Who is considered exceptional

This group will need some social support or protection for all of their lives. Many of them are able to perform useful tasks at home or in a sheltered environment. Mentally deficient children whose I Qs fall below 30 cannot benefit from any training. They need custodial care and are called custodial cases. Within the large category of the physically handicapped children are a number of separate and distinct groups of children, each of which requires special thought by educators.

Herein are children with impaired vision, children with impaired hearing, children with speech handicaps, children with orthopaedic and neurological impairment. Children with impaired vision may be subdivided into two major groups, that is, the partially-sighted and the blind.

The basis of grouping is in terms of visual activity. These children need special programmes, special methods of teaching, special equipment and teaching aids.

The blind have to use braille as their reading medium. Some of them, partially seeing ones, may be able to read large letters slowly but do not have sufficient vision to read them effectively. The blind have to acquire skills in travel and mobility, in adjusting to group situations and strange environments, in avoiding undesirable facial expressions and mannerisms, and in learning to explore the world about them by tactual means.

They need suitable vocational training. Pupils with impaired hearing encounter more difficulty scholastically than other children with sensory disabilities. Besides teaching subject-matter, a teacher of the hearing impaired must offer instruction in speech development, speech reading, language, and auditory training.

In children who are hard of hearing, the residual hearing is functional for acquiring language usually with a hearing aid but sometimes without one.

Children who are deaf, have a profound hearing loss, either congenitally or accidentally after they have experience of speech. They need to acquire their language concepts and skills in speech and speech reading through special instruction i.

Whether the hearing impaired children need specialised instruction in a special class depends on the degree of hearing loss, the age when the loss occurred amount of special training already received and amount of language, speech, and speech reading proficiency attained.

Speech disabilities are often closely associated with loss of hearing. They result from developmental, functional and organic causes. Two organizations developed to study and treat speech disorders: one consisted of speech correctionists who were or had been schoolteachers, and became the National Society for the Study and Correction of Speech Disorders in , while another group more closely affiliated with the medical profession started in and became the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association.

Samuel Orton was active in this field as well, and suggested in the s, along with Lee Edward Travis, that speech disorders generally and stuttering in particular were analogous to dyslexia, and resulted from failure to establish cerebral hemispheric dominance.

This theory was extended but never conclusively proven by Wendell Johnson and Charles van Riper in the s, and the latter suggested in that the social implications of communication were as important as the linguistic ones, which led in turn to the development of psycholinguistics by George Miller and others, which was one of the foundations of cognitive psychology Prutting, Communication disorders account for about 18 per cent of the educational services received by children.

These can involve expressive language, language comprehension, the physical production of speech or social communication, the interpretation of and appropriate response to verbal and nonverbal language in social contexts. Intellectual disability or mental retardation is one of the most common disabilities, and has been recognized for longer than the other forms of modern exceptionality. Intellectual subnormality was discussed in an Egyptian papyrus from about BCE.

Hippocrates felt around BCE that the behavioral abnormalities and seizures that often attended retardation were due to brain disease rather than supernatural causes, but it was not until the 1st century BCE that Soranus of Ephesus founded a hospital for mental disorders where the retarded were also housed.

The Romans often allowed brain-injured children to die of exposure, but the retarded children of the wealthy had property rights and were generally entrusted to guardians Harris, The first special education for intellectual disability was attempted in by Jean-Marc Itard, who undertook the training of Victor the Wild Boy, a probably retarded feral child; an earlier Wild Boy named Peter had been found in Germany and brought to the court of George I in London, but he was a source of amusement and was not trained.

Victor acquired only a few words of language but learned social rudiments and lived equably with a family until his death in Seguin continued these efforts in America and in published an influential book, Idiocy and its Treatments by Physiological Methods.

Dorothea Dix, Hervey Wilbur and Samuel Gridley Howe established institutions for rehabilitation and training of the retarded, first in Massachusetts and then in other states, but disillusionment set in when retarded residents could be taught simple skills but could not achieve normality. In addition, the increasing and often inappropriate use of IQ testing led to the identification of large numbers of people, particularly immigrants, as mentally deficient.

