boys with just the word “ninja.” You must protect your treehouse from an evil tomato by using math. OK then!
6. Math Bingo Games — A Racing Game: Fun app for such a clunky title. Solve the math problems to keep your race car from crashing.
7. Numbers League: Combining super heroes and comic book graphics with math was a stroke of genius. Kids and adults love this game.
8. Bugs and Buttons: B&B helps pre-schoolers practice counting, but there’s also a bunch of fun, silly games paired with great graphics to keep them entertained.

Spelling and Reading

1. Monkey Preschool Lunchbox: Teach your preschooler to spell with this colorful game where kids help primates prepare packaged provisions.
2. Dr. Seuss’s ABC: Who better to teach your kids to spell than the legend himself? This award-winning app is a hit with parents and kids.
3. Bookworm: This addicting word-search game is great for students who know how to spell and want to expand their vocabularies.
4. Toy Story 3 Read-Along: Record your own voice for playback reading to your toddler, or let him or her fingerpaint or sing along with songs from the film.
5. Shakespeare in Bits: Romeo & Juliet iPad Edition: It’s never too early to expose your kids to the Bard. Well, 8 might be too early, but 9 and up is fine.
6. SUPER WHY! for iPad: From PBS Kids, this app lets you play as any of the four characters from the TV show as they write, rhyme, read, and spell.
7. iWriteWords: iWW lets youngin’s practice handwriting and have completed words read back to them. The colors are bright and the graphics are fun.
8. Textropolis: Best for more-advanced spellers, players build up their own Textropolis by beating word-search games. Whole families play this one together.

Science

1. Star Walk: The amazing app comes to the iPad, enabling kids to tilt the screen to the night sky and learn what constellations they’re looking at.
2. NASA App HD: For all the future astronauts out there, this app lets them keep track of space stations, launch progress, and agency news.
3. Elements Quiz: If you’ve got a chemist in the making, download this cheap app with clean navigation of the periodic table.
4. Discover Dinosaurs: What kid doesn’t love dinosaurs? Tikes collect gold stars by beating quizzes on their way to becoming a T-Rexpert.
5. Discover Your Body HD: Fun sound effects and bright graphics help kids figure out all those fun organs and body parts. Don’t worry, the reproductive system is not featured.
6. I Learn with Poko: Seasons and Weather! HD: Poko is here to teach kids 3 to 7 about weather, seasons, and the calendar.
7. Ultimate Dinopedia: Because kids love dinosaurs so much, here’s another great app with info and terrific artwork on 700+ dinos.

Special Education

1. soundAMP R: If your child is hard of hearing, download this app for him or her that will amplify every sound coming out of the iPad with crystal-clear quality.
2. My First AAC: This app is designed to assist toddlers with speech disorders by letting them point to icons to produce words. Twenty-five bucks is a small price to pay to let your child express himself.
3. Read2Go: People with difficulty reading traditional media are already familiar with Daisy e-reader books. This is the best app for reading them.
4. Model Me Going Places 2: The “Model Me” series are designed for kids with autism or Asperger’s. This app teaches them appropriate behavior in various public settings.
5. Speech with Milo: Verbs: A speech-language pathologist created this helpful app where Milo the mouse performs 100 actions, speaking the word upon completion of each.
6. iReward: iReward is a tool to help parents motivate and reinforce the positive behavior of kids of all abilities, but especially developmentally challenged ones.

