Every day is a learning experience

DR RADICA MAHASE

My name is Carlene Sharpe and I am 33 years of age. I have recently completed my four-year bachelor’s degree in primary and special education at the University of Trinidad and Tobago. I work at Ad Astra Private School, specialising in children with different exceptionalities and I volunteer at Rahul’s Clubhouse.

My future goals are to pursue my masters degree in special education and a PhD in special education.

My aim is to ensure that no child is being left behind and to provide a safe and enjoyable learning experience for them. I enjoy interacting with children, regardless of their race, culture, gender, ethnicity and different exceptionalities, as I believe that all children should be given equal opportunities in society. Every day for me is a learning experience and I appreciate learning about everyone's differences and I want to make a positive impact in their lives.

I decided to become a teacher because I have observed my mother, who was struggling to take care of my special-needs brother. As a single parent, she worked really hard to ensure that he was well looked after.

I realised that when people were giving up on him, my mother would always stand by his side, regardless of the circumstances. I realised that no one would take care of your special-needs children the way you would, as a parent.

I became a special-needs teacher because I wanted to make a change and to be someone's second mother – simply by being patient with them, loving, kind, providing a safe environment in which they can trust you, but most importantly, allowing them to be included in society.

I choose SPED because I have a passion and love for special-needs children and I want to make a difference in their lives every day. I want to be able to provide them with academic, social, behavioural, and personal skills that they can use throughout their lives. I want to help them to be as independent as possible and one day, able to fend for themselves in an effective manner.

My experience thus far working with children, specifically on the autism spectrum, has been amazing and challenging.

One thing I've learned is that you can be in a classroom full with autistic children and yet each of them is different. Not every child with autism is the same, so therefore we will encounter different personalities and characteristics, and as an educator, it is important to learn about them individually, so that we can tailor our approach to meet the needs of each child.

This experience has taught me to be more patient, innovative, proactive, interactive, creative, and gentle, apart from being loving and kind.

I am now learning to be a little stern at times, but as I said, it's also a learning experience for me.

Working amongst autistic children I've experienced the very shy ones, and the very selective ones, who are nonverbal, so facial and body language is very important and the implementation of visual, manipulative and interactive activities are all very vital.

Some challenges that I've encountered are behavioural issues, children wanting their own way, and to get them to stay focused. It's easy learning about these challenges in a textbook, but it is completely different when experiencing it in the real world. Every day is about finding new solutions to problems, finding methods and techniques to help each individual. Some methods are providing them with positive reinforcement, praising them, and providing a reward system, just to name a few.

Based on my interaction with parents/caregivers, one of the main challenges that they face is funding. Many parents have to homeschool their children because most primary schools won't accept their child/children because of their exceptionality, for various reasons.

The only option parents are left with is to send their kids to a private school, and some parents can't afford to pay, especially parents from low socio-economic backgrounds.

Another challenge for parents/caregivers is their children are not accepted in the community. Some people are not educated about children with special needs and as a result, they would laugh at the parents. They tell parents they are not raising their children right, or they have poor parental skills.

As a special educator and a concerned person, I would love to see the TT government step in and make a move towards helping children with different exceptionalities to be accepted in primary schools.

For those who cannot attend regular schools, I would like the government to build special-needs schools throughout TT. This would allow for children to be given an equal opportunity with those in the regular primary settings and would provide job opportunities for special-education teachers.

This process would take time, but for now the government can place special-education teachers in the regular primary schools throughout TT to assist these children.

My advice for young teachers coming out of the UTT is always to remember that every day is a learning experience and we must continue to do our best in order to provide students with an effective learning experience. It is important to take what you have learnt and put it into perspective and to always remember that yo u are a "cut above the rest."

Radica Mahase is the founder/director of Support Autism T&T