introduction

Children and youth with special needs have always been

recognized as legitimate beneficiaries of the Philippine
government's reforms in basic education. For almost a century
now, the Department of Education through its Special
Education Division has been providing the broad framework
and standards in establishing and maintaining special
education programs in both public and private schools all over
the country. The past decades witnessed continuous
development programs for a wide range of exceptional
children and youth together. Likewise, the professionalization
of special education continues to be pursued through teacher
and administrator training programs. Bold moves are
undertaken to:
Promote access, equity, and participation of children with
special needs education in the mainstream of basic
education;
Improve the quality, relevance, and efficiency of special
education in schools and communities, and;
Sustain special education programs and services in the
country.
 VISION FOR CHILDREN WITH

SPECIAL NEEDS

The Department of Education clearly states its vision for

children with special needs in consonance with the
philosophy of inclusive education, thus:
"The State, community, and family hold a common
vision for the Filipino Child with special needs. By the
21st Century, it is envisioned that he/she could be
adequately provided with basic education. This
education should fully realize his/her own potentials
for development and productivity as well as being
capable of self-expression of his/her rights in society.
More importantly, he/she is God-loving and proud of
being a Filipino.
It is also envisioned that the child with special needs
will get full parental and community support for
his/her education without discrimination of any kind.
This child with special needs should also be provided
with a healthy environment along with leisure and
recreation and social security measures."
(Department of Education Handbook on Inclusive
Education, 2000).
 Deped order 72 s.2009
Inclusive Education as Strategy for Increasing Participation Rate of Children

Special Education in the Philippines has only served 2% of the targeted 2.2 million
children with disabilities in the country who live without access to a basic human right:
the right to education. Most of these children live in rural and far-flung areas whose
parents need to be aware of educational opportunities that these children could avail of.

The Department of Education (DepED) has organized the urgency to address this
problem and therefore, guarantees the right for these children to receive appropriate
education within the regular or inclusive classroom setting. Inclusive education embraces
the philosophy of accepting all children regardless of race, size, shape, color, ability, or
disability with support from school staff, students, parents, and the community.

A comprehensive inclusive program for children with special needs has the following
components:
1. Child Find. This is locating where these children are through the family mapping
survey, advocacy campaigns, and networking with local health workers. The children
with special needs who are not in school shall be listed. These children shall be visited
by Special Education (SPED) teachers and parents should be convinced to enroll their
children in SPED Centers or schools nearest their homes.
2. Assessment. This is the continuous process of identifying the strengths and
weaknesses of the child through the use of formal and informal tools for proper
program grade placement. Existing SPED Centers in the Division shall assist regular
schools in the assessment process.
3. Program Options. Program Options. Regular schools with or without trained SPED
teachers shall be provided educational services to children with special needs. These
schools shall access educational services from SPED Centers or SPED trained
teachers.
4. Curriculum Modifications. This shall be implemented in the form of adaptations
and accommodations to foster optimum learning based on an individual’s needs and
potentials. Modification in classroom instructions and activities is a process that
involves new ways of thinking and developing teaching-learning practices. It also
involves changes in any of the steps in the teaching-learning process.
5. Parental Involvement. This plays a vital role in preparing the children for academic,
moral, and spiritual development. Parents shall involve themselves in observing
children’s performance, volunteering to work in the classroom as a teacher aide and
providing support to other parents.
 POLICY of Special Education
The policy on Inclusive Education for All is adopted in the Philippines to
accelerate access to education among children and youth with special needs.
Inclusive education forms an integral component of the overall educational
system that is committed to an appropriate education for all children and youth
with special needs.

GOAL of Special Education

The goal of the special education program of the Department of Education all
over the country is to provide children with special needs appropriate
educational services within the mainstream of basic education. The two-
pronged goal includes the development of key strategies on legislation, human
resource development, family involvement, and active participation of
government and non-government organizations. Likewise, there are major issues
to address on attitudinal barriers of the general public and effort towards the
institutionalization and sustainability of special education programs and services.