Various Subjects

1. The Moron Test: This app wouldn’t be worth introducing that word to your kids if it wasn’t so great. It’s part IQ test, part reflex test, and all fun.
2. WeetWoo!: For $4 you get access to an extensive library of kid-friendly fun and educational videos collected by parents. Parents rave about this app.
3. Fish School: Little synchronized swimming fish hold your kids’ attention while teaching them colors, letters, numbers, and shapes.
4. Tangram XL: Here’s a free app that reproduces the simple joy of tangram puzzles. It’ll strengthen your child’s ability to determine spatial relationships.
5. Nota for iPad: Kids as young as 4 can use this app to learn about musical notes, scales, octaves, chords, and more musicology.
6. My PlayHome: In the 90s, we had Home Ec; today, kids have My PlayHome. It’s a great way for kids to explore and learn about the world of the home.
7. Geo Walk HD — 3D World Fact Book: Hold the world in the palm of your hand with this app that lets you touch 500 places on the globe to bring up amazing facts about our planet and its inhabitants.
8. Toontastic: Bring out your child’s creative side with this app that lets kids create their own cartoons about pirates, princes and princesses, and more.
9. gFlash+ Flashcards & Tests: Great for any age of student, gFlash+ lets you create your own cards, share them across the web, and even quiz yourself from either side of the cards.
10. iStart Spanish: Kids’ brains are like sponges; childhood is the easiest time to learn a language. iStart is the best app to help them do it.
11. Brain Trainer by Lumosity.com: For kids of all ages, this app offers brain teasers to improve your memory and problem-solving skills.

Online Colleges

In iPad, autistic children find a rewarding, learning tool

Ten-year-old Deepak Ramesh loves a good puzzle. Having dragged a dozen jigsaw pieces — head, tail, neck, legs — into place, he squeals when a robotic voice spells out the name of the animal. “Giraffe,” he echoes, then starts to piece together an elephant on his latest gadget: the iPad.

For the last two months, Deepak and 14 other autistic children have been swiping, pinching and tapping their way to a better life. Five days a week, one-and-a-half hours each day, they come to Prayas, a computer and iPad training centre for such children on the campus of the Spastics Society of Karnataka in Bangalore. Parents and teachers associated with the project, launched in July 2011 by the Autism Society of India in collaboration with SAP Labs India, a software applications research company, say the iPad has already had a positive effect.

Kavita Sharma, herself the mother of an autistic child, manages Prayas and says such children have a penchant for technology. “There are dozens of visually striking and easy-to-follow iPad applications — ranging from voice-assisted writing for early learners to Wordsearch, which involves scanning a screen full of letters for words, to doodling apps — that help special children improve their cognitive skills while also enjoying the pleasure of a challenge,” says Sharma. “There is a free app called Talking Tom, for instance. It’s a cat that repeats whatever you say. A five-year-old here has learned to speak much better by exploring his voice through the app.”

The centre, with half a dozen computers and seven iPads loaded with handpicked applications, offers a five-month course.

“We have got requests for five or six more labs, but first, we want to see how this one goes,” says V R Ferose, MD, SAP Labs India. The idea began as a series of monthly iPad workshops for parents and teachers working with autistic children, conducted by SAP Labs volunteers from their Whitefield campus. “One out of every 250 children born in India is autistic. Technology can be an enabler in their learning and help make them independent. Since the points of action and reaction are the same in the iPad, unlike in a computer where you type on the keyboard and the output appears on the screen, it is a great platform for these children to learn,” says Ferose. SAP Labs plans to modify existing iPad apps and to build customised content for special educators and parents in India.

At Prayas, Preksha, 21, a cheerful woman who can sing all ABBA and Phil Collins numbers from memory, now has an iPad of her own. “We went to a SAP Labs workshop and I thought I should get her one. She loves reading epapers and abridged Shakespeare ebooks on her iPad and she has recently discovered photography,” says Vani Rajendran, her mother.

Shobha Ramesh, Deepak’s mother, says she is happy with his progress. “He draws better, his typing skills have improved. He doesn’t like it if I correct him. When he enters a wrong input on the iPad and it doesn’t accept it, he corrects himself,” she says. Deepak’s favourite apps are puzzles and Wordsearch, and he is good at both.

On a Monday morning, Sharma’s son, 15-year-old Ujjwal, is busy animating a butterfly on a desktop computer. The gadget-savvy teen prefers the PC for learning and uses his iPad to connect with friends on Facebook and to download music.

For some children, the iPad is like a walk in the garden — it destresses and entertains. Mayank Misra, a 10-year-old non-verbal child, counts strawberries and grapes on an iPad. “He is going through a low, he has been reticent of late,” says Sonal Joshi, staff member. Despite being good at typing, maths and pattern recognition, a moody Mayank refuses to go anywhere near a PC. “He likes to sit here on this bench and play games on the iPad,” Joshi says.  

