Introduction
“Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.”
Albert Einstein
Teaching is the most prominent and most important profession in the World. It helps the students to learn new concepts and to understand the aims of their lives. Teaching is the way to encourage and motivate the students to feel capable of doing anything and increase their self-confidence to achieve their future targets. However, it is all about teaching strategies which make the teacher able to encourage and motivate their students and to help them in learning new concepts. Especially, when concerned about Especial Education Institutions then teachers play very effective and essential role. It is all about teaching strategies which make the Especial Students capable to learning new things and proving them as strong and successful person in the society.
Especial students face a lot challenges while learning new things. Especially, the students with ADHD (Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder) face a lot of challenges during learning their courses. ADHD is the most frequently diagnosed disorder in the children and the adults in the worldwide. The children and adults facing ADHD may face focusing issues which may affect their future and can cause difficulties in their learning process. Furthermore, the ADHD children or adults face difficulties in their visual attention during scene processing due to which they may not learn the things as efficiently and quickly as healthy students can do. However, it is found that some teaching strategies may help the students with ADHD in focusing on the objects and learning the things so quickly and efficiently.
The school management and teachers can help the students with ADHD by arranging proper medication and therapy process for them. In this way, students show great improvement in their behavior and so they learn school content efficiently. However, only medication and therapy cannot help the students in achieving their academic success instead a lot of efforts by the teachers is required. For this purpose, the teachers may use different effective teaching strategies to encourage and motivate the students in learning new concepts and showing great performance in their academic results.
Most of the people are of the view that the children with ADHD do not feel different form the other children but their intelligence level is not equal to them. They are of the view that the children with ADHD cannot focus on the things effectively and that is why they remain incapable of doing anything with accuracy or showing good results in academic results. However, this thinking is far away from the reality. The children with ADHD can also show great results in their academic results because ADHD does not affect their intelligence level. The only way to motivate them, and making them able to focus on the concepts is better teaching strategies. A teacher plays an effective role in students’ life. Similarly, the teachers can help the students with ADHD to be successful in school because they show positive attitude to follow direction.
The children with ADHD face a lot of difficulties, not only in focusing but also in following directions. For example the students with ADHD cannot pay attention the teachers’ lecture, face difficulties in remaining seated, interrupting others, waiting their turn, following rules and regulation, doing messy work, and other issues. This shows that the students with ADHD are different from the normal children and that is why they require great attention while learning any new thing. However, the positive thing about these students is that they struggle hard to follow the directions and to focus on the things going on, and in this way they show great achievements with a little hard work.
This study will now evaluate that what are the difficulties faced by the students with ADHD and the teachers teaching these students? The study will also focus that how the students teaching seminars may be proven as effective in teaching and motivating especial students? This study will be of great importance because it will help to examine the impact of arranging student teaching seminars for the especial students in different institutions. This study will provide findings which will show that only therapy and medication is not the solution of the problems of students with ADHD instead effective teaching methods, strategies, and seminars can also help these students in learning and showing better performance in their academic results. This study become, even, more important when it highlight the great role played by the educators to minimize any frustration or inappropriate behaviors in students with ADHD and motivating them in getting more achievements in their lives.
Literature Review
Now the researchers are more inclined towards the research of effective teaching strategies for the students with ADHD. That is why many scholars have been working on this topic and have published their scholarly articles in the authentic journals. This section of the paper will discuss the already published literature by other scholars. For this purpose the researcher focused on the primary as well as secondary sources by using the key words; teaching strategies for students with ADHD, learning of children with ADHD, and impact of teaching seminars on the students with ADHD. The primary source of the study included the scholarly published article and secondary source included the already published literature and other information from the Internet, and library. However, two scholarly articles; (Sherman, Baydala, & Cermen, 2008) and (Evens & Owens, 2014), were used as primary sources in the literature review of the study. Both articles highlight the importance of both; the psychological treatment and the teaching strategies, for the academic achievements of the students with ADHD.
