Children with learning disabilities should be included in the classroom

By law, most children between the ages of five and 13 must be enrolled in a public or private institution. Each of these children are unique yet similar in many ways. Some children are shy, loud, or smart and some are slower at learning. Despite the differences among all children, mentally and physically, they should not be separated when it comes to education.

I attended a private Catholic elementary school in the Midwest that had resources called "Title I" for the students who didn't learn as easily as the rest of the class. Every other day, those "special" children would be taken downstairs to work with volunteers from the community, and we wouldn't see these classmates until the end of the day. All too often, these children were the ones that our teachers couldn't handle. They would cause a disciplinary problem and our teacher would get flustered, scold them and the whole class would giggle in unison. These children were constantly flowing in and out of the principal's office each day for disciplinary measures. I gave no thought to this; to me, this seemed ordinary. These classmates were different than me and had a lot of trouble with learning.

When my sister began her graduate work with special needs children, my eyes were opened to the struggles that these children faced on top of their learning disabilities through their elementary school years.

The children taken out of my classroom in elementary school were marked with this stigma of being different and called "special ed.," a terribly derogatory name. If a child has Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD), Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), Autism, or Down syndrome they should not be called "special." They should be called children with autism, not autistic. Children are not their disorders.

Often when a child has ADD or ADHD, they have difficulty making friends. Social skills are not as easy to come by when a child is struggling with ADD, ADHD or any other disability. Children with ADD tend to have fewer "real" friendships, and the friends they associate with are usually children far younger than themselves. Taking these children out of a regular school and putting them in a school geared for children like them will not help with this relationship-making skill. Everyone in the classroom will be the same socially, causing few friendships. If these children were placed in normal public or private schools, their chances of becoming friends with their classmates would improve along with their social skills.

Not only will these children's social skills be curtailed by separate schooling, but the tolerance level for them will suffer as well. If all schools are filled with children who can focus in the classroom, make friends easily and get good grades, then when they advance into their adult life they will be less prepared to deal with people who are different than them. If I hadn't been exposed to children with ADD and ADHD early in my grade school years, I would be simply annoyed with those classmates in high school who felt the need to constantly crack a joke or talk during class. This helped me build tolerance for all people. Young children are impressionable and if they see the world to be full of perfect people like themselves, then they will experience shell-shock the instant they aren't in such a sheltered environment.

Teachers hated to deal with children who became restless in the middle of a lesson. Having to step outside of their learning-mode to scold them wasted so much time and hurt the kids who want to be learning. Giving teachers the opportunity to work with children who have ADD or ADHD will force them to become more creative with teaching. They can learn to be better teachers who can engage children of all different types. Teachers with this new challenge of teaching children with learning disabilities can improve their skills.

My teachers who got annoyed with the children with ADD and ADHD made it a punishment to be sent down to Title I, making the whole process a spectacle. These children would become embarrassed, which caused them to act out even more. Taking these children out of the classroom or placing them in another school "made for them" gives disabilities a bigger stigma. In the end, kids are just kids and there is no need to separate them. These children who are having so much trouble need confidence in their abilities and separating them will diminish any confidence in their learning

Separating children with learning disabilities from children who do not have these struggles pleases parents. They argue that they don't want the child with ADD or ADHD to be taking the attention from their child. They want their child's needs to be first priority. If a child who requires more attention is in their child's classroom then they think that the teacher will be focusing solely on that child. If the child with the learning disability requires so much attention that a teacher can't give enough attention to other students, then this is a special case and that student cannot be placed in this school. This is a very rare case that a child would require that much attention.

What many are blind to is the fact that there are people who have gotten their degree in special education or counseling who can be an aid to these teachers and they can help those kids who struggle.

The United States' school system cannot be fixed overnight, but progress can begin now. Students and parents can practice learning to embrace children with learning and social disabilities. Teachers can learn creative teaching techniques to hold the interest of all students, or they can begin a search for a teaching aid. In due time we can learn to integrate all learning styles and speeds into the classroom.