Priya Shah, a special educator who homeschools her 10-year-old son Tarun, says autistic children tend to fixate on things. “They like gadgets, so they may fixate on the iPad too. The challenge is to channel this enthusiasm and help them get better at dealing with life.”

The Indian Express

In iPad, autistic children find a rewarding, learning tool

Ten-year-old Deepak Ramesh loves a good puzzle. Having dragged a dozen jigsaw pieces — head, tail, neck, legs — into place, he squeals when a robotic voice spells out the name of the animal. “Giraffe,” he echoes, then starts to piece together an elephant on his latest gadget: the iPad.

For the last two months, Deepak and 14 other autistic children have been swiping, pinching and tapping their way to a better life. Five days a week, one-and-a-half hours each day, they come to Prayas, a computer and iPad training centre for such children on the campus of the Spastics Society of Karnataka in Bangalore. Parents and teachers associated with the project, launched in July 2011 by the Autism Society of India in collaboration with SAP Labs India, a software applications research company, say the iPad has already had a positive effect.

Kavita Sharma, herself the mother of an autistic child, manages Prayas and says such children have a penchant for technology. “There are dozens of visually striking and easy-to-follow iPad applications — ranging from voice-assisted writing for early learners to Wordsearch, which involves scanning a screen full of letters for words, to doodling apps — that help special children improve their cognitive skills while also enjoying the pleasure of a challenge,” says Sharma. “There is a free app called Talking Tom, for instance. It’s a cat that repeats whatever you say. A five-year-old here has learned to speak much better by exploring his voice through the app.”

The centre, with half a dozen computers and seven iPads loaded with handpicked applications, offers a five-month course.

“We have got requests for five or six more labs, but first, we want to see how this one goes,” says V R Ferose, MD, SAP Labs India. The idea began as a series of monthly iPad workshops for parents and teachers working with autistic children, conducted by SAP Labs volunteers from their Whitefield campus. “One out of every 250 children born in India is autistic. Technology can be an enabler in their learning and help make them independent. Since the points of action and reaction are the same in the iPad, unlike in a computer where you type on the keyboard and the output appears on the screen, it is a great platform for these children to learn,” says Ferose. SAP Labs plans to modify existing iPad apps and to build customised content for special educators and parents in India.

At Prayas, Preksha, 21, a cheerful woman who can sing all ABBA and Phil Collins numbers from memory, now has an iPad of her own. “We went to a SAP Labs workshop and I thought I should get her one. She loves reading epapers and abridged Shakespeare ebooks on her iPad and she has recently discovered photography,” says Vani Rajendran, her mother.

Shobha Ramesh, Deepak’s mother, says she is happy with his progress. “He draws better, his typing skills have improved. He doesn’t like it if I correct him. When he enters a wrong input on the iPad and it doesn’t accept it, he corrects himself,” she says. Deepak’s favourite apps are puzzles and Wordsearch, and he is good at both.

On a Monday morning, Sharma’s son, 15-year-old Ujjwal, is busy animating a butterfly on a desktop computer. The gadget-savvy teen prefers the PC for learning and uses his iPad to connect with friends on Facebook and to download music.

For some children, the iPad is like a walk in the garden — it destresses and entertains. Mayank Misra, a 10-year-old non-verbal child, counts strawberries and grapes on an iPad. “He is going through a low, he has been reticent of late,” says Sonal Joshi, staff member. Despite being good at typing, maths and pattern recognition, a moody Mayank refuses to go anywhere near a PC. “He likes to sit here on this bench and play games on the iPad,” Joshi says.  

Priya Shah, a special educator who homeschools her 10-year-old son Tarun, says autistic children tend to fixate on things. “They like gadgets, so they may fixate on the iPad too. The challenge is to channel this enthusiasm and help them get better at dealing with life.”