Sherman, Baydala, & Cermen (2008) presented a study in which they discussed about the academic challenges faced by the students with ADHD. According to this study, the students with ADHD face a lot of focusing and behavioral problems due to which they cannot show great outcomes in their academic results. The aim of the study was to highlight the best and effective teaching methods for the students with ADHD. The students with ADHD work hard to overcome their behavioral and focusing problems but they require a lot of motivation and support from others. This motivation and support can be either provided by the parents or by the teachers. For this purpose the researchers followed a meta-analysis pattern, according to which the researchers observed the already published literature and then summarized it to make strong conclusion. For this purpose, the researcher initially collected a lot of literature published about the challenges faced by the students with ADHD and its solution by effective teaching strategies.
The findings of the study showed that there exists several teaching factors, such as dealing, lesson planning, use of advanced technology, and paying separate attention, are really helpful in making the students able to show achievement in their academic results. Not only this but also the school management, parents, or teachers can arrange therapy treatments for the students with ADHD to help them in overcoming their behavioral problems. In this way the students with ADHD will understand how to overcome their deficiencies, how to focus on the objects and events, and how to control their behavioral issues and irritation. In this way they show the behavioral improvements and also become able to focus on their academic needs. Conclusively, the study showed that it is the teaching factors which play an essential role in helping the students with ADHD to show great achievements in academic results and behavioral improvements (Sherman, Baydala, & Cermen, 2008).
Evens & Owens (2014) presented a study in which they discussed that students with ADHD face a lot of behavioral issues due to which they need psychological dealing. For this purpose the teachers as well as parents play an essential role in arranging therapy treatments for the children and adolescent with ADHD. The research mainly focused to discuss that psychological therapy treatment plays a very effective role for the children and adolescent with ADHD and help them in showing best results not only in their academics but also in other matters of life. To analyze the impact of psychological treatment on the children and adolescents with ADHD, researchers examined already published literature. They specifically focused on the two major issues to the children and adolescents with ADHD which were highlighted in 1998 by Pelham et al. With the analysis of the issues faced by adolescents with ADHD, the researchers discussed that the only way to deal with the issues to children with ADHD is psychological therapy treatment. This treatment can be arranged by the parents or school management can help the students with ADHD to focus on their behavioral issues with the help of psychological therapy.
This therapy helps them to understand the importance of the event, makes them able to focus on event with accuracy, and encourage them to observe things and respond to them effectively and quickly. In this way such children observe the teaching patterns with accuracy and show very good results in their academic results. The conclusion of the study showed, psychological therapy helps the children and adolescents with ADHD to focus and observe the events with accuracy and to respond to the events so quickly and with active mind. The psychological therapy helps them to deal with their problem with great motivation and to overcome on their disease with full courage. This therapy also makes them capable of understand and learning course contents effectively and to show best academic results (Evens & Owens, 2014).
The literature analysis showed that children and adolescents with ADHD require great attention from their parents and teachers to show better results in their academic tests. Such children can be encouraged and motivated to fight against their disease by providing them psychological therapy and by using effective teaching strategies. Teachers play an essential role in the success of any student and that is why teaching factors leaves a very positive impact on the achievement and behaviors of the students with ADHD. Thus, the school management or the education authorities must arrange special teaching seminars for the students with ADHD to help them in achieving their targets and to make them capable to show best academic results.
Method
The study focused on how the students with ADHD can be encouraged to show better academic results and for this purpose how teaching seminars can be proven effective? The answer cannot be obtained without having survey analysis or meta-analysis. However, in this research, due to lack of time and other limitations, the researcher can only use meta-analysis methodology and can analyze the already published literature. In this way the research observed the already published literature by other authors and examined how different approaches can be used to help the students with ADHD in getting good scores in their academic examination. However, the researcher main aim was to get answer of the research question, what are the difficulties faced by the students with ADHD and the teachers teaching these students, and how the students teaching seminars may be proven as effective in teaching and motivating especial students? For this purpose the researcher only relied on the primary source. The primary source included the scholarly published articles which were gathered by using keywords; adolescents with ADHD, teaching factors and its impact on students with ADHD, deficiencies in ADHD, psychological treatment of students with ADHD. The researcher selected then two articles (Evens & Owens, 2014; Sherman, Baydala, & Cermen, 2008)as primary source to make strong analysis regarding to the impact of teaching factor on the students with ADHD. These articles were helpful for the researcher to analyze the impact of both, teaching strategies and psychological therapy, on the students with ADHD and on their academic performance.
