Arun

Arun is an 11 year-old boy with mild mental retardation. Both of his parents are deaf and mute, and his mother has mild mental retardation. Because his parents are unable to work, he lives with his grandfather. He has a younger brother who is typically developing. His parents live 30 minutes away, so they are able to visit and Arun will leave the school every other weekend to return home. Because of his parents' condition, Arun developed language skills at a significantly later stage than most typically developing infants. He has difficulty controlling the volume of his voice and has problems with the pronunciation of some sounds. Arun would also benefit greatly from working with a speech therapist.

I have prepared an Individualised Education Program (IEP) to help Arun with his English and math skills. He is very interested in learning English, and has strongly improved his vocabulary in the past months. His memory for words (their meaning and spelling) is very good, and he is able to use these words when trying to communicate with me outside of class. His English is probably the most advanced out of all the young students. His Math skills are well developed compared to the other students in his class. He has learned double-digit addition with carry-over, however he does not have a good grasp of meaningful counting. He is able to correctly answer 99+99, but he can only count to 12 in English. When asked to recite numbers he is able to do so quickly and correctly, however when I present him with one number symbol on its own he is unable to identify the number. He can only recall the numbers in sequence and is unable to recognise which names go with which symbols. We have been working on this together and so far he can identify the symbols from 1 to 5. Children with mild mental retardation can hope to reach the intellectual level of a 6th grade child.

Arun is a very warm and caring boy. It is not common for Indians to use 'please', 'thank you', and 'sorry' in everyday conversation, but Arun is always very polite. He tries his best to help me understand what the other children are saying by translating into English.

Arun prefers to play alone rather than with other children. He is very friendly, he gets along well with the other students, and all of the students like Arun, but he still prefers to play by himself or sit quietly. There are many times when Arun will play with me and the other children, but I must usually invite him to join. He is very outgoing and happy, but he will not usually seek out others to play with him. We play a game where Arun pretends to call me, and we chat on our pretend phones, but the minute he speaks to me in Malayalam I say "Malayalam arrila" (I don't know Malayalam) and I hang up. We get through the typical introductions such as "how are you?", "what is your name?", and then he has to think of other words and sentences he knows in order to keep me on the phone. It's a great way to practice his English and his social skills.

Last week, I read Arun's file that was completed when he was first admitted to the school in June 2009. I thought the files must have been switched, because the description of Arun's behaviour was nothing like what I had experienced when working with him. The Arun that I know is very calm, extremely polite and friendly, and gets along well with other although he prefers to play alone. Arun's file described his behaviour as aggressive and stated that he is easily distracted and becomes frustrated often. His IQ was assessed by a psychologist and found to be between 45-49, which would point to a diagnosis of moderate, not mild, mental retardation. After working with Arun for 2 months, it is clear to me that this is not the case. There are clear deficits in his learning ability, however he is able to grasp new, complex concepts. His ability exceeds that of someone with moderate mental retardation. I believe the assessment was compromised by Arun's behaviour (inattentiveness, frustration,...) and the results led to an inaccurate diagnosis. As in North America, many Indian teachers feel that the IQ test has certain flaws. First, it is not sensitive to the cultural differences that exist in India. For example, one criteria is that the child knows how to use eating utensils, but in India this is not necessary to determine mental or physical competency since it is not part of their culture. Also, as in Arun's case, it is not able to distinguish between a child's mental inability to answer a question and a child's unwillingness to answer...a correct answer receives a point and an incorrect or unanswered question does not. It is important, therefore, to conduct behavioural assessments such as the Behavioural Assessment Scale for Indian Children with Mental Retardation (BASIC-MR) in order to determine the extent that behaviour problems can contribute to learning difficulties. At Asadeepam, all children undergo an IQ test to be diagnosed before being admitted, however the teachers understand that the test can be unreliable and they treat the child based on the abilities that they witness personally.