By Yasmin Latif
What is education? Is it only about schooling?
Education is the process of imparting knowledge, developing the powers of reasoning and judgment, and preparing oneself intellectually for matured life, for example, in schools or universities. Education should be seen as more than that. It is also a process where we can invite the truth and the possibility that is defined as wisdom, hopeful and respectful cultivation of learning undertaken in the belief that all should have a chance to share in life.
Education is most important where everybody deserves to have no matter what state of intellectual ability a person has. Then, all educators must be ready to face with many kinds of students that come from various backgrounds. In education process, for the normal students we rarely found issues about their learning process, however, for special need students it will be a different approach of learning process altogether.
Teaching special needs students requires one to face unique and distinctive challenges. Not only will these students demand more of their time and patience but require specialised instructional strategies in a structured environment that supports and enhances learning potential. It is important to note that the disabled are not students who are incapacitated or unable to learn, but they actually need differentiated instructions tailored to their distinctive learning abilities.
Recently, the Kulliyyah of Education in collaboration with IDEAS Autism Centre decided to come out with a programme called Program Pendidikan Khas Masalah Pembelajaran (Special education programme for Learning Problem) with the aim to especially educate parents and teachers to open their eyes and minds to the deeper needs of such kids.
Programme Manager, Mohd Faiz Shuhaimi, gave an explanation on the significance of organising this programme and its impact on the society. According to him, the objective of programme was  to create awareness and improve skills among parents and teachers in educating students with special needs.
The teachers who took part in the programme have to deal with students with many kinds of special needs with different problems such as learning disabilities, communication disorder, emotional and behavioural disorders, physical disabilities and development disabilities.
Focusing on how to educate, teachers and parents learned together in sharing their experience to educate kids with special needs. This programme was able to serve as a platform for them to gain more knowledge and to guide them in handling special needs kids. It also gave the opportunity for both teachers and parents to identify their weaknesses and create awareness towards the needs faced by them.
As parents and teachers, they need to be strong and believe in their kids’ or students’ potential. However, it cannot be denied that it is not an easy job for the teachers to handle special needs students which require them to have special skills and patience.
Mohd Norhizar Umar, the secretary for Special Education Unit of SMK Ampang Pecah, who preferred to be called Cikgu, shared his experience of more than ten years being a teacher of special education programme.
Asked on the quality of special education now compared to the past, he said he considered the present “as in a good stage” as he saw the values in implementing it following an improvement from the introductory approach to the experience he has acquired in the number of years of teaching. However, he admitted that there should be further improvement in terms of refurbishment on addressing certain weaknesses to create bonding in this special education programme.
He added that some students from special education have already entered inclusive classes where they receive equal education like other students, but they are still faced with a question of whether or not they are ready to be part of the mainstream. Or can they get in line with other kids?
However, he said, these students need to go through a screening process to see whether they are able to master the 3M (membaca/read, mengira /count and menulis/write) and be independent. If they are qualified they will be allowed to join the inclusive class, rather than continue to remain in the same group.
Coming from mainstream teaching, he said, when he first entered special education programme he found the method of teaching has to be variety to fit with the students’ needs. The students need to be categorised between slow learners and those with disabilities. Both of these categories need to have different approaches so that they will keep up with the education process.
It is challenging for the teachers “because we just do not deal with their special needs alone, but their race and also religion need to be taken into account to”.
As teachers, patience is an important portion in teaching special needs students because each of the students must have different needs. So, before these students enter a class they need to be properly ‘diagnosed’ so as to categorise them according to their needs.
Indeed, these students do have the potential of a good future but it all depends on how the teachers and parents guide them by using certain approaches that are appropriate to them. Some of them are good not only in academic but also in extra curricular activities. As an educator, teachers require this kind of programme to explore more ideas on how to improve on ways of teaching at the same time to increase the number of teachers in special education.
Special needs kids may not be normal for other kids but they are somehow special compared to other kids. People might have different perceptions about them or tend to underestimate them. The fact is that there is the need for patience and time to handle them because each of them may require different approaches.
For parents, the challenges might be different compared to teachers because parents go through each stage of their kids’ development since they were small. The first form of education comes from parents itself. When parents acknowledge that their kids have a disability that requires special needs, then they need to be ready to go through in their lives and to attend to stronger emotions, to make difficult choices, and to face interactions with many kinds of specialists, for continuous need for information and services.
Knowing the reality that the children are having difficulties or problems in their development may make parents feel isolated due to the perception that they received from people around them. During this time, their hearts and minds are ‘flooded’ with all kinds of feelings and thoughts. At this point, they need to know how to search for information, assistance, understanding, and support.
Dr. Hajah Noraini Zainal Abidin is a mother and currently heads the Pusat Perkhidmatan Pendidikan Khas (Special education centre) in the Ministry of Education.
Before this she was a teacher for special education. She started to be as an educator from 1992 until 2003 and then served the Ministry of Education. She is also a mother for special needs children, her son having Cerebral Palsy (CP) which is considered a neurological disorder caused by a non-progressive brain injury or malformation that occurred while the child’s brain was under development. CP affects primarily body movement and muscle coordination.
Looking at her son’s condition she decided to move forward by putting her full effort to learn from many medium. Starting with learning from the Internet she continued her study for a Bachelor’s degree in special education, then she furthered her study for Master’s degree and a Ph.D. in special education at one of universities abroad. At that time, special education in Malaysia lacked specialists and references. So, she decided to make a change and learn the system on how institutions from outside Malaysia can be applied to the special education system in Malaysia.
Noraini stated that parents should be more pro-active, not just waiting for help, but the need to put their own efforts in searching for help. Parents of disabled children are like new learners where they need to learn about the conditions of their children from A to Z, and never stops to seek for experiences from other people or any institution.
She added that parents must always be alert with their children’s development and constantly refer to specialists about conditions of their children so they will always keep on track. However, parents still face challenges in raising special needs children due to the stigma that these children may not have a good future.
They might not be able to work like other normal people, but they can be a networking for society to learn deeply about what special needs are all about. They can be trained to give their contribution to the society, for example, in volunteerism work, in education, or in any activity that they can informally help.
If these children are able to get good education that suits with their condition then possibly they will have a better future like other people. We need to change this stigma and stop being judgmental by only looking at the outer side without knowing the inside of them.***