This research analysis design is appropriate for the researcher because it allowed the researcher to examine the context-sensitive environment deeply, to use data collection techniques that are specific to the complexity of the situation and to produce a holistic view of the issues being studied. Initially the researcher selected two articles as primary source of the study and then analyzed their methodology and findings regarding to the performance of children and adolescents in academic tests. The study focused that how the students with ADHD face a lot of challenges in their lives and how the two articles highlight those challenges. Moreover, the researcher analyzed that how the two articles discussed challenges faced by students with ADHD and how these students can be encouraged to show good performance in their academics. Both articles used different approaches. One used just teaching factors and other focused on the psychological therapy and the conclusions of the articles were analyzed that which strategy is really helpful for the students with ADHD. The collected information was analyzed and important points were stored in a separate file at password protected computer. Each article was deeply analyze to know what strategies are exactly used in the study to provide benefits to the students with ADHD and finally both articles were summarized to make strong conclusion of this study. Also, the researcher used the findings of the both articles to analyze that either the teaching seminars in the especial education institution can be beneficial or not? The researcher then analyzed the articles to evaluate that if the student teaching seminars will be arranged for the students with ADHD then will it be really helpful for the students to overcome their focusing and behavioral issues? The researcher also analyzed that which teaching factors or strategies may be used for the students with ADHD during the teaching seminars to help them in dealing with their diseases. The researcher also made analysis that how the teaching seminars may affect the target population (students with ADHD) and what can be the outcome of these seminars? The analysis and findings of the research are discussed in the next section (findings).
Findings:
The study aimed to highlight the importance of student teaching seminars in elementary especial school. For this purpose the researcher focused two scholarly published articles (Sherman, Baydala, & Cermen, 2008; Evens & Owens, 2014) as primary source. The published articles helped the researcher to analyze the importance of teaching factors and the psychological therapy in the lives of students with ADHD. The findings of the research showed that teaching factor plays an essential role in encouraging the students with ADHD to work hard. However, along with teaching factors, psychological therapy is also very important because it helps the students with ADHD to overcome their behavioral challenges. This means that without psychological therapy, teaching factors may not show 100% improvement in the children and adolescent with ADHD.
ADHD is the most frequently diagnosed disorder in the children and the adults in the worldwide. Most of the children are found to have the symptoms of ADHD since their childhood and the symptoms increases with their age. It is also found that these symptoms may be costly for the individual and the society. As the children and adults facing ADHD may also face behavioral problems or focusing issues to this may be proven as dangerous for the people having ADHD and for others too (Blum & Kenneth, 2008). Now the teachers, parents, and psychologists can help the children with ADHD to overcome their behavioral and focusing issues.
The main thing to be focused is the academic results of the students with ADHD which can be improved by proper teaching factors. The teaching factors may include lesson planning, motivation, classroom management, and use of multimedia. Along with these teaching factors the psychology therapy may help the students with ADHD to overcome their behavioral challenges and to focus on their learning needs. For this purpose teaching seminars must be arranged in the elementary especial schools where the school management may teach the students with ADHD by using effective teaching strategies and can arrange psychological therapy for them to make them able to focus on their course content and to learn the things in better way. In the seminars the teachers, teaching students with ADHD may, also, be guided to use several effective teaching strategies to help the students with ADHD.
The very first thing which will be guided to the teachers in seminar must be Lesson planning which plays an essential role in teaching the students with ADHD. The better the teacher will plan the lesson, the effectively the learner will learn new things. The lesson plan must include the objective of the study, the teaching strategies to be used in the lesson, and the assessment plan. Moreover, the teacher must include the motivation of the students in the lesson planning because motivation promoted the conceptual learning, enjoyment, and performance in the student. The second most important teaching factor is classroom management. The students with ADHD face focusing and behavioral challenges and that is why they need more material and efforts of teachers to understand the things. The teacher must understand that what type of classroom management will be helpful for the learners to learn a new concept. The classroom must have the better sitting environment where the students can make discussion and can learn the content with great interest.
