Haley Robling
Individual Case Study
Professor Mulholland
29 September 2015
Emotional Disturbance
Daniel is five years old and has a twin brother that is also in our classroom. He
joined our class during the second week of school when the teacher next door was unable
to “handle him.” She thought he would do better in school if he were able to be with his
twin brother. Daniel has an individual education program for a developmental delay in
his speech. According to his IEP he needs help with articulation and will require speech
therapy to improve phonological processing and communication. The goal for Daniel is,
by March 2016 to be able to produce strident sounds in single words in 8/10 trials as
measured by therapist charting and teacher observations and to be documented four times
per year. An accommodation for Daniel is to allow ample response time. Daniel is pulled
out of our class for thirty minutes every morning to work on his speech.
While Daniel has been getting help with his speech through out the past year of
preschool and now kindergarten my mentor has been more focused on his emotions in the
classroom. She thinks that his emotions are not allowing him to succeed as well in the
classroom and would like to add emotional disturbance to his IEP. One condition of
emotional disturbance is, “inappropriate types of behavior or feelings under normal
circumstances” (IDEA, p.1, n.d.). Daniel has a hard time focusing on a task that he thinks
will take too long or is too hard. Instead of trying to work on a center he will lie on the
floor and start crying and screaming or will run out of the classroom. Once he has calmed
down enough to talk to you he is very reasonable about ways to help him succeed in the
classroom.
“Support the student’s inclusion. Emotional disturbances, by their nature, can
make it difficult for people to build or maintain satisfactory interpersonal
relationships. You can support the student with an emotional disturbance in subtle
but meaningful ways, especially during group work, cooperative learning
activities, peer interactions, and team projects” (Kupper, p.2, n.d).
Daniel starts out his center work every morning at his group’s table. At the beginning of
the school year he would run out of the classroom if he felt overwhelmed by his peers
next to him. After talking to him many times after he had come back into the classroom
we decided to give him a desk that he can sit at and work alone. He got to choose the
desk and he picked the one in the back of the room that faces the wall. While he still
starts off his day at his group’s table he always goes to the back of the room to work by
himself. He chooses to move workspaces on his own. While it has helped him stay in the
classroom he still becomes frustrated with the work and is unable to focus. He will
sometimes just sit in his chair and make a crying noise until a teacher comes to help him.
When I sit down with him and tell him step by step what he needs to do he is able to do
the work without my help, he just needs the support of me breaking it down and sitting by
him.
Besides Daniel getting frustrated when it comes to his work he will also get upset
when something is not going his way. When this happens he will again leave the
classroom or start crying on the floor. Daniel may become upset when he is not called on
right away, he has not finished his work, or someone talks when he has been called on.
An accommodation that we have made for Daniel is he is able to leave the classroom and
sit in the pod area but he is not allowed to go outside. This has worked out well since he
is able to calm down and then come back into the classroom when he is ready to explain
how he is feeling and ways we can fix the situation.
“Follow low-interest activities with high interest activities so that students get a
break from difficult or less interesting activities from time to time” (For teachers, p.1,
2014). I think this would be a good accommodation for Daniel. If he does his centers and
completes them I think he should be able to choose what he would like to do next. In the
morning when we are focusing on reading and writing I think it would be a good idea for
him to get to choose the word or letter work he would like to do after completing his
centers. This way he may be interested and feel like he is able complete the work that he
picked out for himself. I know he is able to complete the work that is given during center
times based on his assessments and work he does when he focuses. It’s helping him get
past the crying and feeling like it is too much that will help him succeed in the classroom.
References
For Teachers. (n.d.). Retrieved September 29, 2015.
IDEA - Building The Legacy of IDEA 2004. (n.d.). Retrieved September 29, 2015.
Kupper, L. (n.d.). Teaching Students with Emotional Disturbances: 8 Tips for Teachers.
Retrieved September 29, 2015.
His name has been changed.