Learning Arithmetic Operations In Students With Down Syndrome

Learning arithmetic operations in students with Down Syndrome

According to Organic Law 8/2013, of December 9, for the improvement of Acneae educational quality: it is students with specific need for educational support. The LOMCE defines this students as one who requires educational attention different from the ordinary, for presenting special educational needs, due to specific learning difficulties, ADHD (attention deficit disorder and hyperactivity), for their high intellectual abilities, for having incorporatedafternoon to the educational system, or for personal or school history conditions. They may need educational attention different from the ordinary and the application of specific measures that may or may not imply extraordinary resources (Organic Law for the Improvement of Educational Quality, 2014).

Once the definition has been given, we will deal with what the LOMCE gives to the specific educational support needs. In the first place we will start doing a brief analysis of the law in the BOE, and then move on to the decree established by the Autonomous Community, in this case Cantabria.

In accordance with the provisions of Royal Decree 126/2014, of February 28, which establishes the basic curriculum of primary education, students with specific educational support needs will apply what is indicated in Chapter II of the IITitle I of Law 2/2006, of May 3, in articles 71 to 79 bis, that is, students who require educational attention different from the ordinary will have a curricular and organizational adaptation that ensures their progress, so that it reaches: the maximum level of development of your personal abilities, the objectives and competences of the stage.

On the other hand, it will be the competence of the educational administrations to take the necessary measures to identify this type of students as soon as possible to establish the conditions of accessibility and support resources that favor access to the curriculum of students with special educational needs and adapt the instruments, andIn your case, the times and supports that ensure a correct evaluation of this students.

I would like to highlight a very important aspect of this article 14, which is as follows: the schooling of students who present learning difficulties will be governed by the principles of normalization and inclusion and ensure their non -discrimination and effective equality in access and permanence in theEducational System (Organic Law for the Improvement of Educational Quality, 2014, Art. 14).

I will continue to analyze in this case the BOC, specifically Decree 27/2014, of June 5, which establishes the Primary Education curriculum in the Autonomous Community of Cantabria.

In this, the measures to be taken in each curricular element are detailed in the different articles. Making a small tour of the articles we can see that as regards the schedule you can adapt when there are needs of students who always justify it respecting the limits that the Ministry establishes, as for the competences, the Ministry will encourage the quality, equity and inclusionEducational of people with disabilities, equal opportunities and non -discrimination due to disability, fl exibilization measures and methodological alternatives, curricular adaptations, universal accessibility, design for all, attention to diversity and all those measures that are necessary to ensure thatStudents with disabilities can access a quality education in equal opportunities (Decree 27/2014, June 2014, Art. 8). Regarding methodological orientations, this decree establishes that education must be personalized and the learning rate, the level of student development and attention to diversity, among other principles, among other principles must be respected.

Other articles that echo the attention to diversity are didactic programming (art. 12), the evaluation during the stage (art. 13), individualized evaluation (art. 15) and promotion (art. 17). Also highlight that there is a specific article for attention to diversity (art. 19) in which the measures to be taken in the main curricular elements are detailed.

Finally focusing on mathematics, it should be noted that this area is based on experiences, starting from the close to be able to use them in functional contexts related to situations of daily life and gradually increasing the level of difficulty. All this taking into account attention to diversity and respect for the different rhythms and learning styles.

Description of the general characteristics of Down Syndrome.

According to Fortes (1996) cited in Ortega & Gómez (2007) the recognition of Down Syndrome is attributed to John Langdon Down, who giving a definition presented, with the name of Mongolism, a clinical entity characterized by an Asian aspect of the face of the face of the faceAnd that he, along with other doctors of the time they pointed out as children "without finishing". This is the first description of a person with Down syndrome.

Currently Down Syndrome is classified within chromosopathies, which are alterations in the structure or number of chromosomes that affect autosomas and that cause disorders of different gravity.

Specifically Down Syndrome is a quantitative chromosopathy since it is a genetic alteration that is produced by the presence of an extra chromosome (the chromosome is the structure containing the DNA) or a part of it. Human body cells have 46 chromosomes distributed in 23 peers. One of these pairs determines the sex of the individual, the other 22 are numbered from 1 to 22 according to their decreasing size. People with Down syndrome have three chromosomes in pair 21 instead of the two that usually exist;Therefore, this syndrome is also known as trisomy 21. Down syndrome is the main cause of intellectual disability and the most common human genetic alteration. It occurs spontaneously, without an apparent cause on which you can act to prevent it. It occurs in all ethnicities, in all countries, with an incidence of one per 600-700 conceptions in the world. Today, only a risk factor has been demonstrated, maternal age (especially when the mother exceeds 35 years) and, very exceptionally, in 1% of cases, it is produced by inheritance of the parents. Down syndrome is not a disease. Nor are there degrees of Down syndrome, but the effect that the presence of this alteration produces on each person is very variable. People with Down syndrome show some common characteristics but each individual is unique, with an unique appearance, personality and skills. (Down Spain, 2014).