The Indian Express

40 Amazing iPad Apps for the Learning Disabled

The iPad is a device that many lust after as a shiny new toy, but many people with disabilities can benefit from what it has to offer as a functional tool. Students with learning disabilities can enhance and develop their communication skills, learn how to adapt to situations, and develop social skills. Check out this collection of iPad apps that can make a difference in the life of a learning disabled child.

• Crazy Face Lite: Crazy Face Lite encourages shy students to speak more often, and is great with students who have trouble speaking.
• Autism Timer: This app offers a digital timer for students with autism.
• Behavior Assessment Pro: BAP identifies factors related to problem behaviors for autistic kids.
• Awareness!: Awareness allows students to listen to their surroundings while also playing games, watching a video, and more.
• Everyday Skills: Use this app to find self-directed learning for students with autism and learning disabilities.
• Proloquo2Go: Proloquo2Go offers picture-based communication for children with communication disorders.
• ArtikPix: Children with speech issues can use ArtikPix to practice sounds and words at home.
• Aurify: Aurify is a challenging and rewarding audio game for students, especially those with learning disabilities.
• iEarnedThat: This tool can help parents track and reward good behavior.
• Model Me Going Places: This visual teaching tool can help your child navigate challenging locations with appropriate behavior.
• iWriteWords: Encourage fine motor skills using IWriteWords for practicing writing letters, numbers, and words.
• MyTalkTools Mobile: MyTalkTools Mobile offers augmentative and alternative communication for learning disabled students.
• First Then Visual Schedule: Provide positive behavior support using the First Then Visual Schedule app for the iPad.
• Idea Sketch: Draw mind maps, flow charts, and more with Idea Sketch.
• Off We Go!: Off We Go! can help children with special needs become more comfortable in new situations.
• AutismXpress: Autism Xpress makes it easy for people with autism to recognize and express their emotions.
• StoryBuilder: StoryBuilder can improve auditory processing for children with autism or sensory processing disorders.
• iMindMap Mobile Pro: Let creative thoughts flow using iMindMap Mobile Pro.
• Grace: Grace can help autistic and special needs children build sentences to communicate effectively.
• Which Does Not Belong: This app will help your learner discriminate which items don’t belong in a group and encourage vocal imitation.
• My Choice Board: Kids with autism, communication delays, or learning differences can express their needs and wants through this choice board.
• iThoughts: iThoughts will enable students to see the big picture and concentrate on multiple thoughts at once.
• LivingSafely: LivingSafely can help students with autism and developmental disabilities practice self-directed learning.
• iCommunicate: Children with autism and visual challenges can use this app with pictures, storyboards, routines, and more.
• Toy Story 3 Read Along: Toy Story’s app is a great early literacy tool for early language learners.
• ACT Spell: ACT Spell offers games for training motor/visual/executive functions.
• Stories2LEarn: Promote social skills and literacy by creating personalized stories on Stories2Learn.
• iConverse: iConverse works as a picture exchange communication system for autistic individuals and those with communicative disabilities.
• MyTalk Mobile: Those with communication difficulties can express themselves through MyTalk.
• MindNode: MindNode makes creating mind maps easy.
• Storyrobe: Storyrobe offers a simple and easy way to produce digital stories.
• Flashcards for iPad: This app can be used effectively for special needs learners.
• Glow Draw!: Glow Draw! is a fun drawing app for students with visual development problems.
• What Rhymes?: Encourage reading comprehension with this reading comprehension tool for visual and auditory learners.
• MyHomework: MyHomework can help students with trouble concentrating keep track of their next task.
• Bigger Words: Bigger Words can help kids read easier.
• iSpectrum: iSpectrum offers an assistant for color blindness.
• Dragon Dictation: Dragon Dictation is great for students who have reading disabilities or are unable to write.
• Talkulator: Talkulator can help students with visual problems count and do arithmetic.
• Read2Me: Read2Me will import a text file and read it aloud to weaker readers.

