Chapter 3

MEANING OF SPECIAL EDUCATION AND CATEGORIES OF CHILDREN

WITH SPECIAL NEEDS

Exceptional children and youth like all other pupils in regular classes are
individuals with
their unique traits and characteristics. Some of them learn slower than the average
pupils, like those
with mental retardation. Meanwhile, those who are gifted and talented learn very
fast and show
creativity in their work. There are exceptional children who have learning
disabilities, so that,
although their mental ability is average or even above average, they do not learn
as much as they
can. Still others have sensory disabilities like blindness or low vision and
deafness; communication
disorders, physical disabilities, like cerebral palsy, spina bifida, spinal cord
injuries and limb
deficiency; chronic health impairments like epilepsy, juvenile diabetes mellitus,
asthma, cystic
fibrosis and hemophilia, among others.
However, in spite of their disabilities, exceptional children and youth
like all other children
have the same psychological needs: they want to belong,.to be accepted, to be
appreciated and to be
loved. In return, they are capable of showing appreciation, gratitude, love and
friendship.
The Department of Education Special Education Division of the Bureau of Elementary
Education
manages and supervises the special education programs all over the country. Special
education
enables exceptional children to study in regular schools or in special schools. The
special education
teacher helps them participate in school activities through a modified or
functional curriculum.

At the end of the chapter, the students should be able to:

1. define special education and explain the meaning of individually planned,
systematically
implemented, and carefully evaluated instruction for children with special
needs;
2. explain how special education enables exceptional children to benefit from
the basic
education program of the Department of Education;
3. cite the difference between special education as essentially instruction and
as purposeful
intervention;
4. define the terms exceptional children and youth and children with special
needs (CSN);
5. distinguish the following basic terms in special education from each other:
developmental
disability, impairment or disability, handicap and at risk;
6. define, compare, and contrast the nine categories of CSN from each other;
and
7. develop positive attitudes towards exceptional children and youth.

What Is Special Education?

 Current literature defines special education as individually planned,
systematically
implemented, and carefully evaluated instruction to help exceptional children
achieve the greatest
possible personal self-sufficiency and success in present and future environments
(Heward, 2003).
Individually planned instruction. In the United States, the law on Individuals with
Disabilities
Education Act (IDEA) requires that an individualized education program (IEP) be
developed and
implemented for every special education student between the ages of 3 and 21. The
basic
requirements of IDEA for all IEPs include statements of:
(1) the child's present level of performance, academic achievement, social
adaptation, pre-
vocational and vocational skills, psychomotor skills, and self-help skills;
(2) annual goals describing the educational performance to be achieved by
the end of each
school year;
(3) short-term instructional objectives presented in measurable,
intermediate steps between
the present level of educational performance and the annual goals;
(4) specific educational services; and
 (5) needed transition services from age 16 or earlier before the student
leaves the school
setting.
Systematically implemented and evaluated instruction. Each type of
children with special
education needs requires particular educational services, curriculum goals,
competencies and skills,
educational approaches, strategies and procedures in the evaluation of learning and
skills.
Personal self-sufficiency. An important goal of special education is to
help the child become
independent from the assistance of adults in personal maintenance and development,
homemaking,
community life, vocational and leisure activities and travel.
The present environment refers to the current conditions in the life of
the child with a
disability. The present environment includes the family, the school, the community
where he/she
lives, the institutions in society that extend assistance and support to children
and youth with special
education needs such as the government, non-government organizations, socio-civic
organizations
and other groups.
The future environment is a forecast of how the child with a disability
can move on to the
next level of education, from elementary to secondary school and on to college or
vocational
program, and finally, to the workplace where he/ she can be gainfully employed.
Special education
helps the child in the transition from a student to a wage earner so that he or she
can lead a normal
life even if he or she has a disability.

Figure 8. Boy with Physical Disability Figure 9. Blind

Boy

Figure 11. Vocational Rehabilitation

Figure 10. A Little Boy with Training for Young Adult with
Mental Retardation and Parent Mental Retardation
______________________________________________________________________________

Who Are Exceptional Children or Children and Youth with Special Needs?

