As per IAS topper IRA Sehgal, a specially abled woman herself who created history by topping the UPSC exam, teachers need to be trained to handle children with special needs. She feels that instead of getting in special educators, we need to train school teachers with skills to handle these children, sign languages as well as braille. Special education also needs to be a part of regular school training curriculum. She being a specially abled woman, had experienced growing up by convincing other about her abilities and that people were either skeptical or sympathetic towards her.
There were many schools where she did get admission but equal opportunity is where her father had to fight as schools offered special opportunity while he wanted equal platform and treatment for her. She also stressed that the teachers need to change their attitude wherein some are extremely liberal and some are very strict with children of special needs. The idea is to have teachers who treat them just like other children. As per her both the methods are apparently harmful to the kids as their either make the kids over confident or just hamper their potential from coming out due to over appreciation. The inclusive right needs to be there from childhood a child needs to be compassionate towards differently abled peers of theirs for better understanding and co-existence.
She even harped upon the need to have a specially designed curriculum for children with special needs. For example, an autistic child is unable to study a few languages and if forced to do so with the same curriculum, wouldn’t help. Instead if a special curriculum is designed for them, it would help.
She also harped that the current system of education is trying to push inclusive education methodology but the holistic approach required to do so is missing yet. The need of the hour is to have workshops around the sensitization of the issue and the focus needs to be on how all the children can grow together in one positive environment.
