Pro-D Day - FASD Seminar

I attended the online seminar on FASD (Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder).  We went over what FASD was, which is an often undiagnosed disorder that may result in students being behind developmentally and struggling with sensory input, transitions, memory, executive function, and more.  We then covered what we could do as teachers to support students who may have FASD such as having routine, building relationships with them, and coregulation.

It was interesting to learn about coregulation- essentially using yourself as a calm basis to help calm the student down.  It makes sense that if you are not calm as a teacher, students will be able to tell and subsequently will match your emotions.  I think it's something to keep in mind, especially since teaching can be so stressful at times, that we also need to be practicing methods to stay steady so that we don't pass on our disregulation to our students.

What surprised me was how many people probably have FASD- they gave the statistic that 4% of people likely have the disorder.  I had actually never heard of FASD before attending this session so I wasn't expecting that high of a proportion of the population to have it.

What I would want to follow up on is some of the methods that they gave for helping students with FASD and how they balanced supporting those students' needs with the other students.  For example, they mentioned that one solution they had for a student was to allow them to pace in the back of the classroom to help them concentrate, but I feel like that could be immensely distracting to the other students in the class.  I know that there will always have to be some sort of give and take in the classroom with different students; they can't all have the same needs.  On the other hand, it's true that finding certain accommodations can actually help all students, as you never know who might be having an off day, who might have an invisible or undiagnosed disability, or just otherwise would benefit from having extra support.