Hi Nilesh,

I work with Matchacollege.com, where we just published entitled “40 Amazing iPad Apps for the Learning Disabled” Considering this overlap in subject matter with your blog; I thought perhaps you would be interested in sharing the article with your readers? If so, you can find the article here: (http://www.matchacollege.com/blog/2011/40-amazing-ipad-apps-for-the-learning-disabled/).

Either way, I’m glad to have come across your blog. If there’s anything else on our site that interests you, please feel free to let me know. Thanks again for the great content!

Differences in language circuits in the brain linked to dyslexia

Milan, Italy, May 10: Children with dyslexia often struggle with reading, writing, and spelling, despite getting an appropriate education and demonstrating intellectual ability in other areas.  New neurological research has found that these children’s difficulties with written language may be linked to structural differences within an important information highway in the brain known to play a role in oral language. The findings are published in the June 2010 issue of Elsevier’s Cortex (http://www.elsevier.com/locate/cortex).

Vanderbilt University researchers Sheryl Rimrodt and Laurie Cutting and colleagues at Johns Hopkins University and Kennedy Krieger Institute used an emerging MRI technique, called diffusion tensor imaging (DTI), to discover evidence linking dyslexia to structural differences in an important bundle of white matter in the left-hemisphere language network. White matter is made up of fibers that can be thought of as the wiring that allows communication between brain cells; the left-hemisphere language network is made up of bundles of these fibres and contains branches that extend from the back of the brain (including vision cells) to the front parts that are responsible for articulation and speech. “When you are reading, you are essentially saying things out loud in your head”, said Cutting. “If you have decreased integrity of white matter in this area, the front and back part of your brain are not talking to one another. This would affect reading, because you need both to act as a cohesive unit.”

Rimrodt and Cutting used the DTI technique to map the course of an important white matter bundle in this network and discovered that it ran through a frontal brain region known to be less well organised in the dyslexic brain. They also found that fibers in that frontal part of the tract were oriented differently in dyslexia.  Rimrodt said, “To find a convergence of MRI evidence that goes beyond identifying a region of the brain that differs in dyslexia to linking that to an identifiable structure and beginning to explore physical characteristics of the region is very exciting. It brings us a little bit closer to understanding how dyslexia happens.”  Rimrodt is assistant professor of developmental medicine and Cutting is Patricia and Rodes Hart Chair at Peabody College at Vanderbilt.  The researchers completed the work at the Kennedy Krieger Institute with their colleagues there before moving to Vanderbilt. The research was funded by the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine General Clinical Research Center, the Kennedy Krieger Institute’s Learning Disability Research Center and F.M. Kirby Research Center for Functional Brain Imaging, the National Institute for Neurological Disorders, and the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

DISABILITY NEWS ASIA

Dyslexics get disability quota in colleges

Starting this year, dyslexic students will be eligible for professional college seats, reserved under the disability quota.  With this, Karnataka will be one among the first two States — the other being Maharashtra which will also implement this inclusive system starting this year — to recognise dyslexia as a disability.

In its order on Monday, the Government has decided that from here on, dyslexic students will come under the category of those suffering  from “mental disability” and will be eligible to apply for the three per cent seats earmarked for people with disability in professional colleges across the State.  The order states that this new quota will be enforced from the forthcoming admission season slated to commence in June. It will be applicable to seats in engineering, medical and dental colleges allotted by the Karnataka Examinations Authority through the Common Entrance Test.

Triumphant

The Government Order, in its preamble, states that this provision has been included following a letter by K.S. Gopalan, president, Malleswaram Dyslexic Association.  A senior official from the Karnataka Examination Authority said the same facilities and statutory provisions extended to persons those suffering from mental disability will be applicable to dyslexics.

Rules

To be eligible for this quota, dyslexic students must get a medical certificate stating the nature of their learning disability from NIMHANS, All India Institute of Speech and Hearing, Mysore, or produce a certificate by a clinical psychologist (with an M. Phil degree) attested by a government doctor not below the rank of district surgeon.

Further, the rules state that these certificates will again be ratified by the Medical Board.

