"Fat city how difficult can this be"

This video about the educational experience of a student with a learning disability is extremely fascinating. I have never been keen about simulations because at the end of the day those in simulation can remove the disability and it seems as if a disability is nothing permanent. That being said though, I found this video to be very informative as a teacher because it helped me see ways in which I can improve my instruction.

Even though the whole video was very eye-opening, the part that stood out the most to me was that in which the speaker spoke about processing. The main thing that stood out to me was the realization that everyone can have difficulty processing depending on the situation. In the simulation, "normal" adults had a very difficult time processing due to the pressure and anxiety created by the teacher. Therefore, if we as teachers make a conscious effort to help lower a student's affective filter and give them the needed support, then he/she should be able to process without too much difficulty. My second realization in relation to processing is that students who are classified with a learning disability can generally come up with the correct answer if they are given the time to process a question. What happens though in most classrooms is that the student with a learning disability is often still thinking about the teacher's first question when the class has already moved onto the next question's answer. Therefore, as a teacher, I should make sure I repeat my question and give enough wait time between the question and its answer so that students with learning disabilities can at least keep up with the rest of the class.

Lastly,  as I was watching this video from the perspective of a future ESOL teacher, I kept thinking of English Language Learners (ELLs) instead of students with learning disabilities. Many of the difficulties that students with learning disabilities encounter are also shared by ELLs. ELLs may not have a learning disability, but the language barrier often acts like a disability. ELLs require extra processing time, especially those who have little to no experience with the new language. Imagine being asked a content area question about the Revolutionary War and not having the language needed to first comprehend the question and let alone answer it? The response from this ELL might be similar to that of a student with a disability who has difficulty processing and/or remembering facts. I would imagine that the ELL would have similar feelings to the student with a disability. Sometimes, ELLs are even wrongly classified as having a learning disability because the language barrier looks so similar to a learning disability on the surface. Teachers must be careful to correctly identify the difference between a true learning disability and language interference because depending on the situation, the student will need to be supported in different ways.