F.A.T.

City
Problem Ownership
What might this look like for a student with learning disabilities?
Experiencing
Frustration and
Anxiety

Performace is affected, inability to get information out. Feelings of wating

to quit and give up. Feelings that other people are better then you are. If I
cant see the teacher, then the teacher cant see me. First reaction to
anxiety is to look away from whatever is causing the anxiety.

Processing
(Pace)

Processing time takes longer, before an answer can be processed, the

question must be processed frist. Twice the processing to do. When pace is
too fast, children get stuck on what has already happened and the whole
class has already moved on to the next question or topic.

Distraction

Not interchanlge with attention span. A child who is distractable is

distracted by everything, a child with no attention span is not able to focus
on anything.

Risk-taking

Dont like suprises. Why should I play the game? If I get the answer right,
he wont do anything, but if I get it wrong he will yell at me, so why play?
They have learned that getting the answer wrong will cause embarrassment.

Additional Notes:

General Notes/Suggested Accommodations

Visual
Perception
(blurry picture)

4 current modes to try and get them to see the picture. None of them
actually work: 1)look harder, 2)promise thigns if they get it write, 3) take
things away, 4) blame the child.
Suggested Accommodations: direct instruction needs to take place first.
Direct instruction needs to happen first so that meaning can then take place.

Reading
Comprehension
(two stories, one
with known
vocab, one
without)

Comprehension is almost all the time taught through vocab, but this isnt
acutally true. Just because you understand all the words in a phrase doesnt
mean you will understand what the pharse is saying. Comprehension has
more to do with background than vocab. Very complicated task
Suggested Accommodations: direct instruction is needed!

Visual
Perception (title
for a story)

Not know what he/she did wrong to get introuble. Missprecieved the
stimulus. Stimulus may be seen differently by student, and they therefore
get in trouble because they saw it differently.
Suggessted Accommodations: direct instruction

Visual Motor
(handwriting in a
mirror)

Mixed messagesing coming in from eyes and hands. Hands are saying to do
one thing, but eyes are saying to do something different. The activity of
handwriting in the mirror is very chanllenging and it can be like that for
children with disabilites.
Suggested Accommodations: patience and time

Oral Expression
(story without a
the letter n)

Brain has the system of storage and retervial. Sometimes there becaome a
problem with getting the retervial out of storage, or putting it back into
strogae, but in the wrong place and therefore cant find it later. Can only do
1 cognitive things at a time, but can do a couple of associative things at a
time.
Suggested Accommodations: Giving of time!
Spatial orientation changes what something actually is. Something that you
learened to be one thing, can turn into something completely different based
on how it is spatially situated. All energy goes into decoding, so they are
unable to know what they acutally reading
Suggested Accommodations: time and not asking rehortical questions.

Reading and
Decoding
(story with
interchangeable
pdbq)
Auditory and
Visual
Capabilities
(story understood
by listening)

I have to hear it before it makes sense to me. Unable to fully understand it

until it is actually heard.
Suggested Accomendations: books on tape, supply auditory input.

What is fairness?
Fairness is that everyone gets what he or she needs! Not that everyone gets exactly the same thing, but
rather what the need!