The Hindu

Defining learning disabilities

By Miriam Geronimus

Diane Metcalf-Leggette ’13 is suing the University for refusing to grant her 100 percent extended time on exams, as The Daily Princetonian reported last week. Because she has dyslexia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, Metcalf-Leggette argues that the University is in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act. But this isn’t just a legal matter. Whichever way the judge rules, it may be time to reexamine how learning disabilities are addressed at Princeton.The Office of Disability Services uses a model that courts have supported at times, though it has also been disputed by leading neuropsychologists. To qualify for accommodations under this model, a student’s performance on a standardized psychometric test must be 1.5–2 standard deviations below that of the “average person” in the same age group nationally. Is this the right standard to use? By this measurement, a dyslexic student whose reading rate is as low as the 17th percentile is defined as “average.” This bar seems too low.

Neuropsychologists define a learning disability as a significant discrepancy in test scores. For example, a dyslexic person may have an IQ in the 99th percentile but a reading rate in the 21st percentile. Is this reading rate rightly viewed as “average”? Neuropsychologists note that the discrepancy faced by such a capable but dyslexic student creates a problem different from that faced by people with universally low scores. As neuropsychologist Roger Lauer describes it, it is like having a Ferrari engine but a Volkswagen transmission. Because the speeds at which a person does different mental tasks are out of synch, it is hard for neural pathways to work together. Allotting these students extra time on exams is logical, since it takes them substantially longer to read and process questions. As Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor ’76 observed in a 1997 decision in Bartlett v. New York State Board of Law Examiners, for academically oriented people, “the inability to identify and process words with ease would be crippling.” In that case, Sotomayor, who was a judge in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York at the time, found for the dyslexic plaintiff, who had proven herself an excellent lawyer as an associate but was unable to pass the bar exam without accommodations she had been denied. In choosing the “average standard” — unlike many other selective schools, which use a more inclusive model — Princeton appears to be placing too much emphasis on possible spillover effects on other students (which are likely to be minimal), while undervaluing the costs to learning-disabled students. Documents that Metcalf-Leggette found during discovery suggest that ODS is worried that learning-disabled students will gain unfair advantages through accommodations. But studies show that such students underperform on tests, especially when timed.

Some may worry that students pretend to have learning disabilities to gain an unfair advantage. Research should quell this concern too. According to a June 2009 report from the National Institute for Literacy — a federal agency affiliated with the U.S. departments of Education, Health and Human Services, and Labor — the degree to which non-disabled examinees benefit from extended time on tests is negligible. Additionally, when learning-disabled students were given extra time on the SAT, their scores improved but remained lower than those of their non-disabled peers. The NIL report, which surveyed all peer-reviewed articles on learning disabilities, concluded that “extra time is not going to improve performance if an individual does not know the [course] content.” It is only fair that students with learning disabilities be allowed to demonstrate the full extent of their intelligence and knowledge of course material on exams. Time extensions are the only accommodation that has been studied extensively and shown to work, according to the NIL report. The University does give 50 percent time extensions to students whose scores fall below the average standard, including Metcalf-Leggette. But research suggests that time extensions should be individually gauged and that 100 percent time extensions should be the starting point. These are commonplace in higher education, including at other selective schools such as Harvard, Yale, Brown, Penn and the University of Michigan.

Advising learning-disabled students that the solution is to drop classes with grades heavily dependent on timed exams — as ODS has advised Metcalf-Leggette — is antithetical to Princeton’s own educational goals. If a learning-disabled student avoids such courses even though he or she could master the material, then Princeton’s rules stand in the way of that student’s education. This educational approach is inefficient, wasteful and disrespectful to hardworking, high-functioning students who have gained admission to Princeton despite the obstacles posed by learning disabilities. Princeton has distinguished itself in other areas by not being content to follow the minimal standard required by law or convention. By using a scientifically supported and more inclusive definition of learning disabilities, the University would enable more students to get the most out of their education. Through small modifications to existing accommodations, the University can extend the principles of diversity, equity, efficiency and excellence in education to students who have been admitted to Princeton, but whose success here is impeded by learning disabilities.

Miriam Geronimus is a sophomore from Ann Arbor, Mich. She can be reached at mgeronim@princeton.edu.

