Ahead of our Time

After I was talked down from the tree branches I had escaped to on the 1^st day of school and returned to class, it became apparent I would have to find a way to survive at school. Twitchy, jumpy, lost and confused were adjectives that described me that first year in class. It was like being dropped into a foreign land, where language and culture and customs were a complete unknown. There was no program, no plan, no label for me in the 1950’s. In the early 1960s, the behaviors of excessively inattentive  children were thought to be due to "Minimal Brain Dysfunction". At the end of the decade, though, the name of this syndrome was changed to "Hyperkinetic Disorder of Childhood". In 1980, the disorder was given its current name of “Attention Deficit Disorder”, with or without hyperactivity.”  (http://EzineArticles.com/217254)

I am SO glad the only behavior that was really documented in the years of my schooling  was inattentiveness. If I had been diagnosed with a ‘disorder’, however, it would not have changed my placement in public school. During the years I was in elementary, middle and high school, there were no special education classes per se. In the system I attended, children with hearing and vision handicaps, children in wheel chairs, children with emotional and mental disabilities were all in classes with their ‘normal’ peers. We were a truly diverse population of learners. One teacher, one text per subject, and all levels of abilities in one room - doing what they could to succeed in school. Seemed like a crazy mix at the time. Who could have guessed decades later I would be a teacher that promoted such classrooms  - a champion of full inclusion classes as the next, right approach for special education students in public education.