The Community School Inc. -- A private, specialized program designed to better educate the Learning Disabled.

SPEECH AND LANGUAGE THERAPY:
Speech and Language Therapy is offered as prescribed, either in small groups or in individual sessions. A formal evaluation is routinely done for new admissions. Recommendations for therapy and/or classroom modifications and support are made and periodic re-evaluations are conducted as needed.

Visual-motor Integration and Handwriting Therapy is offered on an individual and/or group basis. It focuses on such skills as perception of objects and symbols in space, figure ground discrimination, visual closure, directionality and coordination of vision with movement.

The goal of handwriting instruction is to achieve legibility without undue burden and to help make writing a more automatic and comfortable process. Children with severe dysgraphia are provided with appropriate therapy.

Individualized Instruction and Clinics for specific skill development where problems are serious to severe are scheduled as needed. Independent work assignments focused on areas of need provide practice in skills currently being taught yet presenting mastery problems to individual children. They also help in developing independent work habits and in aiding children to organize time, workspace and materials. Clinics, in which one or two children work with a teacher on a limited set of skills intensively for one or more periods a week, are also offered. These are usually in phonics, reading comprehension, visual tracking and number fact retention. Goals are limited and, when mastery is achieved, the student may withdraw form the clinic.

GUIDANCE:
Children who have experienced academic and social difficulties are often discouraged. Thus, an important objective of the program is to develop self-esteem in our students, to encourage more productive ways of coping with difficulties and to reduce negative and self-defeating attitudes. Equally important, the underlying dysfunction responsible for the learning disability may have additional consequences that also interfere with development appropriate to age and intellectual potential. Problems such as restlessness, limited attention span, poor organizational ability, low frustration level, impulsiveness and poor social perception require constructive attention.

Skilled teaching, the therapeutic milieu in the classroom and the sensitive intervention of teachers provide the major means for addressing these problems. An incentive system for behavioral change is also in effect. Individual counseling is provided when needed.

Specific intervention programs include:

Unlocking Learning Power (ULP), a group guidance approach to developing awareness of the nature of learning disabilities, each student's individual profile of strengths and weaknesses and training in general and specific coping strategies. Our students are helped to become self-advocates through such understanding.
Therapy groups limited to no more than four students per group designed to teach impulse control strategies, resolution of conflicts and the reduction of aggressive tendencies.
Social Skills and Social Problem Solving Curriculum is a classroom-based weekly program. Its premise is that social growth and competence requires direct teaching of the skills needed to guide social behavior and to make appropriate social decisions.