Special educational arrangements for children with intellectual disability was introduced in Rhode Island in and New Jersey in , and were available in 46 of 48 states by mid-century, when the National Association of Parents and Friends of Mentally Retarded Children, now known as the Arc, was founded. Children with intellectual disability currently make up about 10 per cent of service recipients, equally divided between genetic, environmental and obscure causes.

The pejorative classifications such as idiot, imbecile and moron have been replaced by mild 85 per cent of the identified population, IQ , moderate 10 per cent, IQ , severe per cent, IQ and profound per cent, IQ below 20 mental retardation. An etiology, usually acquired, can be established in 60 to 75 per cent of severe MR cases but in only 40 to 50 per cent of mild retardation; a genetic basis is evident in 25 to 50 per cent, mainly hereditary syndromes of which mental retardation is but one feature.

Melchior Adam Weikart in and Sir Alexander Crichton in provided the first clinical observations of attention deficit , and Heinrich Hoffmann associated this with motor restlessness in the s.

Sir Charles Still in added the concepts of impulsivity and low frustration tolerance, and noted the marked male predominance that is still seen, although many of his patients had other behavior and neurological problems and may have been examples of the minimal brain damage or dysfunction that has often been conflated with ADHD.

ADHD currently affects about 3. Contributing factors include genetics, prenatal toxic exposure, single-parent upbringing, a chaotic home environment and insufficient social support.

The diagnosis in children is based on at least 6 months of inattentive, hyperactive or impulsive behavior in several different settings. The childhood syndrome is generally responsive to medical and psychoeducational treatment, but it is now clear that the disorder does not remit but continues into adulthood with often different manifestations.

The study and treatment of emotional and behavioral disorders in children is a relatively new discipline. The psychiatric nosologies and taxonomies of the 19th century were focused on adults, and the disorders of children were generally the purview of pediatricians.

The first school for children with psychiatric problems was founded near Jena in , and the first text on child psychiatry was published in France in The first child guidance clinic, the Juvenile Psychopathic Institute, was founded in Chicago by Jane Addams in , and Leo Kanner, later of autism fame, established the first academic Child Psychiatry department at Johns Hopkins in The separate treatment of childhood mental disorders in Britain began at the Maudsley Hospital in A specialty organization, the American Academy of Child Psychiatry, now Adolescent also, was founded in and board certification was started in Kanner, Children with these psychiatric conditions are only 1 or 2 per cent of the special education population.

They manifest external misconduct and defiance or internal anxiety and depression symptoms, and may have both. Temperament, family history of psychiatric disorder and neurologic disorders or deficits are biological contributing factors.

Adaptive or maladaptive parenting strategies, school situations and peer group influences are predominant environmental factors. Autism was first described in , but has been alleged in many historical figures. Martin Luther told of a parishioner with behavioral abnormalities consistent with autism, whom Luther felt to be possessed and should be put to death. A court case in Scotland involved autistic behaviors, with the marriage of Hugh Blair of Borgue being annulled and his inheritance redistributed to his brothers.

Some commentators have suggested that Peter and Victor, the wild boys discussed earlier, may have been autistic rather than retarded. Children who have these skills, but perform poorly at school, are often twice exceptional. Twice-exceptional students also tend to face two or more of the following challenges:. A child who has some of these traits combined with the above strengths probably has a sophisticated intellect that gets overlooked because of problems with behavior or expression.

It's important to remember that twice-exceptional children often have extraordinary talents. It's also important to remember that they face difficulties that could mask those talents. Educators and parents who suspect that certain children's educational needs are not being met may need to explore several strategies before discovering an approach that lets them reach their full potential.

At Brain Balance Achievement Centers, we recognize that children with significant struggles in some areas will also likely excel in others due to an imbalance and miscommunication between the two hemispheres of the brain. Identifying Twice Exceptional Children. Twice-exceptional students, also referred to as 2e children, are often characterized as highly intelligent students who struggle in school due to a learning disability , ADHD or sensory integration disorder.

These gifted children often fly under the radar, and many parents and teachers fail to recognize their potential. Learning how to identify twice-exceptional students helps parents and teachers find ways for these children to flourish and make the most of their intellectual gifts.