The use of technology is the best teaching strategy to help the students with ADHD because they face difficulties in understanding the concepts quickly. The elementary especial schools can provide iPod and other technologies to help the students with ADHD in learning the literature with interest. Teachers can use multimedia sources to help the student in learning the content with great ease and in an interesting way. For this purpose, teachers can use movies, literature, website information, poem, or anything which can develop the interest of the lecture and can help the students to learn the concepts easily (JOSHI, 2016). Not only this, but assessment plan may also help the teacher to understand the learning needs of the students with ADHD. In this way the teacher may help the students in overcoming their focusing challenges and can perform well in their academic results.
Assessment is very important to evaluate, either the learner is learning the content or not? Assessment will also help the teacher to understand, how to increase a student’s performance and what further strategies will be helpful in making the student more confident. The assessment process may include different plans, such as testing of vocabulary, encouraging the students to make stories, arranging classroom discussions, and other assessment plans can be used to evaluate the learning of the learners.
In the seminars the main focus of the student teaching should be to motivate the students with ADHD to fight against their disease and to overcome the challenges faced by them. The teachers must inspirit the children to learn the content with great precision. Also, the teachers must encourage the students to work hard and to obtain good grades and for that the students must be rewarded either by the teacher or by the school management. This will enhance child’s progress and capabilities of learning the course content.
Not only teaching factors but also the seminar must arrange psychologists for the students with ADHD who will deal with the psychology of the students to help them in overcoming their behavioral challenges. For this purpose the psychologists may use Malcolm’s experiment. Malcolm’s experiment is the one who actually can help the children with ADHD to improve their focusing capabilities. In this experiment the semantic factors help the students to focus on the target object (Malcolm, 2016) which can help the children with ADHD to improve their focusing (Groot, Huettig, & Olivers, 2016). In the experiment, the Malcolm probed the robustness of the semantic bias by using the spatial probability bias. Malcolm in his experiment, basically, used three objects, one central object, one SR object to the central object, and one NR object to the central object. In this experiment, the target location was adjusted according to the high probability and low probability (Bar, 2004). This design of the probability, which belongs to the target design, is adjusted in a way that the target will coincide with the SR object and then will coincide with the NR object semantically. Thus the semantic factors bias the attention and help the child with ADHD to improve his visual attention or focusing towards object. The results of the experiment also showed a great improvement in the focusing of the child with ADHD.
However, there exist several other patterns of the psychological dealing which can help the children with ADHD to improve their focusing and behavioral challenges. The behavioral challenges can be overcome by using several strategies, such as by counseling, or by using technology. For example LOLA (Laugh Out Louder Aid) is an app for the children who are facing ADHD. This app uses humor to guide and teach the disable children. LOLA is very much helpful for the children with neurological differences, to make them learn different things with the help of humor and fun. LOLA app is not only designed for the children who are facing ADHD but also it has been designed for the students facing sensory integration disorder, emotional and learning disabilities, and processing disorder.
This app trains the brain of disable children and makes them able to acquire different daily living and social skills. The app uses the animated gif to teach or to remind the children and make them able to learn new things, social skills, and many other daily life activities. When the children follow the instructions or complete the tasks assigned by the app then this app presents the positive rewards to the children for their better performance which encourage them to learn more things. By using this app, the children can get command on their communication, interpersonal skills, leadership, and language (LOLA, 2016).
The school can also invite the parents of the children with ADHD because parental involvement plays an essential role in encouraging their children to overcome their behavioral and focusing challenges. The children with ADHD become hyper due to which the parents began to ignore or punish their children. However, in the seminar the training team can train the parents to deal with the children with ADHD and to make them able to focus on their academic course content and on other matters of lives. The children with ADHD do not only face difficulties in their academics but also they face visual attention issues and other focusing challenges. For example the adolescents with ADHD cannot focus on the driving and cannot perform actively in games. Such children and adolescents become frustrated and irritated very quickly and that is why the parents need to show great patience to keep the children or adolescents with ADHD calm and peaceful. Such children are so challenging for their parents and teachers as well. That is why strong strategies, psychological therapy, and patience are very essential to make them confident, motivated, and capable of doing their daily life activities normally, effectively, and efficiently.
