Have you ever experienced or know someone with a child screaming in public while covering their ears or eyes? For some seemingly unknown reason, they might have a loud and sometimes violent reaction episode without anyone apparent trigger. It is common to mistake this as a child throwing a tantrum. Read more
The role of a special needs educator is a challenging but rewarding role to fill. The people who become special needs educators must overcome a great deal of personal challenges as well as the challenges of the job in order to ensure their students are living up to the best of their abilities.
These challenges come from needing to personalise education plans, and ensuring each and every student learns in the manner that is best suited to them for them to develop and progress. There are many different kinds of learning disorders that their students may have, and the special needs educators must find some way to accommodate this for the child’s benefit. This requires a high degree of dedication, training, and care; with demand steadily growing for schools and educators. Read more
2019 marks the year all Singaporean children of the appropriate age are required to attend school, including children with learning disabilities and other special needs. Prior to this, children with special needs were exempt, with many attending special education schools (SPED) run by voluntary welfare organisations or enrolled in private institutions.
Even with this move, the wait list for schools remain long. As schools and institutes move to increase capacity, demand for experience, leadership, and management become apparent. Read more
The holidays may be a very rough, chaotic time for children with special needs. There are a lot of non-routine activities happening all around them all at once, with familiar and unfamiliar friends and families showing up. For many children with special needs, this can be excess stimuli. Read more
Being an educator is incredibly meaningful but comes with many challenges. The preparation needed to conduct the lesson, the nerve-wracking encounter with the parents to inform of their child’ progress and the look of joy or sadness after receiving their exam results. These are part of the learning process a typical educator must go through. Read more
If you have been working for years as an educator for special needs children, you have seen and understand how important all your efforts are, big and small, in helping to guide and educate the children under your care. You have guided them, and you have seen the challenges required, and maybe even helped implement unique intervention and lesson plans best suited to help your students gain the confidence and skills they will need in society. Read more
Speech and language disorders are some of the most common disabilities in young children. They are also often preventable and reversible when detected early enough and given proper intervention. Unfortunately many children go undiagnosed and the disorder becomes more difficult to address as the years roll on. Read more
Special Education is a field that has seen an incredible demand and growth for qualified educators. In the foreseeable future, more demand will be placed for educators with specialised training and expertise. Your experience and expertise will be required to help chart the way forward in the field of special education, whether you are dealing with funding, staffing issues, or developing effective curriculum and policies. Read more
If you have noticed your child is not speaking as scheduled, there is no need to be alarmed. Speech and language development in children is progressive but the schedule of development is not strict. One child may speak slightly earlier and be more developed than another but it could just mean they are developing at a different pace and is to be expected. Read more
Play Therapy is an intervention strategy to help children safely communicate and express their feelings and thoughts naturally in order to deal with trauma, loss, delayed development, and other developmental and social issues . Play therapy is fun, free-flowing, non-directed, and effective.
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