Children and youth who have one or more of the conditions mentioned in the
vignettes in
Chapter 1, among others, are called exceptional children. The term exceptional
children and youth
covers those with mental retardation, giftedness and talent, learning disabilities,
emotional and
behavioral disorders, communication disorders, deafness, blindness and low vision,
physical
disabilities, health impairments, and severe disabilities. These are children and
youth who
experience difficulties in learning the basic education curriculum and need a
modified or functional
curriculum, as well as those whose performance is so superior that they need a
differentiated special
education curriculum to help them attain their full potential.
Exceptional children are also referred to as children with special needs (CSN).
Like the children and
youth in elementary and secondary schools, the mental ability of exceptional
children or CSN may
be average, below or above average.

There are four points of view about special education (Heward, 2003)
1. Special education is a legislatively governed enterprise.
This point of view is expressed in the legal bases of special education
that are discussed in
Chapter 1. Article IV, Section 1 and Section 5, Article XIII, Section 11 of the
1987 Philippine
Constitution guarantee that the State shall protect and promote the rights of all
citizens to quality
education at all levels and shall take appropriate steps to make such education
available to all. The
State shall provide adult citizens, the disabled and out-of-school youth with
training in civics,
vocational efficiency and other skills. The State shall adopt an integrated and
comprehensive
approach to health and other social services available to all people at affordable
costs. There shall
be priority to the needs of the underprivileged, the sick, the elderly, the
disabled, women and
children.
R.A. 7277 - The Magna Carta for Disabled Persons - provides for the
rehabilitation, self-
development and self-reliance of disabled persons and their integration into
mainstream society.
The Philippine Policies and Guidelines for Special Education provides that every
child with special
needs has a right to an educational program that is suitable to his/her needs.
Special education
shares with regular education basic responsibilities of the educational system to
fulfill the right of
the child to develop his/her potential.
There are many other laws, memoranda and circulars that have been enacted through
the years in
support of special education.

2. Special education is a part of the country's educational system.

Special education is a part of the Department of Education's basic education
program. With
its modest historical beginning in 1907, special education is now a major part of
the basic education
program in elementary and secondary schools. The Special Education Division of the
Bureau of
Elementary Education formulates policies, plans and programs, develops standards of
programs and
services. There are special education programs in public and private schools in all
the regions of the
country. The government continues to grant scholarships to deserving school
administrators and
teachers to pursue the graduate degrees at the Philippine Normal University and the
University of
the Philippines. In-service education programs are conducted to upgrade the
competencies of
administrators, teachers and non-teaching personnel. Networks and linkages in the
country and
overseas are sustained.

3. Special education is teaching children with special needs in the least

restrictive
environment.
In the final analysis, teaching is what special education is all about.
From this perspective,
special education is defined in terms of the who, what, how and where of its
implementation.

WHO: The exceptional children or the children and youth with special education
needs are the
most important persons in special education. Then there are the school
administrators, the special
education teachers, the regular teachers, the interdisciplinary teams of
professionals such as the
guidance counselors, the school psychologists, the speech therapists, physical and
occupational
therapists, medical doctors, and specialists who help provide the specific services
that exceptional
children need.
WHAT: Every exceptional child needs access to a differentiated and modified
curricular program to
enable him/her to learn the skills and competencies in the basic education
curriculum. The
individualized education program (IEP) states the annual goals, the quarterly
objectives, the
strategies for teaching and evaluation of learning and the services the exceptional
child needs.

HOW: Children with mental retardation are taught adaptive skills and basic academic
content that
are suitable to their mental ability. Gifted children are provided with enrichment
activities and
advanced content knowledge so that they can learn more than what the basic
education curriculum
offers. Most of them are in accelerated classes where they finish elementary
education in five years
instead of six. Children who are blind learn braille and orientation and mobility
or travel techniques.
Children who are deaf learn sign language and speech reading.

