The clinical field experience activity in which I took part in the current project was the cooking classes held for children with communications disorders. It is worth pointing out that teaching cooking to students with pervasive developmental disorders is sometimes recommended as an additional post-school activity (Mechling, Ayres, Foster, & Bryant, 2013). Thus, I participated in a number of classes, where I helped the special education teachers to work with the students.
The frame of reference through which I perceived these students was comprised of a number of elements such as gender-based and language-based perceptions about the possible behavior of children. It is now clear to me that I had implicitly expected the children to behave in a number of slightly different ways, depending on their gender and their language. For instance, it had been my expectation that the boys would be slightly more active during the class and more willing to engage in communication with their peers regarding the cooking activities.
I also had assumed that the kids for whom English was not their first language would prefer engaging in conversations with children who had the same first language and would less actively interact with those classmates whose first language was not English.
While I was helping the teacher and providing assistance for the kids regarding the cooking activities, some of my previous perceptions were changed based on what I was able to observe during the classes; however, others of my beliefs remained the same. In particular, I was not able to witness more active behaviors of boys as compared to girls. In fact, all the children had some communications disorders and were, in general, not willing to interact with their peers; the teacher specifically had to prompt them to engage in communication, for instance, by suggesting that one of the children should help another to do a particular task related to cooking.
I also attempted to stimulate the communication between kids by showing how to cook not to individual students but to pairs or small groups of kids. On the other hand, my expectation about the students whose first language was not English turned out to be true; the children preferred communicating with those peers who spoke the same first language as they did. It was apparent that such communication was easier for them, for instance, because they did not have to pay additional attention to the choice of words.
Therefore, my frame of references changed slightly as I was able to witness that boys and girls suffering from various communications disorders acted similarly regardless of their gender; however, my perceptions regarding the interaction between students with different first languages stayed the same, for I did not witness any examples of different behavior. Because of this, it might also be recommended that educators should additionally prompt communication between the learners whose first languages are different due to the fact that these students might be less willing to engage in interactions with one another.
Reference
Mechling, L. C., Ayres, K. M., Foster, A. L., & Bryant, K. J. (2013). Comparing the effects of commercially available and custom-made video prompting for teaching cooking skills to high school students with autism. Remedial and Special Education, 34(6), 371-383. Web.