Unit 2: Categories of learners with special educational needs

This unit helps you get a better understanding of the various types of learners with SEN and learn about teaching and learning strategies for addressing them.

Unit learning outcomes

By the end of this unit, you will be able to:

1. Identify characteristics of learners with different types of special educational needs (SEN);
2. Explain why each type of learners with SEN is considered as having special educational needs;
3. Apply teaching and learning strategies to respond to various special educational needs in the classroom.

Unit indicative content

1. Learners with sensory disabilities
2. Learners with physical disabilities
3. Learners with deviant learning abilities
4. Learners with specific learning difficulties
5. Learners with behavioral, emotional and social problems
6. Learners from minority communities
7. All other groups facing difficulties in education (orphans, street children, child mothers, traumatized children, ...).

Learning resources

- Read the following resources and work on the unit activities (e-tivities):

• Unit 2 PPT
• The article on pupils with SEN
• "Specific learning disabilities" from the book "Children with special educational needs (NCSE, 2014)
• Strategies teaching children with autism, sensory disability and physical disability(Davis & Florian, 2004)

- Watch the videos on braille writing and sign language.

- Get familiarized with the indicated assistive devices for physically disabled people.

Learning activities

- E-tivity 2.1: Quiz activity for Unit 2

This e-tivity 2.1 helps you assess the achievement of the unit level learning outcomes 1, 2 and 3.

- E-tivity 2.2: Forum activity for Unit 2

The purpose of this e-tivity 2.2 is to help you exchange ideas about the reasons justifying why some learners qualify as having special educational needs.

- E-tivity 2.3: Feedback activity for Unit 2

The purpose of this e-tivity 2.3 is to detect misunderstood points for Unit 2.