WHERE: There are several educational placements for these children. The most
preferred is
inclusive education where they are mainstreamed in regular classes. Other types of
educational
placements are special schools, residential schools, self-contained classes, home-
bound and hospital
instruction.

4. Special education is purposeful intervention.

Intervention prevents, eliminates and/or overcomes the obstacles that might
keep an
individual with disabilities from learning, from full and active participation in
school activities, and
from engaging in social and leisure activities.
Preventive intervention is designed to keep potential or minor problems
from becoming a
disability. Primary prevention is designed to eliminate or counteract risk factors
so that a disability
is not acquired. Secondary intervention is aimed at reducing or eliminating the
effects of existing
risk factors. Tertiary prevention is intended to minimize the impact of a specific
condition or
disability among those with disabilities. Remedial intervention attempts to
eliminate the effects of a
disability.
________________________________________________________________________________

The Basic Terms in Special Education: Developmental Disability, Impairment or

Disability,
Handicap and At Risk
Developmental disability refers to a severe, chronic disability of a child five
years of age or older
that is:
1. attributable to a mental or physical impairment or a combination of mental
and physical
impairments;
2. manifested before the person attains age 22;
 3. likely to continue indefinitely;
4. results in substantial functional limitations in three or more of the areas
of major life
activities such as self-care, language, learning, mobility, self-
direction, capacity for
independent living and economic self-sufficiency; and
5. reflects the person's need for a combination and sequence of special care,
treatment or other
services that are lifelong or of extended duration and are individually
planned and
coordinated. (Beirne-Smith, 2002)

Impairment or disability refers to reduced function or loss of a specific

part of the body or
organ. A person may have disabilities such as blindness or low vision, deafness or
hard of hearing
condition, mental retardation, learning disabilities, communication disorders,
emotional and
behavioral disorders, physical and health impairments and severe disabilities.
These disabilities or
impairments limit or restrict the normal functions of a particular organ of the
body. In the case of
the sensory disabilities - blindness and deafness — vision or sight and audition or
hearing do not
function normally and restrict the person's seeing and hearing. The speech
mechanism is impaired
in communication disorders and causes the person to have voice problems, improper
rhythm and
timing in speech and even stuttering. The skeletal and nervous systems are impaired
in cases of
physical and health impairments and severe disabilities. The results are crippling
conditions,
cerebral palsy and other physical disabilities. Impairment and disability are used
interchangeably.
Handicap refers to a problem a person with a disability or impairment
encounters when
interacting with people, events and the physical aspects of the environment. For
example, a child
with low vision or blindness cannot read the regular print of textbooks. The child
either reads books
that are published in large print or transcribed into braille. A child who is hard
of hearing or who
suffers from deafness cannot hear regular conversation and uses a hearing aid and
reads the lips of
the speaker. A child who has a physical disability such as a crippling condition
cannot walk
normally and uses a wheelchair, braces or artificial limbs. However, it must be
remembered that a
disability may pose a handicap in one environment but not in another. A wheelchair-
bound child
with a physical disability may not be able to compete with his classmates in the
Physical Education
class, but may excel in Mathematics, Science and other academic subjects.
At risk refers to children who have greater chances than other children to
develop a
disability. The child is in danger of substantial developmental delay because of
medical, biological,
or environmental factors if early intervention services are not provided. Down
syndrome occurs
during the early phase of pregnancy when one parental chromosome fails to separate
at conception
resulting in the child's having forty-seven chromosomes instead of the normal
forty-six or twenty-
three pairs. At birth, the infant has abnormal physical characteristics and mental
retardation. If a
pregnant woman contracts German measles or rubella during the first three months of
pregnancy,
the fetus is at risk for blindness, deafness or mental retardation. The fetus in
the womb of a woman
who consumes alcohol heavily and chain-smokes, or takes prohibited drugs is at risk
for brain
injury that causes disabilities. If a disability runs in the family, the fetus may
inherit it and the infant
will be born with a disability. Children may meet accidents, suffer from certain
diseases,
malnutrition and other environmental deprivations that can lead to disabilities.

