Teach Effectively!

Susan Kramer, a columnist for an online resource called Bellaonline that bills itself as “The Voice of Women on Line,” writes about Learning Disabilities. She has more materials there than I can review quickly, but I have a few initial impressions.

First, Ms. Kramer seems to have a genuine interest in a broad array of the problems that confront many parents who have children with disabilities. There are entries on music (especially dance), structuring home times, arts and crafts, as well as standard academic areas (e.g., reading). It is important for those of us who are concerned about children with Learning Disabilities, Emotional and Behavior Disorders, and other problems that we should remember to consider the “whole child,” not just the academic and social areas of development. It’s just as important for our kids to have fun and learn other things (e.g., crafts) as it is for any other children.

However, Ms. Kramer’s columns seem to run pretty heavily to the squishy and unfounded. She has recommendations about using kinesthetic learning techniques—she claims to have a kinesthetic learning style herself—to concepts such as arithmetic (have students walk across a line and count up one as they do so; have 18 students divide themselves into 3 groups…18 ÷ 3 = 6). Most of these are cute and I can see doing some of them about once. They do not constitute a curriculum. They are likely to take more time than they would yield in benefits. And, Ms. Kramer offers no documentation that they are beneficial beyond her own personal experience.

Sadly it is this level of analysis that too often passes as worthwhile recommendations. Teachers and, especially, teacher educators must ask tough questions when confronted with recommendations of this sort. I outline these in sundry publications and will review them here later. In the meantime, it’s worth remembering the words of Og Lindsley to which I referred in earlier entries here and here in these blogs: “Show me your data!”

Link to Ms. Kramer’s section of Bellaonline. I hope to devote time to reviewing these recommendations more closely. Thanks to Liz Dtiz for alerting me to this site.