THE EFFECTIVENESS OF AN EDUCATIONAL PROGRAM FOR CHILDREN WITH DOWN’S SYNDROME ON THEIR CHARACTIRISTICS

Abstract

     The main purpose of this study was to asses the Characteristics of children with Down’s syndrome, in the fields of language, reading, writing, numeral, and social adaptive skills, and how these Characteristics vary according to variables of mental retardation (mild or moderate), gender (males or females), age (6 –8 years)(9 – 11 years) and (12–14) in a Jordanian sample (n=60). Another purpose was to asses the effectiveness of an individualized instructural program in academic skills for Down syndrome children (n=15) aged (6-14).

To answer the first question of the study about the behavioral characteristics of Down’s syndrome children, the following Jordanian version scales have been administrated to the sample:

·         Stanford - Binet Intelligence.

·       Numeral Skills For Mental Retardation.

·       Language Skills For Mental Retardation.

·       Reading Skills For Mental Retardation.

·       Writing Skills For Mental Retardation.

·       Social Adaptive.

            The analysis of variance (ANOVA) was applied. The findings of the study revealed statistically significant differences:

·       The performance patterns of varied age groups in areas of social adaptive skills, language, numerals, reading & writing skills in favor of higher age group.

·       The degrees of mental retardation groups performance on social adaptive skills, numerals, reading, writing & language skills, in favor of mild retardation group.

·       As  for gender, the study revealed statistically significant differences between males and females. It was clear that males are better in reading, writing, and numeral aspects, yet females’ performance was better in language and social adaptive skills according to T-Test results.

  To answer the second question in this study about the effectiveness of the instructional program for Down’s syndrome children (n=15), an experimental design was used, (Pre-test Teaching Post- test). A training program was implemented which included ten academic objectives for every child to meet his needs, which was assessed individually for each student of the sample. The percentages of achievement was documented graphically for each student to all instructional objectives, the result shows that (70%) of the objectives were achieved.