Categories of Children at Risk

Children with established risk are those with cerebral palsy, Down
syndrome, and other
conditions that started during pregnancy. Children with biological risk are those
who are born
prematurely, underweight at birth, whose mother contracted diabetes or rubella
during the first
trimester of pregnancy, or who had bacterial infections like meningitis and HIV.
Environmental risk
results from extreme poverty, child abuse, absence of adequate shelter and medical
care, parental
substance
abuse,
limited

opportunities for nurturance and social stimulants.

Figure 12. A Young Girl with Idiopathic Figure 13. Pupils and Teacher
of the
Mental Retardation Philippine School for the Deaf
in Pasay City

Figure 15. Mary Jane Viñas reads her

Figure 14. A Girl with Physical Disability
lessons in Braille.
________________________________________________________________________________

What Are the Categories of Exceptionalities Among Children and Youth with Special
Needs?

1. Mental retardation refers to substantial limitations in present functioning. It

is characterized
by significantly sub-average intellectual functioning, existing concurrently
with related
limitations in two or more of the following applicable adaptive skill areas:
communication, self-
care, home living, social skills, community use, self-direction, health and
safety, functional
academics, leisure and work. Mental retardation manifests before age 18
(American Association
of Mental Retardation, 1992).

2. Giftedness and talent refers to high performance in intellectual, creative or

artistic areas,
unusual leadership capacity, and excellence in specific academic field (US
Government).
Giftedness refers to the traits of above-average general abilities, high level
task commitment,
and creativity (Renzulli, 1978). Giftedness emphasizes talent as the primary
defining
characteristic (Feldhusen, 1992). Giftedness shows in superior memory,
observational powers,
curiosity, creativity, and ability to learn (Piirto, 1994).

3. Specific learning disability means a disorder in one or more of the basic

psychological
processes involved in understanding or in using language, spoken or written,
which may
manifest itself in an imperfect ability to listen, think, speak, read, write,
spell or to do
mathematical calculations. The term includes such conditions as perceptual
handicaps, brain
injury, minimal brain dysfunction, dyslexia, and developmental aphasia. The term
does not
include children who have learning problems which are primarily the result of
visual, hearing or
motor handicaps, of mental retardation or of environmental, cultural, or
economic disadvantages
(US Office of Education, 1977).

4. The term emotional and behavioral disorders means a condition exhibiting one or
more of the
 following characteristics over a long period of time and to a marked degree,
which adversely
affects educational performance: (a) an inability to learn which cannot be
explained by
 intellectual, sensory, and health factors; (b) an inability to build or maintain
satisfactory
interpersonal relationships with peers and teachers; (c) inappropriate types of
behavior or
feelings under normal circumstances; (d) a general pervasive mood of unhappiness
or
depression; or (e) a tendency to develop physical symptoms or fears associated
with personal or
school problems. The term includes children who are schizophrenic (or autistic).
The term does
not include children who are socially maladjusted unless it is determined that
they are seriously
emotionally disturbed (US Department of Education).

5. Speech and language disorders or communication disorders exist when the impact
that a
communication pattern has on a person's life meets any one of the following
criteria: (a) the
transmission and/or perception of messages is faulty; (b) the person is placed
at an economic
disadvantage; (c) the person is placed at a learning disadvantage; (c) there is
negative impact on
the person's emotional growth; (d) the problem causes physical damage or
endangers the health
of the person (Emerick and Haynes, 1986).

6. Hearing impairment is a generic term that includes hearing disabilities ranging

from mild to
profound, thus encompassing children who are deaf and those who are hard of
hearing. A
person who is deaf is not able to use hearing to understand speech, although he
or she may
perceive some sounds. Even with a hearing aid, the hearing loss is too great to
allow a deaf
person to understand speech through the ears alone. A person who is hard of
hearing has a
significant hearing loss that makes some special adaptations necessary (Paul and
Quigley, 1990,
cited in Heward, 2003).

