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12 % of all children receiving Special Education services have mental retardation |
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1-3 % of the total population have mental retardation |
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significantly subaverage intellectual functioning |
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deficits in adaptive behavior (across 2 or more areas) |
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manifested before age 18 (during developmental period) |
| 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 |
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Intermittent: as-needed, characterized by episodic nature; |
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Limited: consistent over time, time-limited |
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Extensive: regular involvement, not time-limited |
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Pervasive: constant, high intensity, across environments |
| Characteristics of Mental Retardation |
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impairments in memory, especially short-term |
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do not use active memory strategies when they first encounter new information |
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benefit from external memory strategies (i.e. moving objects in a particular order as an aid to remembering a verbal item sequence) |
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difficulty in generalizing the skills learned in one setting to other settings that involve different cues, expectations, people and environmental arrangements |
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lack of motivation |
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set low goals to minimize failure |
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develop learned helplessness |
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use outer-directedness (seeking others to guide them) |
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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) |
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the more retarded a student is, the more functional are academics |
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aimed towards independent living |
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Prenatal (before birth) |
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Perinatal (during birth) |
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Postnatal (after birth) |
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Chromosomal disorders (occur when a parent contributes too much or too little genetic material) |
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i.e. Down Syndrome: 3 chromosomes instead of two on the 21 pair |
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occurs 1 in every 600-800 births |
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occurs 1:100 when mother's age is above 40 |
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hypoxia and anoxia: oxygen deprivation |
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PKU, Galactosemia, Tay Sachs Disease |
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prematurity, meningitis, head trauma |
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social and environmental influences |
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poverty (can lead to malnutrition, no immunizations, poor maternal health) |
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child abuse, neglect |
| Methods |
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Learning to complete a job application form |
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Learning to use a city map or a telephone directory |
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Learning survival words (men/women, entrance/exit, walk/don't walk, emergency, caution) |
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Learning to carry on a reciprocal conversation |
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Learning to identify denominations of money and to make change |
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Equipment that is used to increase an individual's ability to communicate effectively |
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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 |
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occurs in separate resources rooms and programs |
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teaches basic academic and social skills |
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provides intensive programming in reading, math, and language arts |
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tutorial assistance |
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alternative ways of achieving goals |
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developing learning strategies |
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emphasizes the life-skills preparation |
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identifies expectations of the environments where students will live, work, and play after they leave school |
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teaches skills that prepare them to function successfully in those environment |