DISABILITY
Professional Development Activities
T
his section provides professional development activities for professionals working with individuals with disabilities. They are organized to provide implementation strategies for presentations of 15-45 minutes and include handouts and discussion questions.
Awareness Index for Learners with Disabilities
Recruiting Sources
Stereotypes and You
1
DISABILITY
Awareness Index for Learners with Disabilities
T
his activity is designed to raise awareness about issues for professionals working with individuals with disabilities. It provides a forum for discussing personal attitudes and stereotypes related to this population. This activity can be used in assessing not only the behavior and practices of individuals, but also organizations, schools, and teams.
Objectives
- To define disability.
- To raise awareness about issues for learners with disabilities.
- To understand biased behaviors and actions towards learners with disabilities.
Time
The activity may be modified for a 30-45 minute presentation. Suggested modifications are as follows:
- 30 minutes
Begin the activity by presenting the key concepts of the Supporting Learners with Disabilities for Success brochure and supplemental materials contained here. Distribute the Awareness Index handout and allow participants 10 minutes to record their answers. Review the correct answers with the group and introduce one or two discussion items, as time permits.
- 45 minutes
Follow suggestions for 30 minute activity above, except ask the participants to break into small groups to discuss their reactions to the given answers. Assign each group one discussion question and ask them to choose a leader to present the group’s viewpoints on the subject.
AWARENESS INDEX FOR LEARNERS WITH DISABILITIES
Please answer each of the following questions as true or false.
1 / Most female individuals with disabilities work in technical, sales, and administrative support positions.2 / Males with disabilities make up the smallest percentage of the labor force.
3 / In the 1990s there have been no significant gains in percentage of women with disabilities in the labor force.
4 / Women with disabilities are more likely than men with disabilities to be living in poverty.
5 / The primary barrier to employment of individuals with disabilities is lack of skills.
6 / The cost savings to educate a child with a disability in a neighborhood school, rather than in an institution, is $3,000/year.
7 / There are only twice as many 20-year-olds with disabilities working today as compared to before 1975.
8 / Fifty percent of children with developmental disabilities lived in state institutions prior to 1975.
9 / Women with disabilities experience a high incidence of abuse--physical, emotional and sexual.
10 / Prior to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) of 1975, approximately 1 million children with disabilities were shut out of schools, and hundreds of thousands more were denied appropriate services.
11 / Approximately 43 million in the USA live with some level of disability.
12 / Ten percent of individuals with disabilities need accommodations to perform their jobs.
Source:
Association of Service Providers Implementing IDEA Reforms in Education Partnership. (2001, April). Presentation at the Association of Career and Technical Education National Policy Seminar, Alexandria, VA. Unpublished.
DISABILITY
Recruiting Sources
T
his activity is designed to raise the issue of the importance of recruitment for learners with disabilities. It will allow participants the opportunity to identify strategies and discuss potential recruitment barriers.
Objectives
- To identify sources for recruiting learners with disabilities.
- To expand individual contacts and sources used to recruit learners with disabilities.
Time
The activity may be modified for a 15-45 minute presentation. Suggested modifications are as follows:
- 15 minutes
Begin the activity by briefly reviewing the recruitment strategies listed in the Supporting Learners with Disabilities for Success brochure. Distribute the Recruiting Sources handout and allow participants five minutes to record their answers. Ask the participants to volunteer one or two sources from their list and record their responses on a flipchart. Participants may want to record the given sources for future reference.
- 30 minutes
Follow the suggestions for the 15-minute activity above, except ask participants to break into small groups to share their responses. Assign a representative from each group to discuss several of their responses to one or two of the given source categories. Participants may want to record the given sources for future reference.
- 45 minutes
Follow the suggestions for the 30-minute activity above, except ask the audience to name two or three other sources not already identified by the group.
Recruiting Sources For Individuals with Disabilities
Place a check in the column of any recruiting sources you have used or would be willing to use. Then fill in as many specific names and phone numbers as possible.
Resources / Sources Used / Sources Willing to Use / Name and Phone Numbers of People or Organizations to ContactMiddle and High Schools’
Special Education Personnel
Adult Education Classes
Community Social Service Agencies
Local Houses of Worship and Religious Centers
Doctor’s Office or Hospital Advertisement
School Counselor Referral
Instructor Referral
One Stop Centers
State Agencies
Non-profit organizations
Center for Independent Living
Office of Rehabilitative Services
Source:
Gardenswartz, L. & Rowe, A. (1994). The diversity toolkit. Burr Ridge, IL: McGraw-Hill.
DISABILITY
Stereotypes and You
T
his activity is designed to increase awareness regarding the common stereotypes about individuals with disabilities. It allows participants the opportunity to examine their own thoughts and ideas on how they have handled stereotypic behavior in the past.
Objectives
- To increase awareness about the need to broaden the understanding of how stereotypes affect service provision for learners with disabilities.
- To provide examples of how an individual might respond to stereotypic behavior.
Time
The activity may be modified for a 15-45 minute presentation. Suggested modifications are as follows:
- 15 minutes
Begin the activity by briefly reviewing the recruitment strategies listed in Supporting Learners with Disabilities brochure. Distribute the Stereotypes and You handout and allow participants 5 minutes to record their answers. As a group, ask the audience to volunteer one or two sources from their list and record their responses on a flipchart. Ask participants to write down the given sources for future reference.
- 30 minutes
Follow the suggestions for the 15-minute activity above, except ask participants to break into small groups to share their responses.
- 45 minutes
Follow suggestions for the 30-minute activity above, except facilitate an additional 15-minute group processing discussion.
Suggested Discussion Questions
- How did you feel sharing these incidents with someone you didn’t know?
- What is most difficult about dealing with stereotypes a prejudice?
- Why do you think human beings make stereotypic judgments?
- What is the effect of these pre-judgments?
- What did you become aware of or learn from this activity?
- How can you apply this learning when you are back on the job?
Stereotypes and You
1.Think of a time when you were an outsider in a group. What was it like? How did you feel? What did you do to feel more comfortable?
2.Have you ever been “caught” by your own stereotyping, misjudging someone because of your own erroneous assumptions? What happened? How did it feel? What was the result?
3.Have you ever been misjudged by someone else? What happened? How did it feel? What did you do?
- Think of a time when you heard a racial/sexist/ethnic slur/joke or prejudicial comment. How did you react? How did you feel? If you could replay the incident would you respond differently? If so, how?
Source:
Gardenswartz, L. & Rowe, A. (1994). The diversity toolkit. Burr Ridge, IL: McGraw-Hill.
Illinois Center for Specialized Professional Support (ICSPS)/Special Populations Project1