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A special education class at Washington School on Thursday. (LAURA GONZALEZ PHOTO / April 21, 2012) |
The hardest moment in Rosita Delgadillo’s life as a parent was when she had to have the serious conversation with her boys. She knew the moment would eventually come, but she was scared because as a mother that loves her children she was trying to protect them from disappointment.
Her elder child was starting junior high when he sat his mom down and asked her why he was in a special education class. He wanted to know why he was different from other children he saw around the school.
“It was very different to make them understand that being in a special education class does not mean that they are bad children, because people in general don’t know what special education entails,” Delgadillo said in Spanish.
Both her sons, Chris Torres, 17, and Robin Torres, 12, have been diagnosed with bipolar disorder and she said that the most difficult part is dealing with the perception of her children’s disorder to people.
One of the main symptoms of bipolar disorder is mood swings. For this reason, children that have it are likely to become aggressive and bully others.
Delgadillo said many times she has been called to the school because her sons are acting up.
“Sometimes people don’t understand that they have a problem and they label them as problematic,” she said.
Labels in special education children are a burden, she said. Being rejected or being bullied affect their personality.
“They see that and they start thinking that they are not good enough,” she said.
Special education teacher Ranae Wren said that the biggest problem for special education children is that they don’t have the socialization and communication skills that general education children have.
They will either not talk that much or they will be very aggressive. They have both problems: being bullied and being the bullies, she said.
Wren is a second- and third-grade teacher at Washington School and she said that the school is very proactive in anti-bullying awareness.
Many students have a problem differentiating reporting and tattling and so they resolve not to say anything for fear of the repercussions.
“They think they’ll get in trouble,” Wren said.
Wren teams up with a general education second-grade teacher and they get the children together to do physical education or science, that way they are all exposed to different behaviors and they will be more tolerant of anything they consider to be different.
Elizabeth Ayala’s child is 9 and he has a learning disability. She had the same problems growing up and she was bullied as a child.
History is repeating with her son.
She said that she teaches her son not to let anyone make him feel badly about his disability. Being bullied is a helpless feeling. She said.
“I’m teaching him not to let others bully him and not to bully anybody,” Ayala said. “I’m teaching him to think about his actions.”
Ernesto Lugardo’s son is 8 and he is on the autism spectrum. He teaches his son to tell the aggressor to leave him alone and to always tell the teacher.
He wants to put his son in a self-defense class, but he wants to wait until his son is older to understand that it is only to know how to defend himself and not to learn how to become the aggressor.
He said he is really happy with the effort that the school does to promote the peace among students.
“That’s why we go to school, to get a better education to handle things without violence,” Lugardo said.
Multimedia Producer Laura Gonzalez can be reached at 760-337-3440 or lgonzalez@ivpressonline.com
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