Chapter III

Labeling – Helpful??

The information that I

believed in 1965

was a kind of

educational salvation

began to look

like a cannonball. 

I found myself

giving information to

teachers that provided

the ammunition and

justification for - the

teacher’s inability to

teach children who

learn differently, for

removing the child

from the regular

classroom, for allowing

certain children to

learn and/or to

produce less than

their classmates, etc.

Parents rapidly latched

on to the descriptions

of disabilities or

disorders too, because

they were dealing

with (and continue to

deal with) the nightly

tears and tantrums

over homework and

the regular requests

from the child’s teacher

to talk to their child

about the quality of

their work.  On at

least one level,

parents were relieved

because they were

given explanations for

their child’s difficulties

that did not reflect

poorly on their

parenting or point at

a flaw in their

beloved child’s character.  

They rapidly picked

up the information

about learning disabilities

and differences and

went to their children’s

teachers to ask

them to modify

their child’s program

or homework, to

understand the fidgety

behavior as out

of the control

of the child,

to allow the child

to work standing

up or lying down,

to chew gum, to….

do whatever they

imagined could reduce

the stress of school

and homework. 

Learning curves of

teachers, like those

of the children

they teach vary –

some learn very

rapidly, for others

learning is very

slow and labored.

To many teachers,

the parents’ expanding

information base and

the constant requests

began to be experienced

as a pummeling;

and as an unexpected

consequence, a divide

between parents and

teachers began to grow. 

Now our educational

system has a strong

we/they culture and

everybody is somebody’s

problem.

Also with the

changes in language,

new sets of challenges

were encountered,

including financial ones. 

Once we - the parents,

teachers and the

education system had

defined our children

as having a “real”

difference, a disability,

or a disorder, we

were faced with

how to diagnose

the problems and

how to decide

when they were

“bad enough” to

receive extra help,

the intervention of

a specialist, or

placement in a “special

class.”  Many tests

were developed and/or

re-designed and specialists

in many fields

vied for the right

to determine “the diagnosis.”  

The one thing

everybody agreed upon

was that the child

needed some kind

of help with learning. 

Many programs within

the schools and

outside were developed

 to provide help,

but the problem

was still centered

in the student who

was now impaired

rather than flawed

in character.

Descriptions of the

degree of impairment

abounded.  Legal definitions

were developed and

schools and testing

agencies, such as the

Educational Testing Service

used legal definitions

to decide just how

impaired a student

was and whether

and what kind of

help, accommodations, etc.

the student could

receive.  Public schools,

using the legal

definitions developed

guidelines to determine

eligibility for “special

assistance.”  In the

most rigid of school

systems, the student

could not be determined

to be “eligible” for

assistance unless a

“severe discrepancy” existed

between some measurement

of intellectual functioning

and performance in an

academic area, such

as reading or math. 

That “severe discrepancy”

translated roughly into

a two-year deficit

in some area of learning. 

A two-year deficit in

reading or math

in a 1st or 2nd Grader

is hard to identify. 

So many children

just had to mark

time, fail and fail,

until the discrepancy

was “significant” –

usually around the

end of 3rd grade

or the beginning of

4th Grade.  Of course,

by then, the student

had accrued at

least three years

of failure and

the concomitant sorrow

and erosion of self-esteem.

Those children who

 were “lucky enough”

to receive some

“special assistance” whether

provided by the

school or the parent,

might enjoy some

improvement in academic

performance, but the

cost was high - having

a label that says

impaired, receiving “special

help” during coveted

classes such as Art,

Music or P.E.,

having copious hours

of tutoring while

other children had

recreation time and/or

enduring the continued

admonitions to “try harder.”  

Our education systems

continue to fail

large numbers of

students and to

perpetuate a base

of assumptions that

has not changed

even though our

language has changed. 

Not only do

these rarely questioned

assumptions continue, but

they limit what

we can do educationally,

how we see ourselves

as teachers and how

we see those we

are mandated to serve. 

 
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A note on the formatting:

The narrow lines in this article are intentional. The text has been arranged at roughly three words per line to demonstrate one way a reading environment can be changed to support the reader.

This particular format will not help everyone and that is the point. Readers process written language differently. Adjusting line length, spacing, type size, color, syllable cues, and other elements can give dyslexic and struggling readers greater control over how they encounter text.