View Content #23702

By Justin Harford, Mobility International USA

Whether teaching students with learning disabilities, autism, deafness or visual impairment, the best language teachers will have questions and concerns.  By employing many of the techniques that are recommended for language teachers, the best approach might be business as usual. Design your classes and curriculum to fit as many students as possible, and accommodating students with disabilities will be a snap.

Let’s consider some examples that will illustrate just what we mean.

Make sure to use a multisensory approach when designing in-class and homework activities. It is easy to let one’s self fall into the habit of only emphasizing visual input when teaching vocabulary or explaining a grammatical concept; however, by ensuring that your students also interact with the concept or vocabulary with their hearing, smell, touch and even taste, it will become more memorable and accessible  to as many students as possible.

Check in regularly with your students. Dr. Irene Konyndyk, who has taught extensively on language access for students with learning disabilities through presentations, www.foreignlanguagesforeveryone.com and her book by the same name would encourage her students to regularly reflect on their language study in her class, discussing both their strengths and their concerns about their progress. This is an excellent way to ensure that all of your students are learning including those with disabilities. It can also give you an idea of how your students will learn most efficiently, what is working and what is not.

Ian Sutherland, a professor at Gallaudet University and co-author of the book Worlds Apart: Disability and Foreign Language Learning, recommends organizing your desks in the shape of an arc around the classroom, rather than in the traditional rows. This will enable deaf and hard of hearing students to read your lips, or the signs of an interpreter, while simultaneously following a visual presentation. It will also connect all of your students in an interactive situation with both the teacher and each other, while also leaving plenty of space in the center of the classroom for fun and engaging activities.

The next time that you teach a language class, think about how you can design it for as many students as possible. Designing your class with universal access in mind will ensure that it is accessible and engaging for everyone with and without disabilities.

References

Berberi, Hamilton, and Sutherland (2014). Worlds Apart?: Disability and Foreign Language Learning. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Konyndyk, Irene. Foreign Languages for Everyone. Available at http://www.foreignlanguagesforeveryone.com/.