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Unit 31: Rehabilitation of Exceptional Children: Role of Peers, Role of Family

Similarly, rehabilitation programs generally focus on rules and conformity, practices that are often Notes
designed to control youth and maintain staff-imposed order. Mental health systems commonly focus
on individual pathology and seek to improve client functioning through adult-child counseling
approaches. In those instances where peer group approaches have been used with special education,
it has usually been to arrest or change maladaptive social behaviors.
Over the past two decades, child- and family-service programs have popularized the term
empowerment and, to some extent, have incorporated peer-referenced paradigms into their
approaches with adolescents. Many programs have failed to truly value children as partners in this
process; instead, they have used peer influence to police the environment and maintain order once
children have broken adult-imposed rules.
Adult Views of Troubled special Children: Unfortunately, many childcare professionals have a
pessimistic view of children and behavior that is detrimental to the rehabilitative process, and the
basis of most therapeutic approaches for children with behavior disorders is a negative attitude. A
pervasive clinical orientation that explains problematic behaviors as pathological or deliberate has
prevented child-care professionals from viewing behaviors as symptoms of personal distress.
Furthermore, the managed care movement has been overly obsessed with the quick elimination of
isolated problematic behaviors, usually delivered in the most economical forum available. As a
consequence, treatment interventions often fail to modify or restructure those particular values or
cognitive structures that led to the adolescent's misbehavior.
Dynamics of Problem Solving: Troubled adolescents typically have a difficult time with problem-
solving tasks. How they go about seeking solutions may be more important than what alternatives
they produce. Developing problem-solving processes (the "how") promotes generalization to future
problem-solving situations; what solutions they choose may offer only temporary relief from a
momentary difficulty.
Developmental theorists have proposed that effective problem solving is at the heart of mental health
and adjustment. Furthermore, the literature strongly supports the impact of peer influence in this
process. Bronfenbrenner's (1979) theory on directive beliefs supports the idea that peer group
microsystems contribute to an adolescent's development as the adolescent organizes experiences to
develop future plans.

31.4 Summary
There are following role of peers and family in rehabilitation of exceptional children.
• Acceptance, which involves viewing the child with disability realistically and withdrawal of
emotional investment from the loss of a healthy child and attachment to the real child with
person with disability, is a crucial and important aspect, where each parent individually goes
through the process of mourning at his or her own space
• A good family encompasses a warm and easy husband-wife relationship. In order to promote
parental understanding, physicians, psychologists, therapists and teachers must show a warm
compassionate attitude toward the child.
• The Mother Participates in a programme which is committed to avoiding disabled children
from being taken from their family home and community.
• Cause of the handicap is known or unknown contributes to variety of parental reactions. If the
cause is known and could not be prohibited by the parents for example some sort of brain
injury during birth, parents usually experience less guilt. When known cause is apparent by
the parents and avoidable for example parental infections of the mother or seizures and injuries
resulting from the child falling or dropped by mother, father or by some family member the
guilt experience is relatively more. Causes are not known or not detectable in around 30-40% of
cases who are Mentally Challenged (Indian council of medical research, 1996).
• Nature of disability, what exactly is wrong with the child is one of the major concerns of the
parents of child with disability. It affects the realistic acceptance of the parents of child with

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