What About Me?

Children with differences do not need to be fixed or cured or pitied. Children are valuable simply for the person they are and will be. Schools and school districts have sought to remediate the weaknesses of children with disabilities without focusing on or utilizing the strengths and interests of children with disabilities as the basis for individual education programs (IEP). Beginning with a pre-referral process that focuses on parent or teacher concerns for children, driving an evaluation that focuses on a child's weaknesses, leading to an IEP built on remediating weaknesses that often ignore an individual's strengths and interests, the process and end product are focused on deficits in children. This chapter will present an alternative to this model, an alternative focused on identifying and utilizing a child's strengths and interests in the development of IEPs.