Knowledge of Self and Disability
One of the constructs of self-advocacy is knowledge of self. This includes
understanding one's strengths and limitations and the effects of one's disability on
learning. According to an interview with one of the special education teachers, students
70
in special education know that they struggle in school, but do not understand how their
disability contributes to their difficulties in school. From my observations of transition
IEP meetings and reviews of the IEP documents, it appears that the confusion is
perpetuated in the IEP transition meeting and in the IEP documentation itself. In most of
the transition meetings I observed, students were asked questions about school
performance or their favorite subjects, such as "What's hard for you?", "Your reading is
not at grade level. Did you know that?", "What is your favorite and least favorite
subject?" and "Why are your grades so low?" Not a single student was asked directly
about their learning disability. In one meeting, the high school counselor asked the
middle school special education teacher to explain the qualifying disability of an
"auditory processing deficit." Instead of explaining it, he said that the student tends to
panic when she has a test or a deadline. Later in this same meeting, the mother said, "I
don't understand why she is getting an A in English, but testing below grade level in
reading." There is a lack of clarity in the discussions about grading practices for students
with learning disabilities, how learning disabilities affect the LD student in the classroom,
and how teacher expectations in Basic English and Math classes compare to teacher
expectations in general education classes.