Along with these strategies the company of the friends also matter. Most of the time the children with ADHD are neglected and ignored by other children which causes lack of confidence and other behavioral issues in the children with ADHD. That is why the teachers of the especial elementary school must encourage their students to interact with each other to develop strong friendship between them. For this purpose, the children must be encouraged to perform group activities. In this way a strong bond will be created between them and the students will become more confident to perform their activities in the best way.
Conclusion
In Especial Education Institutions, teachers play very effective and essential role. It is all about teaching strategies which make the Especial Students capable to learning new things and proving them as strong and successful person in the society. Especial students face a lot challenges while learning new things. Especially, the students with ADHD (Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder) face a lot of challenges during learning their courses. However, the school management and teachers can help the students with ADHD by arranging proper medication, teaching strategies, and therapy process for them. Now, this study will now evaluate that what are the difficulties faced by the students with ADHD and the teachers teaching these students? The study will also focus that how the students teaching seminars may be proven as effective in teaching and motivating especial students? The study aimed to highlight the importance of student teaching seminars in elementary especial school. For this purpose the researcher focused two scholarly published articles (Sherman, Baydala, & Cermen, 2008; Evens & Owens, 2014) as primary source. The findings of the study showed that the teachers, parents, and psychologists can help the children with ADHD to overcome their behavioral and focusing issues by using teaching factors, including lesson planning, motivation, classroom management, and use of multimedia, and psychological counseling.
The seminar can focus on the teaching factors; lesson planning, motivation, classroom management, use of multimedia, parental involvement, and psychological dealing. The better the teacher will plan the lesson, the effectively the learner will learn new things. Motivation promotes the conceptual learning, enjoyment, and performance in the student. The use of technology is the best teaching strategy to help the students with ADHD because they face difficulties in understanding the concepts quickly.
Teachers can use movies, literature, website information, poem, or anything which can develop the interest of the lecture and can help the students to learn the concepts easily (JOSHI, 2016). Not only this, but assessment plan may also help the teacher to understand the learning needs of the students with ADHD. In this way the teacher may help the students in overcoming their focusing challenges and can perform well in their academic results. Not only teaching factors but also the seminar must arrange psychologists for the students with ADHD who will deal with the psychology of the students to help them in overcoming their behavioral challenges. For this purpose the psychologists may use Malcolm’s experiment or technology like LOLA (Laugh Out Louder Aid) app. The school can also invite the parents of the children with ADHD because parental involvement plays an essential role in encouraging their children to overcome their behavioral and focusing challenges. The parents need to show great patience to keep the children or adolescents with ADHD calm and peaceful. Along with these strategies the company of the friends also matter. That is why the teachers of the especial elementary school must encourage their students to interact with each other and to perform group activities. Conclusively, the student teaching seminars with better teaching strategies and psychological therapy of students with ADHD of the especial elementary school can encourage the students to perform well in their academic results.
References
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Groot, d., Huettig, F., & Olivers. (2016). When meaning matters: The temporal dynamics of semantic influences on visual attention. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 42, 180–196. doi:10.1037/xhp0000102.
JOSHI, A. (2016). Multimedia: A Technique in Teaching Process in the Classrooms. Great World Environment.
LOLA. (2016). Laugh Out Loud Aid: Laugh while learning goals every day. Retrieved 12 4, 2016, from https://connectability.devpost.com/submissions/38440-lola
Malcolm, G. L. (2016). Intrusive effects of semantic information on visual selective attention. Atten Percept Psychophys, 78, 2066–2078. doi: 10.3758/s13414-016-1156-x.
Sherman, J., Baydala, L., & Cermen. (2008). The impact of teaching factors on the achievements and behaviors of the students with ADHD. Educational Research, 50(4), 347-60.
