Curriculum Barriers: Case Study

Charlie (not his real name) is a student in my second grade classroom. He repeated the first grade and is reading on level. Charlie struggles in math and writing. His writing is large and illegible. He writes many of his letters and numbers backwards. He also wears glasses but often losses them. He often misses school and has no parental help at home. His dad is currently in jail.

I suspect Charlie has a learning disability. However, he has not been diagnosed. the biggest barriers to learning are with the math curriculum. He often mistakes numbers and their order and has difficulty lining up algorithms. Additionally, when writing his ideas get lost in the mechanics. He struggles to make the pencil do what he wants it to do. This often frustrates him and he gives up, leaving his assignments incomplete and incoherent.

I try to motivate Charlie because his confidence is lost. I give him praise and attention. I keep an extra set of glasses for him at school so he can see the board. I also allow him to do his homework at school during recess and hand it in late without being penalized. Charlie sits close to my desk as he is easily distracted and needs constant redirection. Using UDL checkpoint 5.2 which addresses using multiple tools for construction and composition, I can allow Charlie the opportunity to type his writing on a word processor in lieu of him hand writing it.

http://www.cast.org/teachingeverystudent/tools/curriculumbarrierstutorial.cfm