Checking in different writings dedicated to people with Down syndrome, it can be seen that there are many sections dedicated to reading and writing, while practically not mentioning learning logical-mathematical concepts. It is from the 90s when an interest begins to be observed in how students learn with Down Syndrome these contents. However, despite this boom, the teaching of this subject has not yet been planned, since the special difficulty that these people present in mathematical thinking tends to emphasize.

It is observed that these people present some type of anomaly in the functioning of the following mechanisms and processes (Florez, 1997):

• Mechanisms of attention, alert state and initiative attitudes, which intervene cores and mesencephalic systems, areas of the frontal and temporal cortex and the prefrontal cortex.
• Processes involved in the elaboration of language, both in its conceptual components (lexicon, semantics, pragmatic) and computational (phonology, morph-ionexis).
• Sensory information processing systems, to a greater degree of auditory nature than visual nature.
• Short and long -term memory processes that depend on the sensory areas, both primary and associative, of the hippocampus and the prefrontal cortex.
• Correlation, analysis, calculation and abstract thinking processes, which depend primarily on the prefrontal cortex and its interrelation with other structures.

The alterations suffered by people with Down syndrome in the cerebral cortex give rise to disorders in cognitive dimensions (affecting processes such as care and perception, these being those that will intervene in logical-mathematical processes), motor and affective.

"The short -term memory deficit is one of the biggest differences of children with Down syndrome in relation to subjects of the same chronological age without said syndrome" (Arraiz, 1994).

Those affected by this syndrome find it difficult to retain, process and evoke auditory and visual information, although it has been observed that the auditory system is more affected than the visual. These problems cover both perception systems and the execution of them.

According to a study by Sue Buckley (1995) it is confirmed that visual memory is more effective than the auditory and that this is, perhaps, one of the reasons why they prefer more visual learning. According to the above, professionals should fundamentally use the visual channel to get the information to students with Down syndrome, while still using the other channels so that they do not fall into disuse.

With all these data we can conclude from the educational point of view and more specifically from the scope of mathematics than for a person with Down syndrome the stimuli must be presented mainly visually and adapting to their rhythm of acquisition of stimuli, sothat a previous analysis of its abilities and rhythms is important, since its understanding is done more slowly due to the decrease in ramifications and interconnections between neurons. (Macías, 1999).

Bibliography

• Ortega-Udela, j. M., & Gómez-Ariza, C. J. (2007). New technologies and mathematical learning in children with Down syndrome: generalization for autonomy. Pixel-bit. Media and Education Magazine, (29), 59-72.
• Organic Law for the Improvement of Educational Quality (LOMCE) (Organic Law 8/2013, December 9). Official State Gazette, No. 295, 2013, December 10.
• Royal Decree 126/2014, of February 28, which establishes the basic curriculum of primary education. "BOE" no. 52, March 1, 2014.
• Decree 27/2014, of June 5, which establishes the Primary Education Curriculum in the Autonomous Community of Cantabria. Extraordinary Boc, No. 29, 2014, June 13.
• Down Spain (2014). What is Down syndrome? [Web page]. Retrieved on 10-20-2019 from https: // www.Down’s Syndrome.Net/Syndrome-Down/
• Macías. M. J. (1999). Down syndrome. General characteristics. In c.J. Fernández. Disability and child disorders in the school environment. Minutes II Psychology Days. Úbeda: Minerva Graphics.
• Flórez, j. (1997). Neurobiological bases of learning and memory in Down syndrome. In: Miñan. Educate people with Down Syndrome. Granada: Down Syndrome Association.
• Arreiz, a. (1994). Mental deficiency: children with Down syndrome. In s. Molina (dir). Psychopedagogical Bases of Special Education. Alcoy: ivory.
• Buckley, s. (nineteen ninety five). Learning reading as language teaching in children with Down syndrome: theoretical results and meaning. In, j. Perera (dir.). Down’s Syndrome. Specific aspects. Barcelona: Masson.