Special education aims to:

1. Provide a flexible and individualized support system for children and youth
with special needs in a regular class environment in schools nearest the
students' homes.
2. Provide support services, vocational programs, and work training,
employment opportunities for efficient community participation, and
independent living.
3. Implement a life-long curriculum to include early intervention and parent
education, basic education, and transition programs on vocational training or
preparation for college.
4. Make available an array of educational programs and services: the Special
Education Center built on "a school within a school concept" as the resource
center for children and youth with special needs; inclusive education in
regular schools, special and residential schools, homebound instruction,
hospital instruction, and community-based programs; alternative modes of
servicedelivery to reach the advantaged children in far-flung towns,
depressed areas, and underserved barangays.
 WHAT IS Special Education?

Special education is an individually planned,

systematically implemented, and carefully evaluated
instruction to help exceptional children achieve the
greatest possible personal self-sufficiency and success in
present and future environments (Heward, 2003).

Individually planned instruction - In the United States, the law on

Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) requires that an
Individualized Education Program (IEP) be developed and implemented for
every child with special needs between the ages 3 and 21.

Systematically implemented and evaluated instruction - Each type of

child with special education needs requires particular educational services,
curriculum goals, competencies and skills, educational approaches,
strategies, and procedures in the evaluation of learning and skills.

Present environment - refers to the current conditions in the life of the child
with a disability. The present environment includes the family, the school, the
community where the child lives, the institution in society that extend assistance
and support to children and youth with special needs such as the government,
non-government organizations, socio-civic organizations and other groups.

Future environment - is a forecast of how the child with special needs can
move on to the next level of education, from elementary to secondary school
and on to college or vocational program, and finally, to the workplace where
he/she can be gainfully employed. Special education helps the child in the
transition from a student to a wage earner so that he or she can lead a normal
life even if he or she has a disability.
 Definition of Special Education

A comprehensive definition of special education is provided by Salend (2011, p. 7)

as follows:
"Special education involves delivering and monitoring a specially designed and
coordinated set of comprehensive, research-based instructional and
assessment practices and related services to students with learning,
behavioral, emotional, physical, health or sensory disabilities. These instructional
practices and services are tailored to identify and address the individual
strengths and challenges of students; to enhance their educational, social,
behavioral, and physical development; and to foster equity and access to all
aspects of schooling, the community, and society."
This indicates that special education is characterized by:
Individual assessment and planning
Specialized instruction
Intensive instruction
Goal-directed instruction
Research-based instructional practices
Collaborative partnerships
Student performance evaluation

The field of special education has evolved over the past 250 years (Lloyd et al.
1991). The first to emerge were schools for the deaf in the 1760s and for the blind
in the 1780s. These were followed by schools for children with intellectual
disabilities in the 1830s and schools for children with physical disabilities in the
1860s. Around 1900, many countries around the world began to require that all
children attend school, which brought children with learning difficulties to the
attention of teachers. This led to Binet being asked to create a test to identify
such children, which later became the first intelligence test. In the early part of
the twentieth century, these tests were used to select children with moderate
levels of learning difficulties to be educated in special classes within mainstream
schools. For the past 30 or so years, the policies and practices of special
education in general, and special classes in mainstream schools in particular,
have been challenged by an alternative approach that has come to be called
“inclusive education.”
 EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN

Both general and special educators will

frequently refer to their students as
exceptional children. This inclusive term
generally refers to individuals who differ from
societal or community standards of normalcy.
These differences may be due to significant
physical, sensory, cognitive, or behavioral
characteristics. Many of these children may
require educational programs customized to
their unique needs. For instance, a youngster
with superior intellectual ability may require
services for students identified as gifted; a child
with a visual impairment may require
textbooks in large print or Braille.

However, we need to make an important point. Just because a pupil is identified as

exceptional does not automatically mean that he or she will require special education. In
some instances, the student’s educational needs can be met in the general education
classroom by altering the curriculum and/or instructional strategies.

