Thanks to the popular movie star Aamir Khan who produced and directed the surprise hit Taare Zameen Par (TZP), public awareness of a critical learning difficulty known as dyslexia has sky-rocketed. However, addressing this learning difficulty, which educators believe affects tens of millions of children across the country, demands more than just awareness. It calls for teachers, school managements and parents to take steps to respond to the behavioural and learning difficulties of students struggling to cope within the countrys overcrowded classrooms, with love, understanding, and action.Typically, when a teacher notices a child being off-task, distracted, hyperactive, or failing, the first response is to scold him/her for not paying attention, not trying hard enough, and being lazy. In TZP, some of the insults directed by teachers at Ishaan, the dyslexic protagonist of the movie, are idiot, duffer, lazy, crazy, books are his enemies, youre the problem, etc. The plain truth is that no child wants to fail or misbehave; there is always an underlying cause. One way to respond differently to difficult behaviour or learning difficulties is to train teachers to be sharp observers. By equipping them with observation skills and techniques, they can learn to identify possible causes of learning and behavioural problems. At the University of Tennessee, I studied one such technique, i.e functional behaviour assessment. This technique equips teachers to identify the ‘function of a childs behaviour — i.e. to ascertain the real reason or purpose behind the behaviour. As teachers collect data through observation, they begin to discern a pattern. Behind all challenging behaviour, there is an ABC pattern: Antecedent (trigger), Behaviour (specific description of behaviour), and Consequence (positive or negative reinforcement). As we analyse data, we can deduce whether the child is trying to obtain something or escape from something. In TZP, for instance, after observing Ishaans ‘laziness and ‘disinterest, Ram Shankar Nikumbh (Aamir Khan) becomes aware of Ishaans ability to focus on creative and imaginative tasks (e.g. when all pupils are making paper boats). He also observes that Ishaans focus decreases when confronted with reading, writing, and mathematics, and how he tries to avoid or escape any activity centred upon writing and text. In reality, we all try to avoid tasks that expose our weaknesses or make us feel uncomfortable. Dr. Mel Levine, a highly respected American paediatrician and learning expert, is of the opinion that teachers around the world tend to over-rely on testing (cognitive tests, IQ tests, etc) to identify problems. Instead he says, …teachers can learn so much through good observation. Its knowing what youre looking for, knowing what the possibilities are, knowing what to prescribe… When teachers are equipped with sharp observation skills, they can introduce early interventions to address dyslexia and behaviour problems. As teachers we need to do this whilst always treating students and children with love and understanding. Instead the existing reality is that teachers and parents impose incredible demands on children to perform well in all subjects. Dr. Levine comments in his book A Mind at…
