Analysis of Learning Needs and Challenges for Disabled Students

This report analyzes the challenges faced by teachers in educating disabled students in Australia. It highlights the need for teacher training, gaps in government policies for inclusive learning, and the importance of curriculum adaptation. The report discusses issues like inadequate infrastructure, lack of collaboration among services, and complex funding processes. It proposes solutions such as curriculum adaptation, improving teacher quality, community engagement, and promoting student wellbeing and aspirations to create effective education for disabled children. The report emphasizes the need for schools to engage with organizations providing training and professional development to improve learning outcomes for disabled students. It also underscores the significance of community involvement in the educational process to make students feel valued and respected, leading to a welcoming environment for the disabled community.

Running head: LEARNING NEEDS
LEARNING NEEDS
Name of the Student:
Name of the University
Author Note:

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Abstract
The report aims to discuss the problems that the teachers face in dealing with the disabled
students. First of all, they feel the need of training for conveying their lessons to the students
with various disabilities. Secondly, though the government has issued policies for inclusive
learning, there are gaps in them. The schools have low infrastructure to apply those policies.
Finally, the curriculum set for the students need to be revised so that more sympathetic
perspectives can be included in them.

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Table of Contents
Introduction:...............................................................................................................................3
Background:...........................................................................................................................3
Government policies:.............................................................................................................4
Problems:................................................................................................................................5
Proposals:...............................................................................................................................7
Conclusion:..............................................................................................................................11
References:...............................................................................................................................13

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Introduction:
The report analyses the importance of changes in the methodologies in the education
for the students with special needs. A good education is very essential for the good futures
which can be made sure by daily presence of the children and young students in schools.
Beside this, the proper education methodology will support proper education of the disable
students of Australia.
The report aims to illustrate the key factors that affect the education of the children.
The methods and curriculum used in the schools are not effective in the wellbeing of the
students and do not carry their backgrounds or histories. Therefore, some changes are needed
both in the process and the materials.
The report focuses on the concept of the education systems that are applied in the
disabled students, the government policies and procedures, key challenges that are faced by
the teachers and parents regarding the children’s education, the needed changes in the models
and aim to build an effective school for the disabled pupils.
Background:
All the governments of Australia have committed to close the Gap targets though
proper utilization of the policies as well as agreements among the state and territory
governments and the state government of Australia. It targets to focus on the accession to
education, attendance in schools, improvement of learning and completion of school.
The government has committed to improve the outcomes for the disabled students
through their reform agendas and schools funding. The quality schools and quality education
systems will help in quality outcome for all the disabled students. It also includes particular
reform that focus on the new requirements of recipients of the special schools. All the

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governments of Australia have been funding for improving the number of students as well as
trained teachers in the schools.
Government policies:
The Australian government has issued directions for the disabled education. The
principals of the schools are requested for considering the statements and inform their actions
in schools for improving the quality education outcomes of the students with various
disabilities.
The key areas are:
 Making children ready for the education in schools
 Regular attendance of the students
 Improved literacy and numeracy skills
 Making students ready for higher studies after school.
The education council has endorsed The National Education Strategy that set the
priorities and principles. These principles work as a structure to guide the jurisdiction for
proper implementation of localised policies for improving the educational outcomes of the
students. The government also have tried to keep the disabled students in normal schools
therefore various programs are being conducted. The chief objective of these schemes are to
offer educational opportunities for the disabled kids in normal schools in order to enable their
retention in school system. The disabled students who are admitted in special schools need to
be considered for integration in common schools so that they obtain the communication as
well as living skills at a practical level.
The policies outline the priority areas like
 Quality teaching, leadership and workforce development
 Identity including culture

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 Partnership
These strategies identify collaborative actions for helping engaged students, raising standards
and ensuring pathways after school. the children with incapacities need to be integrated in the
normal school system.
 Students with locomotor handicaps
 Mildly hearing impaired
 Partially sighted children
 Mentally handicapped yet educable group
 students with multiple handicaps such as blind, orthopaedic and hearing impaired.
Problems:
The challenges that the schools face in Disabled education are:
Teaching materials: most of the disabled students do not have proper curriculum and
teaching materials. Integrated Education for the Disabled Children must enable proper system
and methodology for these students (Eades, 2013).
Aspirations: the disabled student are expected to o low-paid jobs but they also can dream
equally as their friends. The education system of Australia allows career counselling after
senior secondary school but talking about career aspirations becomes too late (Willows,
Hanley & Delormier, 2012). According the educationist Stephen Hagan even the brightest
child in the disabled communities has to struggle more for attaining a satisfactory education
in the schools in compare to the other child.
No collaboration among services: the collaboration among the services, departments and
staffs is mandatory in supporting the students with disabilities. The non-existence of
collaboration among education, health and the community services led to problem in

