Teaching children with intellectual disabilities is much like teaching those with normal cognitive abilities. Key factors such as clarity, patience, and enthusiasm, are critical when teaching any student. The following is a guide of how to teach not just a developmentally disabled child, but additionally, any child who is struggling which learning.
1. Understand the child's learning style. Each person learns differently. Some children learn best through seeing things visually. Others may absorb information better if they hear it. Yet still are those who may need hands-on education to understand concepts. Understanding your child's learning style can help you optimize your teaching strategy, and help your child learn faster, and absorb more.
2. Understand what interests your child. People, children and adults alike, learn best when they are genuinely interested in a topic. By trying to relate the material to their hobbies, a child will be more willing to pay attention, as they find that the material is applicable to their life. For example, when teaching addition math, one could use an example of "one train plus three trains equals four trains" if the child is interested in trains, or use "one cat plus three cats equals four cats" if the child is interested in cats. In the end, the mathematical skills that they learn are the same, but by gearing the subject towards their interests, the student will be more interested and willing to pay attention.
3. Respect your student. Give your student choices, and make them an active participant of what they are learning. Instead of saying, "let's do math, and then do English", ask them if which subject they would like to do. Though, in the end, they will inevitably do both, knowing that they have some semblance of a choice in the matter lets them be more involved in their education, and also makes your lesson more interesting.
4. Be patient. Don't expect your student to "get it" once you explained it. Make sure your student knows it's okay not to understand it the first time, and encourage them to ask questions to clarify. After explaining a difficult concept, ask the student to explain the concept in their own words before moving on. Also, be aware of how much material your child can take in a given time period. Overloading your child with material will cause them to be unnecessarily frustrated, and will not help with the overall rate of material covered.
5. Reiterate. Spend some time reviewing what was covered in previous lesson(s). Not only will this help your child better understand the connections between what he/she is learning now, and what was learned before, but will also help greatly with retention of material.
6. Use memory mnemonics. Devices such as songs, pictures, acronyms, dances, or stories, can help with absorbing and retaining the day's lesson. These also add to the lesson by making it more interactive and entertaining.
When teaching an intellectually disabled child, it is extremely vital to know how much material they can process in a day, what kind of learner they are, and what interests them. However, overall, it is not much different from teaching any "normal" child. Developmentally disabled children are still children curious about the world.
