By Ng Shu Ping
(Additional reporting by Tan May Ann)
As parents, we’re always on the lookout for certain behaviours or missed milestones when it comes to our kids’ development. While we know that each child is unique and born with different strengths, needs and interests, it’s only natural to be concerned if our child is struggling with reading or is having a tough time making friends.
Children with special needs may experience learning and developmental delays or difficulties in learning skills such as how to listen and speak, or how to read and write. However, with the right intervention strategies and a nurturing environment that cares for each child’s needs, they can grow up to learn, play and participate meaningfully alongside their typically developing peers.
Today (21 March) is World Down Syndrome Day, which is observed to raise awareness of Down syndrome and to celebrate and advocate for the rights, inclusion, and well-being of children and adults with Down syndrome around the world.
It is important for both parents and teachers to understand and appreciate each child’s uniqueness – regardless of their learning abilities – and to support their growth and development in a way that is meaningful and relevant to their lives.
How then do we equip our educators to support children with diverse needs in our classrooms?
- Empower and train teachers in early intervention
We recognised that the lack of training for early childhood educators in working with children with special needs is often a key challenge to inclusion in preschools.
In 2019, St. James’ Church Kindergarten (SJCK) and Rainbow Centre (RC) embarked on a project funded by Lien Foundation called Making Every Preschool Inclusive (MEPI). MEPI involved the formation of collaborative teams of early childhood educators from SJCK and early interventionists from RC, employing a co-teaching model to support children with additional needs in our preschools. The MEPI project resulted in having more early childhood educators equipped and empowered to enable inclusion in our preschools.
Another vital component of MEPI was the equipping of a Child Development Support Educator in Anglican Preschool Services, Tan May Ann, to empower her to carry the work beyond the project.
Being an early childhood educator with training in early intervention has allowed May Ann to adapt child-specific intervention strategies in our preschools. She works closely with our centres in applying inclusion practices in their classrooms and continues to support and mentor our educators on their learning journey to acquire knowledge and skills in making our preschools more inclusive through workshops, training, peer-sharing and in-class support.
She is also the link between our class teachers and teachers from the Early Intervention Programme for Infant and Children (EIPIC) provider who run external programmes for children in our preschools.
May Ann says: “The biggest challenge as an educator is informing parents and helping them to come to an acceptance with the possibility of their child having special needs. This hinders identification for early intervention as parents are averse to the idea of sending their child for formal assessment, which may potentially put a label on their child. Many of them are worried about how this label may affect their child’s and family’s future. However, early intervention is key as the early years are so crucial for development in children.
One of my roles is guiding educators on how to reach out to support systems like EIPIC centres or therapists to establish collaboration. This helps bring strategies into the preschool, helping the child to apply the skills learnt in early intervention. ”
Another challenge of teaching children with special needs, May Ann says, is managing behaviours. Due to a lack of understanding between teacher and child, the child may use undesired behaviours to communicate his needs and opinions.
May Ann says: “This differs from child to child… In order to overcome this, teachers need support to understand why the behaviour is happening. Once the child recognises that you understand them and a more appropriate behaviour is taught, the undesired behaviours reduce.”
- Share and learn from teachers and parents
As part of the Government’s continuing efforts to give every child a good start, the Early Childhood Development Agency (ECDA) announced new initiatives in April 2021 to enhance inclusion and support for children with developmental needs, one of which was appointing an inclusion coordinator within each of our preschools.
English teacher Sheena Lim from Little Seeds Preschool (St. Andrew’s) is one of the inclusion coordinators involved in the MEPI project. She has gained a deeper understanding of inclusion in the classroom through the training and hopes to encourage her colleagues to adopt similar inclusive practices.
Sheena says: “Through co-teaching with May Ann, I was guided on how to differentiate lessons accordingly to the childrens’ needs. I learned to integrate various strategies such as visual schedules and movement breaks. This experience has greatly impacted me, building my confidence in working with children with diverse needs.
Having a visual schedule helps children to be aware of what’s happening next and encourages independence. Providing movement breaks helped a child with special needs regulate his need to move. By giving the space to move before re-joining the class, it helped him engage appropriately in classroom activities afterwards.”
Other than receiving training from ECDA, these appointed inclusion coordinators also embarked on a learning journey in 2022 facilitated by speech therapist and LSP parent Ms Vivian Tan, whose children started their journey in Little Seeds Preschool (TSA – Tampines) in 2021.
She said: “What struck me most about Little Seeds was how engaged the teachers always were. I loved seeing the teachers caring for their charges from the window.”
As a therapist, she naturally started to notice there were some children with developmental needs in the classes and wrote to the school to explore how she could support these children.
After an initial discussion, an Early Intervention Project was born where Vivian and May Ann developed a process and workflow for early identification and early intervention of children with developmental needs in our centre. They implemented a screening toolkit to identify and support children with developmental needs and used differential techniques to facilitate children’s participation in the classroom.
Vivian also conducted monthly training sessions focused on a different learning need such as language delay and communication disorders.
English teacher April says: “I have been applying the knowledge (through the trainings) in my classroom to track and identify patterns in children’s undesired behaviour, as well as coming up with strategies to support their various needs. One of which is modelling!
When supporting children with speech difficulties, I learned to rephrase grammatically correct sentences gently and use exaggerated mouth movement to provide a positive model of pronunciation. For example, if the child says, ‘I want dwaw’ I will reply, ‘Oh, you want to draw?’”
- Embrace the uniqueness of each child
In APS, we believe that every child matters and we aim to develop them into their God-given potential.
Through years of working with our children in early intervention, we have seen them progress and reach significant milestones.
May Ann shares: “One of the first students of the MEPI project who I followed for 3 years faced uncertainty over his education options after preschool. At 4 years old, he had close to no speech and had frequent outbursts towards his teachers and peers. Teachers did not understand his behaviour and attempts to stop these outbursts often led to an escalation of his emotions. There was a major communication breakdown between his teachers and him. The MEPI Project worked on bridging communication and understanding between the child with the people in his environment, his teachers and peers.”
May Ann also had to educate his parents, who were both working, to understand that they need to work with him at home too as parents are important stakeholders in the child’s life.
She adds: “We helped them understand that what they do with him at home affects how he behaves in school… After years of helping the parents (at home), and the child (in school), he went from playing alone because his peers was afraid of his outbursts, to being able to make friends. He learnt to use more appropriate behaviours and speech to communicate.”
“I’m happy that we have done our best with early intervention to help him progress. We can now send him to primary school with a peace of mind.”
By acknowledging and embracing the uniqueness of each child, it is possible to create a more inclusive, equitable, and supportive society where every child feels valued and respected, has the opportunity to reach their full potential, and can contribute to their communities in meaningful and positive ways.
If you have any specialised skills in the area of inclusion, and would like to share your expertise and experience with our educators, please get in touch with us at inclusion@anglicanps.edu.sg
