NewsBytes

• Special Education (SPED) Schools are now in full swing.

SPED schools are a MOE initiative to build a more 'inclusive' society.

Besides being an economic powerhouse, the all-important barometer of a nation's success lies in its graciousness and its ability to narrow the income gap between the have's and the have nots. As such, SPED schools play an important part in ensuring that kids who need that extra assistance in their learning are not readily and unfairly labelled as 'slow' learners and put on a reduced curriculum; when these kids, with that extra little help, will be as capable as any mainstream students. Indeed, often times, it is the care and concern of a Special Education Officers (SEOs) that removes the fear of learning due to their constant failures in understanding the lessons that put them on a path of success.

As Mrs Mary Neo, a SEO said, “I still remembered this father whose child was dyslexic who returned to thank me long after the child has graduated from primary school. He was grateful that his daughter was accorded a place in the mainstream school like all her other friends”

The stigma and damage done to a child's psyche could be more than we can ever imagine. To quote from Mr Alex Flemming, Director of Research in Early Education, 'our system is capable of mishandling a child if he or she is relegated to a lower-level stream (of learning) because a psychologist' report said so without proper intervention.'

Indeed, here at SBDC, we offer the unadulterated advice based on our scientific results, namely the Gibson Cognitive Test Report (GCTB) to provide the best training for a child's learning needs. Because in SBDC, we do not believe any child is learning disabled, just UNable to learn for reasons that are too many; ranging from emotional instability in families, absent parents due to excessive work commitments to a lack of training in basic phonics in early education that impedes reading abilities.

To think that anyone can readily pinpoint a child's inability to learn as a Learning DISability vis-a-vis a person who's visually disabled is hedging that on all possible explanations, only one is acceptable. This thinking is clearly archaic at best and at worst, criminal, given the current scientific advancements in the understanding of the human mind.

• Spatial Processing as an important skill

From our latest research in our consultation with our partners, Spatial Processing (or Visual Processing as some would call it) is a fundamental skill of learning. Spatial Processing is the ability to discern objects, pictures, people around us and to store for retrieval in our memory when it is needed later. It cuts across all aspects of life; whether you are a student, a construction worker, a businessman, a sportsman or a mother, the ability to visually process (much like the best cameras in the market, except better) has tremendous implications. Imagine that you can recognize the faces of the people you come across and attach meanings to it so that you can remember their names. Or that you can visually process at lightning speed, what is immediately happening around you and act accordingly. For top performers like air force pilots, this ability or the lack thereof, directly impacts the success of flight missions.

As such, the games that we let our children play must build this ability at a young age.

Whether it is make-believe games, cooking (masak-masak), lego, these games involve the manipulation of disparate objects in space, combining for some intended purpose, with an element of fun, that adds to a child's visual processing speed and memory. Playing for a child is truly learning in this case.