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identifying and connecting with the teaching models. The research reveals the student who
cannot connect or represent in their textbooks cannot perform good academically.
Complex formulas of funds: process for applying to get support for disability is fragmented,
complex therefore, time consuming (Price, 2012). Obtaining approval also are delayed for
funding students that leave them without necessary support. Inadequate provision of aids is
one of the biggest issues in providing equivalent access to the education for the students with
disabilities. Despite the fact that there are numerous funding sources but none of these is
sufficient for making the full range of required services available.
Infrastructure: analysis displays that for each dollar spent for the education of the children
with diseases like autism and dyslexia just 47 cents is allocated for their education. Despite
this inequality, if the children of the remote areas attend school and pursue education, they do
not have proper infrastructure like classrooms and enough trained teachers (Ford, 2013).
Poverty: as the parents of the disabled students cannot afford expensive health care services
for their children, they suffer more than their peers thus cannot attend schools. Hearing loss
can be found in a large number of disabled students that harm their learning.
Choice of the parents: the parents of the children with disabilities want to keep their child
in some Special Schools to get the sophisticated staff to student ratio, or to safeguard and care
for it, when it also could be benefitted and managed well in regular and normal schools.
Some parents with children with more severe disability, opt to enrol their children in the
inclusive schools, while the educational assistances are achievable. These issues in general
often give rise to annoyance and misery for the child.
Need of quality training for teaching staff: the survey reveal more than 25% of Australian
teachers realize that they need better training for professional development for teaching the
disabled students (Barton et al., 2017). The schools with more than 10% disabled students

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have teachers who have no professional training to teach disabled students. Only 23% of the
total teachers have some idea of methods of teaching the indigenous students.
Lack of full time instructors: in some disabled communities, children are eager to learn
mathematics or have interest in learning English. These children cannot progress due to
massive shortage of teachers (Deer, 2013). They do not have full time teachers or their
teachers cannot teach basic mathematics and English. As the older teachers retire, the
situation becomes more pathetic.
Disengaged teachers: Disabled rugby player Dean Widders states that a good teacher relates
and engages with the community and encourages kids to attend schools. Children crave for
consistencies and continuity from their teachers (Gray & Partington, 2012).
Proposals:
Improving the quality of the outcomes regarding education of the disabled children
has been given higher priority from the perspectives of the national and state governments as
well as jurisdictions of Australia (Behrendt, Griew & Kelly, 2012). The chief target of all the
government is to reduce the gaps in attainment of education. The policies are formed to
manage the disabled students, their parents, carers as well as staff and teachers.
The chief problem with the teachers that they feel the need of training on the
complexities as well as sensitivities of their works so that they can manage them properly and
satisfy their urges for education. In this regard, the school communities need to have
engagement with the organisations that arrange such trainings and professional learnings
(Coelli & Green, 2012). With the help of these programs, the teachers will be able to embed
these practices into the school fabrics and improve leaning out comes of the disabled
students. Such programs will develop the cultural environment of the schools, produce

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quality teachers, increase community engagement, betterment of student health, curriculum
and leadership.
Curriculum adaptation:
The curriculum of the schools is one of the key elements that needs to be discussed.
There is a need to devise proper adaptations of the educational curriculum for the range of the
students with variety of age, capacities as well as abilities. This is one of the most difficult
area for the education providers as well as for the students (Cowlishaw, 2013). This field is
huge as the individual feature of the students along with their requirements as well as their
level of readiness for learning. Therefore, the curriculum must be apt and their adaptations
must be penetrating. The separate problem of admittance and completion of the segmented
courses for qualification also need to be solved. This will mitigate the issues regarding
enrolment, grant and post qualification profession.
Quality teachers:
Improving the quality of teaching is a key factor for creating an effective education
centres for the disabled children as well as the whole school community. The parents and
carers highlighted the issue of sympathy and awareness among the teachers and educational
expectations. The teachers pointed out the issues regarding knowing the background of their
students, relationship between teachers and parents, professional training, personalised plans
for learning and most importantly, the relation between students and teachers (Chaffey,
Bailey & Vine, 2015). The factors associated with the quality of teachers also include the
whole atmosphere of the school, aspirational education, attendance of the students,
opportunities of education, personalised training, inclusion of the disabled staff for assistance
and good quality of infrastructure. The good teacher communicates well, expects works rom