Correction: Due to an editing error, an earlier version of this column stated that Diane Metcalf-Leggette ’13 was diagnosed with four learning disabilities. Though her original complaint read that she had four learning disabilities, she was most recently diagnosed with only dyslexia and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

Published: Tuesday, April 6th, 2010

The Ability Debate

Parimal Lokhande

06-Jan-10

Start with asking you a question: Do we really understand the problems of the disabled? The shameful yet the most correct answer is no. In our country, where vote-bank politics is rampant, almost all minority groups have managed a variety of sops for themselves. The disabled, however, have remained a hidden minority deprived of the basic needs, which even the most disadvantaged take for granted. Our leaders are painfully ignorant that the disabled barely enjoy the fundamental rights guaranteed by the Constitution,may be they assume that this 5 percent of the 1 billion does not exist et-all.Why should they exist, they do not vote the pot bellied politicians to power right?

To illustrate, let us consider just three fundamentals rights: right to education, right to employment and right to full social living. Do the disabled have free access to schools and universities? No answers needed. Now tell me, How many principals of “leading” schools will be willing to admit a 10-year-old on a wheel chair? Nine out of ten would probably suggest that such a child should take tuition at home. Thus,when the foundation itself is weakened, the chances of future employment are minimized anyway. That’s, simple logic. Let us be honest. When you think of employment for the disabled, what are the jobs that come to your mind? Do you visualize a disabled person behind a CEO’s desk in multinational company,as a radio jockey at a leading station or even as a professor at a prestigious university? Most unlikely. You will probably think of a peon, a sitting job mechanic or a petty shop owner. The reality is close to this!!!!!

The bias against the disabled is strongly embedded in our social psyche, making it all the more difficult for the person to equip himself to live normally; especially so in India, where a person’s physical handicap is often equated with the sins he or his forefathers may have committed. A disabled person is usually haunted by references to his previous birth at home,among relatives, at places of work and even at the “temples of learning”. Where education and employment remain a distant dream, to think of normal social living appears comical. People ‘may’ grant a disabled person some serious attention when he talks of schooling or employment but talk of his dating,marriage, going to a disco or for a walk(wheel) down the aisle; and it has most in giggles. They are the “unnecessary things” that can be banished from the lives of the special.

Broadly speaking, there exist two schools of thought in respect of settings in which education may be imparted to children with disabilities.Those favoring a special school system argue that it is only in special settings that children with disabilities can get quality education, adequate attention and all the required facilities; and that too in an appropriate atmosphere with a level playing field and without feeling excluded in the crowd of non-disabled children. Such settings ensure that the children with disabilities are able to keep pace with the class unlike in the so-called integrated/inclusive settings.

Contrary to the above view, the exponents of integrated/inclusive settings attack the special school system vehemently on the ground that such a system tends to ghetto-ise children with disabilities. Strongly favoring the idea of working towards creating an inclusive, barrier-free, and rights-based society, they assert that a vast majority of children with disabilities can be accommodated within the regular school settings, and hence, in an inclusive environment, with some adaptations. In any event, a child with a disability is essentially and primarily a child first and a child with a disability only next. Besides, they argue that the cost of setting up special schools is highly prohibitive.

In the first place, it is critical to recognize that promoting inclusion in all spheres of life is non-negotiable. Therefore, inclusion in education, in order to be effective and meaningful, must happen at all levels of the entire education process-viz., at the curriculum development level, at the teaching learning level, at the infrastructure development level, and at the school management level, at the examination and evaluation etc. Piecemeal inclusion is no inclusion. It has got to be all-pervasive.

Although inclusion is primarily a goal, to my humble way of thinking, it is also a process. All the progressive international instruments including the UN Convention on The Rights of Persons with Disabilities place an all-out emphasis on participation of persons with disabilities in all spheres of life; and no such participation is possible without inclusion. Inclusion is a precondition to participation.