7. Students with visual impairment display a wide range of visual disabilities -

from total
blindness to relatively good residual (remaining) vision. There is a visual
restriction of sufficient
severity that it interferes with normal progress in a regular educational
program without
modifications (Scholl, 1986, cited in Heward, 2003). A child who is blind is
totally without sight
or has so little vision that he or she learns primarily through the other
senses, such as touch to
read braille. A child with low vision is able to learn through the visual
channel and generally
learns to read print.

8. Physical impairments may be orthopedic impairments that involve the skeletal

system - the
bones, joints, limbs, and associated muscles. Or, they may be neurological
impairments that
involve the nervous system affecting the ability to move, use, feel, or control
certain parts of the
body. Health impairments include chronic illnesses, that is, they are present
over long periods
and tend not to get better or disappear.

9. The term severe disabilities generally encompass individuals with severe and
profound
disabilities in intellectual, physical and social functioning. Because of the
intensity of their
physical, mental or emotional problems, or a combination of such problems, they
need highly
specialized educational, social, psychological and medical services beyond those
which are
traditionally offered by regular and special education programs in order to
maximize their
potential for useful and meaningful participation in society and for self-
fulfillment. Children and
youth with severe disabilities include those who are seriously emotionally
disturbed,
schizophrenic, autistic, profoundly and severely mentally retarded, deaf-blind,
mentally
retarded-blind and cerebral-palsied-deaf (US Department of Education).

Labels and names that were derogatory were used in the past to describe
people with
physical deformities, mental retardation and behavior problems. These demeaning
terms that are not
used anymore are "imbecile, moron, idiot, mentally deficient, dunce and fool." Even
the words
"mute" and "dumb" are unacceptable and inappropriate to describe persons who
manifest speech
and language problems as a result of deafness.
________________________________________________________________________________

Is It Correct to Use Disability Category Labels?

There are two points of view regarding the use of labels to describe
children and youth with
disabilities. The first point of view frowns on labeling these children as mentally
retarded, learning
disabled, emotionally disturbed, socially maladapted, blind, deaf or physically
disabled. Use of
disability labels calls attention to the disability itself and overlooks the more
important and positive
characteristics of the person. These negative labels cause the "spread phenomenon"
to permeate the
mind of the able-bodied persons. The disability becomes the major influence in the
development of
preconceived ideas that tend to be negative, such as helplessness, dependence and
doom to a life of
hopelessness. The truth is, persons with disabilities are first and foremost human
beings who have
the same physical and psychological needs like everybody else. They need to belong,
to be loved, to
be useful.
The second and less popular point of view is that it is necessary to use
workable disability
category labels in order to describe the exceptional learning needs for a
systematic provision of
special education services.
Nevertheless, decades of research and debates on the issue have not arrived
at any
conclusive resolution of the labeling problem. A number of pros and cons have been
advanced by
various specialists and educators (Heward, 2003).

Pros and Possible Benefits of Labeling

Categories can relate diagnosis to specific types of education and
treatment.
Labeling may lead to "protective" response in which children are more accepting of
the atypical
behavior by a peer with disabilities than they would be if that same behavior were
emitted by a
child without disabilities.
• Labeling helps professionals communicate with one another and classify and
assess research
findings.
• Funding of special education programs is often based on specific categories
of
exceptionality.

Labels enable disability-specific advocacy groups to promote specific

programs and to spur
legislative action. Labeling helps make exceptional children's special needs more
visible to the
public.

