This excerpt, from a series of blog posts addressing “the old way vs. the new way” in regard to the traditional approach to intervention measures, is based on a true account and conversation that the authors had with the subject, as described below.
A 17-year-old high school student recently walked into a high-stakes test without the accommodations that he had received for years. This was not an arbitrary administrative decision; it was his choice.
“All my life,” he said, “they have been giving me everything modified, adapted or adjusted. In 10th grade, I realized that none of those crutches would be available in the real world. I wouldn’t have extra time to complete an assignment. I would have someone translate instructions into simpler words. I knew that I needed to develop the skills to do these things. So, I threw away the crutches. But it was hard because all my life, they’d been telling me that I needed those crutches.”
For this 17-year old, there had never been any serious consideration of what skills he could develop or how he could learn to manage without crutches. The IEP said he needed them, so he got them. And the same is true for millions of other students.
We do not mean to imply that accommodations and supports aren’t needed. They are. If a student has limited working memory and can’t remember a set of instructions, and if it is important for him to know them, then letting him write them down or giving them to him one at a time makes sense. Otherwise, he can’t accomplish the task(s) set for him. But what about helping that student build his working-memory capacity? What about helping him understand that he can develop that skill and be able to be far more effective at school, at home and in his eventual career? What about having a plan to wean him off the crutches?
Imposing accommodations or supports on a permanent basis is like saying that we would take a child with one leg weaker than another and tell him he doesn’t really ever need to walk. We wouldn’t do that because we know that the weaker leg can be strengthened and, with the right kind of physical therapy and training, the student could walk. We would provide graduated levels of support while the therapy is in process so that the child gets progressively closer and closer to normal walking.
There is a cognitive equivalent to physical therapy. The skills for which many, many students receive accommodations and supports are amenable to training. However, when we continue to give them supports intended to work around those weaknesses, they never even get a chance to stretch and exercise them. So, when they reach college or the workforce, they struggle, and potentially fail.
The mother of another teenage boy met recently with her son’s counselor at school. She was concerned because he was potentially going to fail a course and she was spending hours a week helping him keep track of his assignments and homework and planning. The counselor said, “You should just let him fail once.”
The question here is whether this young man had the ability to keep track of his assignments and homework and planning for himself and whether he would “learn his lesson” and start taking more responsibility for his own work. It turns out that that young man has executive function issues. Essentially, his mother had been supporting him and serving as his executive functions. What do you think will happen when that support is suddenly removed? We compare it to throwing a child into the deep end of a swimming pool without swimming lessons. It might be ok, but it might be disastrous.
Suddenly deciding to throw away one’s crutches is risky. It took a lot of courage for the young man quoted above. It has been a challenge, and one that he could have been far better prepared for if IEP accommodations also came with a plan to reduce or eliminate them altogether over time.
The takeaway: It is critical to recognize, when addressing the needs of students, the “why” prior to implementing the “how.” Once we can glean information from a thorough assessment, one that takes both strengths and weaknesses into consideration, then and only then can we hope to remediate in an effective manner that allows a student ownership and subsequently creates his/her own methodology to conform to real-world standards.
The authors endorse a new form of “tutoring” to include more than “subject-based” support. Only with validated cognitive assessment combined with a targeted learning profile can we created a personalized learning plan—one that goes far beyond the reaches of the IEP.
Betsy Hill is an experienced educator and president of BrainWare Learning Company. She has studied the application of neuroscience to teaching and learning with Dr. Patricia Wolfe and other experts and works with educators, clinicians and corporate trainers on using neuroscience research to address some of the most perplexing problems in education. She holds a Master of Arts in teaching and an MBA from Northwestern University, and teaches strategic thinking at Lake Forest Graduate School of Management. Betsy recently received the coveted Nepris award for dedication to expanding students’ career exposure and bringing real-world relevance to education.
Annette Simmons is a parenting/educational consultant, remediation advisor and neurointerventionist. With 20+ years’ experience in the New York City DOE, Annette brings her ample expertise to her workshops, webinars, seminars and, most recently, online cognitive tutoring. Holding dual Masters of Arts in early childhood education and multiple learning modalities, she was pleased to partner with BrainWare Learning Company in pursuit of bringing neuroeducational practices to schools, centers and clinics.
For more information about cognitive assessment, training and literacy solutions plus brain-based approaches to classroom experience, please reach out to [email protected] or [email protected]. Facebook group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/parentsofstrugglinglearners/
To learn more about what cognitive tutoring could mean for your child—and how it differs from other types of support—please call Annette at 917-873-5363.
