The Topic of my PhD research is - A new approach to disability awareness - How a combination of experiential learning and critical reflection can combine in professional development to create a real and lasting understanding of hidden disability and help participants generate real lasting solutions of support in their teaching or work contexts. I am working with Peter Renshaw to complete my confirmation process. This topic is very difficult to pin down into research compoents as it is so broad and one area opens up into many!!

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Put simply, I hypothesise that there needs to be a real experience of what it is like to have Autism or Aspergers Syndrome or an intellectual or perceptual motor difficulty before individuals can even begin to emphathise with the person the are working with. I have created simulations that immerse participants in the key disability areas we are exploring. This is the first stage of the process. The second and equally important area is the critical reflection process. The paticipants need to ask themselves how they felt, what they felt and explore their own reactions to the disability simulation. It is not about anyone elses reaction or feelngs or even the activity- it is their reaction and response and theirs alone. From this point we then look at generating solutions on all levels. This is where the real ideas and change agents occur.

ii have filmed this process at the University of Southern Queensland, where I work part time. These extracts are based on the two key activities that are central to my work on hidden disabilities. Exploring and Understanding living with Autism or ASD and also exploring perceptual motor and intellectual difficulties and even an experience of Cerebral Palsy. The simulations are exactly that. I could never hope to capture exactly what it is like for every person to live with ASD, as every individual is unique and ASD is a spectrum and has many differences within it. However, it is a taste of living with an overload to all the senses. The mirror activity also immerses the participant in a different view of the world and asks for their reaction. There are many deeper levels to this research and the ongoing workshops and participation by teachers, doctors and parents and many others is incredibly exciting. However, what makes it most worthwhile for me is when a parent or teacher tells you an individual story about how the experience changed their understanding and attitude towards just one particular student or teaching situation. My research will document some of these experiences I have been lucky enough to have been given permission to share.

Please have a look and explore each of the experiences below - These activities/discussion questions and simulations and the critical reflection process form the basis of Sharon’s PHD Research...

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Click on the link/s below, to see the first of a series of films (a lecture split into smaller sections - mostly 10 minutes maximum) considering the challenges of working with students who have hidden disabilities.

Clip 1 - Sharon Boyce, introduces this first section...pre-viewing activities where Janice as course examiner and colleagues got a feel for how it is to be in a learning context and to have special needs!

Duration = 03:14 minutes

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/intro.wmv

Clip 2 - Here Sharon gives us some more in-depth information about the invisible disabilities in our work with early and primary years students and their families. Thank you to Sharon for sharing this deep insight and expertise - you as a preservice teacher may well find good reasons to return to this inspiring series of films in future!

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/clip01.wmv

Duration = 07:09 minutes

Clip 3 -Janice, Rod and Susan experience what it is like to be asked to draw an item as a student with cerebral palsy. This workshop activity includes the use of a mirror. Both Rod and Janice find this hugely difficult, but Susan less so.

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/clip02.wmv

Duration = 02:00 minutes

Clip 4 - Workshop participants Janice, Rod, Susan and Melissa reflect on their experience of 'back to front' drawing, and the implications for their teaching practice. They consider the question 'How would I want my classroom experience be, if I had cerebral palsy, dyslexia" (Janice feels quite ill at this point!)

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/clip03.wmv

Duration = 07:19 minutes

Clip 5 - Susan, who found the task less disturbing and confronting, considers that with more time, and another opportunity, she could succeed: an important message for us all as educators.

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/clip04.wmv

Duration = 08:00 minutes

Clip 6 - Rod comments that a student would want time to rest, reflect during the day, and to feel that he has achieved. For teachers: give choices in the kinds of activities we offer to allow children to achieve the outcome or learning.

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/clip05.wmv

Duration = 10:35 minutes

Clip 7 - Susan considers the challenges of providing for students with learning disabilities within a constraints of curriculum and testing. We agree that art shouldn't be about tracing or colouring in! This presentation encourages us to think outside the square. Why can't we allow children who cannot write to use computers, or visual presentations to express their knowledge and experience?

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/clip06.wmv

Duration = 07:02 minutes

Clip 8 - Sharon introduces an activity that replicates how many students who have been assessed as having Autism spectrum disorder experience daily life in the classroom

Workshop participants experience the sensory overload at the 'autism table', being asked to play a simple cooperative game of snakes and ladders in a classroom context. Touch, smell, healing, sight and taste are all altered. Headphones plugged into an auditory overload CD, leather gloves with special pads alter feeling, coloured glasses distort visual perception and a smelly chemical smell confronts the workshop participants. Perfume that a teacher wears, foods, deodorants, body scents can be very confronting for the Autistic child. Fans, bells ringing, the teachers' voice combine to confuse and disorient. The everyday classroom becomes a nightmare of overload!

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/clip07.wmv

Duration = 06:40 minutes

Clip 9 - Participants give feedback: annoyance, anger, confusion, withdrawal, aggression. No learning can take place in such a context. Students ignore the teacher's instructions because of their confusion: nothing makes sense! Our traditional classrooms can be terrifying places for children because of the environment and experiences the meet there - feeling sick, feeling like running away, is how children can feel. The 4 participants all react in very different ways to this experience, but all come to understand how behaviour problems can emerge.

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/clip08.wmv

Duration = 06:18 minutes

Clip 10 - Experienced teachers consider how they can provide the autistic child with an environment that is controlled and quiet. Music and texture are discussed as are ways of planning ahead so that the child can anticipate how the day, the hour will run.

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/clip09.wmv

Duration = 10:09 minutes

The workshop participants consider that quieter classrooms, bigger items to work with, tidy and neat environments, calmer colours will all help reduce agitation and possible aggression.

There is no quick fix: but understanding that we need to take time to try to get to know the individual, what his or her qualities, needs and strengths are, and how the curriculum can be made worthwhile.

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/clip10.wmv

Duration = 10:02 minutes

Clip 12 - Learning has to be a journey of real exploration: we hope that you as future teachers and educators in your various fields have found this workshop facilitated by Sharon Boyce, and the related discussions between experienced teacher-educators interesting and informative.

mms://WinMedia.usq.edu.au/edu/edx1250/clip11.wmv

Duration = 03:55 minutes