To my mind, inclusion must be an all-pervasive phenomenon. However, given the prevailing realities, the so-called special schools will continue to play an important role for a long time to come. In my view, these schools can and should promote inclusion. Besides, our emphasis must be on imparting quality education to children with disabilities in an appropriate environment.Let us utilize the special schools in promoting inclusion rather than making such schools a casualty in the name of inclusion. Thus, inclusion should be understood and defined in proper perspective.

The bottom-line is that disability has never been a Rights issue for anyone in India. Whatever has been granted to the disabled has been as through doling out alms. And, services made available to the handicapped sporadically have been subject to the “mercy” of the existing political and the bureaucratic machinery from time to time. This has led to irregular and indifferent services being provided as a token of charity rather than as a matter of right.

Recently, how could I forget to quote this, certain visually handicapped people were successful in ‘convincing’ the Supreme Court that the sightless should be allowed to take the examinations for the civil services. It is another matter that they have still not been able to convince the ministry for petroleum and natural gas that sightless persons can successfully run gas agencies. The ministry’s logic is that the “danger would be too great”.It is sheer apathy towards the problems of the disabled that it elicits such ridiculous, horrible and unjustified responses from the keepers of our society.This indifference is directly related to the fact that the disabled have been unable to forge a powerful coalition. Why, I refer to recent examples from history- Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar did his bit for people who now dream of leading this country(Mayawati is almost there),Ganghiji led his charge for the harijans and more recently the Women’s Bill is all ready to play its legitimate in bringing the fairer sex, if not more, but at least at par with the men.

At least, not yet.Without a visible leadership, the Indian disability movement will continue to remain unnoticed. It is time the disabled defined their identity and marked their presence. If necessary, they be ready to parade instead of being closeted.

http://testfunda.com/examprep/mba-resource/current-affairs/article/the-ability-debate.htm?assetid=16210a2b-7622-4a19-9d68-2b00a17ab870

A historical perspective of learning disabilities

At one time scientists thought that all learning disabilities were caused by a single neurological problem but research has demonstrated that the causes are more diverse. Historically, speculation had attributed learning disabilities to heredity, or other unknown mysterious factors. An early explanation concluded that learning problems that were primarily the result of poor vision or hearing, motor disabilities, mental retardation, autism, emotional disturbance, or environmental, cultural or economic disadvantage while considered to be eligible for special education, were not considered to be a learning disability. The real concern, at that time, was why children with average or above average intelligence were having difficulty learning, and sometimes performed below their average peers in academic achievement.

The very recent advances in modern technology have provided an answer to this question by allowing scientists to look into the living brains of children. The amazing finding has been that the way in which the brain and nervous system develops is influenced by the experiences the child has during the early childhood years while the nervous system is developing. It seems that the development of the brain and nervous system differs from child to child and that the specific differences in brain and nervous system development accounts for the specific differences in learning abilities.  These findings resulted into a more indepth look at how early childhood experiences contributed to the development of learning problems in children. While intensive research identified many early learning experiences that contribute to the development of learning disabilities, the environmental factor identified as having the most impact upon the child’s development was found to be his relationship with his parents and their attitude toward his success. This relationship is referred to as parenting, and all other factors in the environment were found to be secondary to it because parents create the environment that the developing child experiences.

Other important factors in the child’s environment found to have an impact upon the development of learning abilities included nutrition, allergies to food, toxic chemicals, and heavy metals. A lack of sleep and physical exercise are additional factors. And, most importantly, when parents control these factors, the brain continues to develop, or returns to normal functioning.  The exciting result is that parents need not despair about their child’s learning problems, for research findings suggest that specific learning disabilities can be prevented, remedied, or corrected by identifying, and removing the specific factors in the environment that are preventing normal development of the child’s learning abilities.  Simply stated, to prevent, mediate or correct the cause of a child’s specific learning disability, a summary of this research appears to be suggesting that if you become proactive in greening up the child’s environment by removing toxic chemicals that may be causing allergies, see that he eats nutritious food, gets plenty of sleep and physical exercise it will go a long way toward helping your child become a better student. Researchers report that, in some instances, suggested methods have shown results in only a few days.

Examiner.com