Category Archives: Mainstream Inclusion

Providing Social Skills to Hearing Impaired Children

Children who are deaf or hard of hearing don’t hear all or certain sounds due to an inability to detect these sounds within the ear. They substitute their communication in different ways which may include sign, lip reading, images or text. Some children with a hearing impairment wear hearing aids or have a cochlear implant in order to assist the hearing process. So providing social skills to hearing impaired children sometimes needs to be delivered in more structured ways. The causes of a...

A child with Dyslexia in the Classroom

Having a child in the classroom with dyslexia can be daunting if, as a teacher you are not prepared, or understand the individual special needs of the child. It is important to put in place simple strategies that will not only assist the child to learn but feel accepted in the workplace environment also. Reading is at the foundation of many other subjects of learning at school and a child who finds the task of literacy skills difficult can often fall behind not only in English subjects but in...

Disability Students Are Bullied More

It isn’t right but it is a fact, according to the latest findings from a study published in Paediatrics, that primary aged children with a disability or health care need is more likely to be the target of bullying in mainstream schooling. Almost 1500 children, their parents and teachers were surveyed and found that 1 in 3 chldren had some sort of extra health care need. When the results of these surveys were then cross examined with school records it was evident that children with...

Avoiding A “Casey Heynes Bullying Incident”

Casey’s bully story could have been any boy’s story. The country is reeling from this video footage because the video speaks volumes more louder than words and what can really happen in playgrounds all over Australia has been now shown to the world. This story fuelled a great debate amongst parents and professionals as to what Casey did was right or wrong. I’m not entering my own views as that is not what I’m writing this article for. What would be more productive to...

As Parents, Are You Guilty of Yelling At Your Kids?

As we know yelling at our children is non productive. Not only does our blood pressure go up but it teaches them the same strategy to deal with anger instead of better resolution strategies, but none of us are perfect right? So now that we are almost at the end of the summer break in Australia our patience as parents has been well and truly tried and tested with bantering of questions and sibling arguments and to help you get through the rest of the break without ‘losing your...

Reduce the Chances of Bullying

I am not an idealist and expect to eradicate bullying – there is always a hero, which means there has to be a villain. But I was shocked to learn that with all the Social Acceptance Programs and Bullying Behaviour Management Strategies implemented in schools today bullying statistics have increased! Here are two statistics* that stood out for me: 1. School violence has decreased 4% BUT bullying has increased by 5% Between 1999 and 2001 bullying started to increase and in 2005-2006 86% of...