Possible Disadvantages of Labeling

• Because labels usually focus on disability, impairment, and performance
deficits, some
people may think only in terms of what the individual cannot do instead of
what he or she
can or might be able to learn to do.
• Labels may cause others to hold low expectations for and to differentially
treat a child on the
basis of the label, which may result to a "self-fulfilling prophecy." For
example, in one
study, student teachers gave a child labeled "autistic" more praise and
rewards and less
verbal correction for incorrect responses than they gave a child labeled
"normal." Such
differential treatment could hamper a child's acquisition of new skills and
contribute to the
development and maintenance of a level of performance consistent with the
label's
prediction.
• Labels that describe a child's performance deficit often mistakenly acquire
the role of
explanatory constructs. For example, "Sherry acts that way because she is
emotionally
disturbed."
• Labels suggest that learning problems are primarily the result of something
wrong within the
child, thereby reducing the systematic examination of and accountability for
instructional
variables as the cause of performance deficits. This is especially damaging
outcome when
 the label provides educators with a built-in excuse for ineffective
instruction. For example,
"Jalen hasn't learned to read because he's____").
• A labeled child may develop poor self-concept.
• Labels may lead peers to reject or ridicule the labeled child.
• Special education labels have a certain permanence; once labeled, it is
difficult for a child to
ever again achieve the status of simply being "just another kid."
• Labels often provide a basis for keeping children out of the regular
classroom.
• A disproportionate number of children from diverse cultural, ethnic and
linguistic groups
have been inaccurately labeled as disabled, especially under the category
mild mental
retardation.
• Classification of exceptional children requires the expenditure of a great
amount of money
and professional and student time that could better be spent in planning and
delivering
instruction.
________________________________________________________________________________

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act of America

In the United States, there is a powerful law ("blockbuster legislation")

that was enacted in
1975. Public Law 94-142, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) has
changed the
American system education. It has affected every school in the country and has
changed the roles of
regular and special education teachers, school administrators, parents and others
in the educational
system. The IDEA is a comprehensive legislation regarding the education of children
with
disabilities. The law clearly reflects the concern of society for citizens with
disabilities to be treated
like all other citizens with the same rights and privileges.
The major provision of IDEA states that all children with disabilities who
are between the
ages of 3 to 21, regardless of the type or severity of their disabilities shall
receive a free, appropriate
public education. All children with disabilities shall be located and identified.
Six major principles
shall be followed in organizing and implementing special education programs:
(Heward, 2003)
1. Zero reject. Schools must enroll every child, regardless of the nature or
severity of his or
her disabilities; no child with disabilities may be excluded from a public
education.
2. Nondiscriminatory testing. Schools must use nonbiased, multifactored methods
of
evaluation to determine whether a child has a disability and, if so,
whether special education
is needed. Testing and evaluation procedures must not discriminate on the
basis of race,
culture, or native language. All tests must be administered in the child's
native language, and
identification and placement decisions must not be made on the basis of a
single test score.
Figure 16. SPED Resource Room
3. Appropriate education. Schools must develop and implement an individualized
education
program (IEP) for each student with a disability. The IEP must be individually
designed to
meet the child's unique needs.
4. Least restrictive environment. Schools must educate students with disabilities,
with
children who do not have disabilities to the maximum extent possible.
5. Due process. Schools must provide safeguards to protect the right of children
with
disabilities and their parents by ensuring due process, confidentiality of
records, and parental
involvement in educational planning and placement decisions.
6. Parent participation. Schools must collaborate with the parents of students with
disabilities
in the design and implementation of special education services.
__________________________________________________________________________

Read and Respond

Test on Content Knowledge

1. Define and explain the following terms: exceptional children, special education,
disability or
impairment, handicap, and at risk.
2. In what ways is special education:
• A legislatively governed enterprise?
• A part of basic education?
• The process of teaching children and youth with special education needs?
• An intervention process?
3. Fill in the following matrix with the definition, learning and behavior
characteristics of the
categories of CSN.

CATEGORY OF CSN DEFINITION, TYPES,

CHARACTERISTICS
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.

Reflection and Application of Learning

 Touch base with exceptional children in your community. Locate a public or
private
elementary and secondary school where CSN are enrolled. Ask your instructor for a
letter
requesting the school principal's permission to visit the special education
classes.
Ask the SPED teacher for information about the children: the category of
their
exceptionality, the causes, personal data like their age, family background, number
of years in
school and other relevant information.
Observe how the SPED teacher goes about his or her job. You may ask how he
or she feels
about teaching these children. You may also ask him or her about the future of
these children when
they leave school.
Write a report on your visit and observation of CSN. Share your findings
with your
classmates.