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Strategies for Students with Special Needs
Several strategies have been shown to be effective in teaching students with special needs. Research has found that most of these strategies benefit all students (Marzano et al, 2001). Some effective instructional strategies for students with special needs include:
- Assistive Technology. Specialized keyboards, mouse alternatives, screen readers, and voice recognition software can help many students with special needs use technology more effectively. Many educational software programs—such as talking dictionaries and talking word processing applications—offer opportunities for students with special needs to improve writing skills.
- Prior Knowledge. Linking new knowledge to previous understanding is particularly important with students who have special needs. Know-Wonder-Learn (KWL) charts, discussions, journals, and questioning can help students use what they already know to understand what they are learning.
- Explicit Modeling. Activities such as note-taking, making connections among ideas, asking questions, project planning, and time-management may not come naturally to students with special needs. Teachers can break down these types of activities into smaller steps and think out loud to model each step.
- Feedback. Students with special needs often have difficulty monitoring their own progress. Providing effective feedback can help students develop the reflective and metacognitive thinking skills they need to evaluate their own work.
- Graphic Organizers. Organizing information is often a problem for students with special needs. Students with learning disabilities are often visual learners who respond well to graphic representations of information. Concept maps, cause-and-effect graphics, T-charts, storyboards, Venn diagrams, and timelines can help students incorporate new knowledge into what they already know. Multimedia such as pictures, charts, graphs, audio, and video can also help, as can kinesthetic activities, such as manipulatives, role-playing, and dramatic performances.
- Cooperative Learning. When students with special needs work on projects in cooperative groups, they are exposed to the learning strategies of their peers and all students learn from each other. When students receive instruction in how to support each other’s learning, small groups can be safe places for students to ask clarifying questions and receive help when needed.
- Assessments. While students with special needs should become proficient readers and writers, they should not be limited to these methods when showing what they have learned. Models, dramatic performances, drawings, and similar activities allow students to demonstrate the content they have learned in ways that address their strengths.
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