F.A.T. City Workshop Outline
Corresponds with the video Understanding Learning Disabilities: How Difficult Can This Be?
I. Experiencing Frustration, Anxiety and Tension
LD students experience these feeling when teachers:
A. Use throwaway sarcasms which may make the rest of the class laugh, but create a
victim out of the LD student.
What is the definition of exclusion?
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B. Move through question and answer periods so rapidly that LD students cannot keep up
and choose not to volunteer, or when called on, cannot answer.
C. Become intimidating, and expect LD students to look at them when they speak to
them.
Anxiety affects performance in the classroom.
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II. Inability to Process Language
LD students’ inability to process language as rapidly as others may make it necessary for
teachers to:
A. Move less rapidly through classroom discussion, especially the question and answer
periods.
B. Take the LD student aside and promise only to call on him/her when standing in front
of the student’s desk. That way, only the teacher and the LD student know when the
student is required to answer.
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III. Risk Taking
Sometimes intimidating situations in the classroom make LD students hesitant to take
risks. This leads to:
A. Lack of participation in classroom discussion for fear of giving a wrong answer which
will be ridiculed.
B. LD students developing into LD adults who are reluctant to take chances.
If teachers respond positively to answers that students give, then LD students might not
be so reluctant to raise their hands and volunteer answers. This is a form of
encouragement.
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IV. Visual Perception
The visual perception problems of LD students make it difficult for them to immediately
understand what they are looking at. This problem is exacerbated by teachers who:
A. Urge the LD student to “try harder” to understand what he/she is having trouble
making sense of.
B. Engage in “blaming the victim” by accusing the LD student of not trying hard enough.
Seeing is different than perceiving. Why does Mr. Lavoie emphasize this concept?
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V. Reading Comprehension
A. LD students have trouble with reading comprehension even if they know and
recognize individual words within a sentence.
B. They may be dyslexic or might not have a grasp of the background information
required to understand what they are reading.
Comprehension often depends on background.
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VI. The Effect of Visual Perception on Behavior
Often, the LD student gets into trouble and does not know what he/she did wrong.
Misperceptions of visual stimuli can lead the LD student to give incorrect answers or
respond inappropriately to situations.
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VII. Visual-Motor Coordination
Difficulties with visual-motor coordination often make the writing process difficult for
LD students.
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VIII. Oral Expression
The inability to retrieve stored linguistic information the way others can is called
dysnomia. Teachers can help with this problem by giving the LD student more time to
answer and respond to questions.
What is dysnomia, according to Richard D. Lavoie?
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IX. Reading and Decoding
LD students are often dyslexic and they cannot decode information as quickly as others
can.
Teachers should try not to ask students rhetorical questions; they shut down
communication between the teacher and student.
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X. Auditory and Visual Capabilities
LD student often need to hear a written passage before they are able to comprehend it.
Many LD students benefit from having books or lectures on tape.
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XI. Fairness
Teachers are urged to reexamine the notion of what is “fair.” “Fair” does not mean that
every student gets the same treatment, but that every student gets what he/she needs.
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