F.A.T.

City
Problem Ownership

What might this ‘look like’ for a student with learning disabilities?

Experiencing A student experiencing frustrations or anxiety will will avoid eye contact with the
Frustration and teacher, the likely source of anxiety. Matters are made worse by the fact teachers
Anxiety want eye contact as a signal that students are listening/paying attention.

Processing (Pace) A student with a slow processing speed will have delayed responses to questions
that other students will find simple. During lectures, asking them a question may
take them out of processing the lecture so that they can process the question,
leaving them with less information.

Distraction A distracted student will direct their attention to every detail around them. Their
attention is split among a myriad of small details. This differs from because
attention-deficit which is when there is no attention paid to anything. A distracted
studetn is still aware of their surroundings.

Risk-taking A student with a learning disability will be adverse to risk-taking because the
typical classroom punishes wrong answers without reward correct answers.

Additional Notes:

General Notes/Suggested Accommodations

Visual Scaffold instruction, tell students when the image is, contextualize it and help
Perception students give meaning to the image. Do not expect studetns to teach themselves.
(blurry picture)
Reading Comprehension has more to do with background than understanding vocabulary.
Comprehension Connecting the reading to background knowledge or common understanding will
(two stories, one make it easier to read and comprehend.
with known
vocab, one
without)
Visual Be aware of student interpretations and how students perceive stimuli. They
Perception (title might not understand why they are in trouble because they were just responding
for a story) to stimuli.

Visual Motor Understand that students may have difficult with motor coordination due to
(handwriting in a complications within their own body. When it comes to handwriting, typing as an
mirror) alternative for writing may offer a way for LD students to be accomodated.

Oral Expression For some LD students, speaking or listening can be cognitive tasks as opposed to
(story without a associative experiences. Cognitive experiences require mental focus and cannot
the letter ‘n’) be multitasked. This means that the student will have great difficulty listening to
the lecture and taking notes.

Reading and Spatial orientation does not dictate object identification, except with letters.
Decoding
(story with
interchangeable
‘pdbq’)

Auditory and Auditory information and visual information, like reading, are processed
Visual differently.
Capabilities
(story understood
by listening)

What is ‘fairness’?

Everyone gets what he or she needs. In order to be

fair, people need to be treated differently.