The term exceptional children and youth cover those with intellectual disability, gifted
and talented, learning disabilities, emotional and behavioral disorders, communication
disorders, deafness, blindness and low vision, physical disabilities, health impairments,
and severe disabilities. These are children and youth who experience difficulties in
learning the basic education curriculum and need a modified or functional curriculum,
as well as those whose performance is so superior that they need a differentiated special
education curriculum to help them attain their full potential.

Exceptional children are also referred to as children with special needs (CSN). As the
children and youth in elementary and secondary schools, the mental ability of
exceptional children or CSN may be average, below, or above average. The term
students with disabilities are more restrictive than exceptional children because it does not
include gifted and talented children. Learning the definitions of several related terms will
help you better understand the concept of exceptionality.
 IMPAIRMENT VS DISABILITY Vs handicap

The terms impairment, disability, and handicap are sometimes used

interchangeably, but they are not synonymous.

Impairment refers to the loss or reduced function of a particular body

part or organ (e.g., a missing limb).

A disability exists when an impairment limits a person’s ability to

perform certain tasks (e.g., walk, see, add a row of numbers). A person
with a disability is not handicapped, however, unless the disability leads
to educational, personal, social, vocational, or other problems. For
example, if a child who has lost a leg learns to use a prosthetic limb and
functions in and out of school without problems, she is not
handicapped, at least in terms of her functioning in the physical
environment.

Handicap refers to a problem or a disadvantage that a person with a

disability or an impairment encounters when interacting with the
environment. A disability may pose a handicap in one environment but
not in another. The child with a prosthetic limb may be handicapped
(i.e., disadvantaged) when competing against non-disabled peers on
the basketball court but experience no disadvantage in the classroom.

Many people with disabilities experience handicaps that are the result
of negative attitudes and inappropriate behavior of others who
needlessly restrict their access and ability to participate fully in school,
work, or community activities.
A disability may or may not be a handicap, depending on specific circumstances
and how the individual adapts and adjusts. An example should help clarify the
differences between these two concepts. Laura, a ninth-grader who is
mathematically precocious, uses a wheelchair because of a diving accident. Her
inability to walk is not a problem in her calculus class. Architectural barriers at her
school, however, do pose difficulties for her. She cannot access the water
fountain, visit the computer lab on the second floor, or use the bathroom
independently. When describing Laura in these situations, we would be correct in
calling her handicapped. It is important that professionals separate the disability
from the handicap.

Gargiulo and Kilgo (2011) remind us that an individual with a disability is first and
foremost a person, a student more similar to than different from his or her
typically developing classmates. The fact that a pupil has been identified as having
a disability should never prevent us from realizing just how typical he or she is in
many other ways. As teachers, we must focus on the child, not the impairment;
separate the ability from the disability; and see the person’s strengths rather than
weaknesses.

AT RISK

At risk refers to children who have greater chances than other children to
develop a disability. The child is in danger of substantial developmental delay
because of medical, biological, or environmental factors if early intervention
services are not provided. Down syndrome occurs during the early phase of
pregnancy when one parental chromosome fails to separate at conception
resulting in the child's having 47 chromosomes instead of the normal 46 or 23
pairs. If a pregnant woman contracts German measles or rubella during the first 3
months of pregnancy, the fetus is at risk for blindness, deafness, or intellectual
disability. The fetus in the womb of a woman who consumes alcohol heavily and
chain-smokes, or takes prohibited drugs is at risk for Brain Injury that causes
disabilities. If a disability runs in the family, the fetus may inherit it and the infant
will be born with a disability. Children may meet accidents, suffer from certain
diseases, malnutrition, and other environmental deprivations that can lead to
disabilities.
 REFERENCES

Reference: Inciong, T., Quijano, Y., Capulong, Y., Gregorio, J., & Gines, A. (2016).
Introduction to special education. Quezon City: Rex Printing Company, Inc.

https://www.deped.gov.ph/2009/07/06/do-72-s-2009-inclusive-education-as-
strategy-for-increasing-participation-rate-of-children/

Hornby, G. (2014). Inclusive Special Education Evidence-Based Practices for

Children with Special Needs and Disabilities. Sage

Heward, W. (2013). Exceptional Children: An Introduction to Special Education.

Pearson