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students and mixes with his pupils freely (Ma Rhea, 2012). The efficient teacher uses
technology for teaching the weak disabled students and bring variations in their lessons.
Community engagement:
The relationship with the community and engagement is one of the key theme to build
an effective partnership with a broader community and the school. This make them feel
respected and valued. The key elements that can be pointed out by the teachers along with the
carers and disabled parents are inclusion of the community mentors and role models in the
schools, participation of the parents, carers, elder people in the cultural activities of schools
(Fryberg et al., 2013). The schools can involve the communities in the decision making or the
policies of the school authorities. This will provide a welcoming ambience for the disabled
community on the one hand and make the school authority aware of the local students’ family
as well as community issues. The most important theme about participation of the
communities in school management deals with the significance of community perceptions
about the school’s learning process and related issues. This aim to ask the disabled
community member for assisting the teachers in proper learning process.
Wellbeing and aspirations:
The wellbeing and mental satisfaction is another them that need to be discussed in
detail. These factors play important role in building an effective school for the disabled
students. This intention can also have a great impact on the whole school community. The
factors that the teachers along with the parents and carers can found that the psychological
satisfaction brought by the education is effecting the children. Therefore, the school
authorities can include strategies for supporting the students both physically and mentally.
The methods of career counselling for the students are offered in the secondary schools which
act late (Beresford, Partington & Gower, 2012). Therefore, the proper training is needed for

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understanding aspirations of the serious students which will guide them for career
development. This enables development of the students’ behaviour and self-confidence. It
makes the students feeling secured and satisfied therefore, eventually they become more
accepting and take pride in spite of their disabled identity. The health and wellbeing issue
include behaviour management and incidence, racism (Colquhoun & Dockery, 2012).
Management in classes:
This is obvious that the teachers irrespective of region or sector and any level of
education system, needs to provide coaching to a wider range of the student abilities
(McKegney, 2014). Despite the fact that the process needs more time and create huge
demand in the time, responsiveness and creativity of the teachers. Therefore, the total number
of students learning in a class needs to be reduced in the inclusive schools. Reduction of
students numbers in the classes needs more trained and empathetic teachers so that they can
attend every pupil with great attention and deal with them individually.
At every levels of education spectrum, some disabilities of the students are difficult to
attend than the other. These problems include the behavioural problems, Hyperactivity,
Autism, Attention Deficit Disorders, learning difficulties (which are accompanied by
obstruction in the students leading to behavioural difficulties), Deafness (for communication
difficulties in the curriculum) and finally psychiatric problems. the teachers find these
problrms challenging for incorporating students with mental disability in the normal classes,
as the scopes and volume of curriculum adaptation is mandatory in only one class (Fulcher,
2015).
The factors related to the insertion of proper methodology in the student’s curriculum
focus on the inclusion of content in the subject specific areas, requirement for more
perspectives teaching, the encouragement in community involvement in designing the

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curriculum, the process of perfect delivery of the lessons (Fitzpatrick et al., 2012). The school
must provide student oriented learning therefore value the students along with their parents
and community. Moreover, this factor will be beneficial for the school community as well as
the staff.
Leadership:
To the researchers, the best way to penetrate the community and build an effective
school for the disabled students is parent teacher collaboration where the teachers and parents
will know each other and get information about the students (Guèvremont, & Kohen, 2012).
The principal is the leader of the school community, therefore, his engagement with the
parents is the most significant issue for the effective teaching. Effective communication,
established policies and standards, educational expectations are the key factors highlighted by
the parents and carers of the students of the disabled communities (Santoro 2012). The
leadership includes proper respecting as well as understanding the parental views of the
school’s atmosphere, students’ comfort, development of positive and effective staff,
increasing student relationship with teacher and most importantly visible presence of the
principal in the parent teacher meets. The factors also include capital works, resourcing,
policies and processes of schools and the most common theme, the role of principal as
administrator.
Conclusion:
Therefore, from the above discussion it can be concluded that, the education system
prevailed in Australia need changes in the areas of learning materials. The texts do not
penetrate the minds of the disabled students for which an educational gap has been formed.
The curriculum need to focus the proper methods to teach the disabled students. The
administration must give stress on the training of the teachers so that they can convey their