special words for natural human variation
the
chaos of 15 years of socialist ‘education’
Mostly informative of the real situation
- recommended reading.
“Many experts fear that funds earmarked to help
children with learning difficulties are being redirected
to cope with a new tide of social deprivation that is
washing up in the classroom. Children from troubled
homes, who turn up at schools with behavioural problems,
are being routinely put on the SEN register alongside
those with more specific learning difficulties, such
as dyslexia and dyspraxia.
“It is a picture apparently borne out by official
figures, which show that affluent Richmond upon Thames
in west London has 11.8 per cent of primary pupils on
the SEN [Special Educational Needs] register. In Liverpool, with its higher levels
of unemployment and poverty, that figure is 22.6 per
cent. So are SEN, and the vast resources that accompany
it, being used as an excuse for poor parenting?
“The current SEN system was established in 1981,
after a report by Mary Warnock, with the aim of including
in mainstream schools children with learning difficulties
who had been previously educated in separate establishments.
Three decades on, there are more than one in five schoolchildren
in England on the SEN register – more than half
of all pupils in 100 schools."
Almost all so-called ‘dyslexia’
is poor teaching of reading.
Almost all so-called ‘dyspraxia’ is another
excuse-me word for ‘clumsy’.
"Compared to other specific learning difficulties, major research into dyspraxia – or developmental coordination disorder (DCD) as it is more formally known – has only begun fairly recently.
"DCD is the term used to diagnose children who have motor skills substantially below what is expected for their age. They are not lazy, clumsy or unintelligent – in fact, their intellectual ability is in line with the general population – but they do struggle with everyday tasks that require coordination.
"Take a typical boy with DCD: he is a bright and capable 10-year-old boy, but he struggles to tie his shoe laces and needs help to fasten the buttons on his school shirt. He can't ride a bike and no one passes him the ball when he plays sports. His teacher has told his parents that while he is a clever and very able student, his handwriting is slow and difficult to read. He finds it hard to keep up in class or to complete his homework – and his performance at school is deteriorating."
[Quoted from theconversation.com/]
This quoted article makes no sense. I'll demonstrate using just one short paragraph.
"DCD is a lifelong disorder that cannot be explained by a general
medical condition;..."
What is "a general medical condition"?
"...there is no definitive answer as to what causes it at present."
What is a "no definitive answer"? A sane person is interested in what is, not in what is not. What does this tell the reader about what is?
"However, it is known that DCD is not due to brain damage, like some
learning difficulties."
What is "brain damage"?
On what basis is the claim that it "not due to brain damage" made? We know next to nothing about fine-scale problems in the brain.
And from another paragraph :
"Unfortunately for many children, DCD does not act alone: it commonly
presents alongside other developmental disorders such as dyslexia,
specific language impairment and attention deficit hyperactivity
disorder. Children with DCD have been found to be generally slower
than their peers to hit early movement milestones such as crawling and
walk..."
and notice "Take a typical boy with DCD: he is a bright and capable 10-year-old boy, but... ", which is followed by a whole list of the boy's incompetances. This is not a description of "bright and capable".
And
"DCD affects around 5-6% of children..."
5% of the population has intelligence levels of about 75 IQ (sd 16) and below.
Notice that these problems are claimed as grouped.
Calling particular expressions 'syndromes' and giving them fancy titles does not make one 'scientific'.
These words are widely use as comfort blankets for parents with dull children.
Then there are so-called 'professors' etc who present themselves as 'experts' on these fancy 'syndromes'. You will find that
where they are active, ever more children with those particular 'syndromes' start appearing in that local area, university and hospital
departments start growing, books and articles multiply. It is how the system 'works'.
As C. Northcote Parkinson said, "Work tends
to fill the time available". Bureaucracies grow, grants and wages and staff grow.
All this does not mean that such children/people cannot be taught and helped, but neither does it mean that
this is usually any more than natural human variation.
related material
'Dyslexia'
Intelligence and madness
Reality, laying
the foundations for sound education
How
to teach a child to read using phonics [synthetic phonics]
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