I have been taking a class that deals with exceptionalities and teaching children with special needs. It has been really eye opening, and brings up a debate about the costs and benefits of prescription drugs (think ritalin) and labeling of kids. While labels can be helpful to validate the experience of students and to help them get the help they may need to be able to work within our system, the labels themselves can also be detrimental and seem to somtimes lead to apathy on the part of teachers, parents and/or students (eg, "I can't do that assignment, I'm ADHD"). This story by this american life called Mother of Invention brings it all home for me.
here is the syopsis
Karen Sosnoski's one-year-old son, Anton, was born with what's known as Mosaic Down Syndrome, a rare condition where some of his cells have the extra chromosome that causes Down syndrome and other cells don't. So as he grows, he could end up having all the health risks and challenges of Downs syndrome...or just a few of them. Through a website, Karen found a kid with the same diagnosis, named Tim Colvin, who was doing really well...perhaps because his mother, Kristy, invented a surprising and unusual way to raise her son. When some people hear about what Kristy did, they're shocked. Karen went to talk to Kristy and Tim about how Tim was raised. (13 minutes)
here is the link.
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?sched=1265
just click where it says full episode in orange.
