Mental Retardation

Definition
Classifications
Services
Early Intervention
Characteristics
Causes
Prevention
Methods
Curriculum

•   12 % of all children receiving Special Education services have mental retardation
•   1-3 % of the total population have mental retardation

  Definition  (according to the 1983 AAMR - American Association on Mental Retardation):  
•   significantly subaverage intellectual functioning
   (IQ below 70 - mild; IQ below 50 - severe)
•   deficits in adaptive behavior (across 2 or more areas)
•   manifested before age 18 (during developmental period)

*The AAMR first defined mental retardation in 1921.

  Classifications

IQ Range Old Classification New Classification
50 - 70 Mild mental retardation Educable mental retardation
35 - 55 Moderate mental retardation Trainable mental retardation
20 - 40 Severely/multiply handicapped Severe mental retardation
25 or below Severely multiply handicapped Profound mental retardation



Adaptive Life Skill Areas:
-  Communication
-  Self-care
-  Homeliving
-  Social skills
-  Community use
-  Self-direction
-  Health and safety
-  Functional academics
-  Leisure
-  work


  Services:
•         Intermittent:  as-needed, characterized by episodic nature;
                                          may be short-term
•         Limited: consistent over time, time-limited
•         Extensive:  regular involvement, not time-limited
•         Pervasive:  constant, high intensity, across environments

Early Intervention & Down Syndrome - click here to read a research-based essay about the effects of early intervention on Down Syndrome

  Characteristics of Mental Retardation

Limitations in Intellectual Functioning:

Attention
•         impairments in memory, especially short-term
•         do not use active memory strategies when they first encounter new                               information
•         benefit from external memory strategies (i.e. moving objects in a                     particular order as an aid to remembering a verbal item sequence)
Generalization
•         difficulty in generalizing the skills learned in one setting to other settings         that involve different cues, expectations, people and environmental         arrangements
Motivation
•         lack of motivation
•         set low goals to minimize failure
•         develop learned helplessness
•         use outer-directedness (seeking others to guide them)
•   benefit from behavior analysis: Use applied behavior analysis (the systematic collection and graphing of data to ascertain a student's progress toward a specific objective)


  Limitations in Adaptive Skill Areas:

Self-direction (self-determination)
-  the ability of individuals to live their lives the way that they choose to live them, consistent with their own values, preferences, and abilities

Functional Academics
•   the more retarded a student is, the more functional are academics
•   aimed towards independent living

Home Living Skills


  Causes of Mental Retardation

Timing:  when it happened
•   Prenatal (before birth)
•   Perinatal (during birth)
•   Postnatal (after birth)

Type:  Biomedical
 -      Causes that develop within the individual
•   Chromosomal disorders (occur when a parent contributes too much or too little genetic material)
i.e. Down Syndrome:  3 chromosomes instead of two on the 21 pair
•   occurs 1 in every 600-800 births
•   occurs 1:100 when mother's age is above 40
•   hypoxia and anoxia:  oxygen deprivation
•   PKU, Galactosemia, Tay Sachs Disease
•   prematurity, meningitis, head trauma

Type:  Psychosocial
•   social and environmental influences
•   poverty (can lead to malnutrition, no immunizations, poor maternal health)
•   child abuse, neglect


  Preventing Mental Retardation

Primary:  intervention before cause occurs
Secondary:  intervention begins when problem is known (lead screening, PKU testing, ect.)
Tertiary:  intervention after problem is present (special education, physical therapy, ect.)


  Methods

Functional Academics:  
•   Learning to complete a job application form
•   Learning to use a city map or a telephone directory
•   Learning survival words (men/women, entrance/exit, walk/don't walk, emergency, caution)
•   Learning to carry on a reciprocal conversation
•   Learning to identify denominations of money and to make change
Augmentative Communication Device
•   Equipment that is used to increase an individual's ability to communicate effectively
Self-determination
•   A curriculum on self-determination should include:  choice making, decision making, problem solving, goal setting and attainment, self-observation, evaluation and reinforcement, internal locus of control, positive attributions of efficacy and outcome expectancy, self-awareness, self-knowledge
Peer tutoring
Cooperative learning
Assistive Technology
 

  Curriculum:

Remedial emphasis:  
•   occurs in separate resources rooms and programs
•   teaches basic academic and social skills
•   provides intensive programming in reading, math, and language arts

General Classroom Support:
•   tutorial assistance
•   alternative ways of achieving goals
•   developing learning strategies

Adult outcomes:
•   emphasizes the life-skills preparation
•   identifies expectations of the environments where students will live, work, and play after they leave school
•   teaches skills that prepare them to function successfully in those environment