There are several things that we need to pay attention to for children with special needs. Be it outside of school or at school. Children with special needs in an inclusive environment must take part in several activities called assessment and identification. These two rights are fundamental programs for them. So what is identification and assessment for children with special needs?
Interpret identification and assessment for children with special needs.
At the first point we must understand is identification. This process has the meaning as a screening activity or screening with the aim of being able to filter out the types of special needs experienced by children. This screening process cannot be done by just anyone, but must be carried out by professionals. In this case, it is a competent teacher so that the use of standard and non-standard tools/instruments developed by teachers and professionals can be maximized.
While the assessment process, is an activity to identify the condition of students or children with special needs. This condition includes several things such as their competence, potential, and also the characteristics of students so that by knowing the various conditions experienced by students, we as teachers can determine what kind of educational program we will give to students with special needs.
Thus the development of their potential will run optimally. In addition to knowing the potential in children, assessment is also useful for recognizing the types of weaknesses that exist in children with special needs. The assessment process for children with special needs also functions in many ways. Among the many assessment functions, are:
- The basis or reference in planning learning for children with special needs.
- The next function is for mentoring and evaluation.
- Then, another function is as a basis for transfers or referrals.
In this assessment process, it is also divided into several types, including academic assessments, developmental assessments, and also non-academic assessments. For academic assessment, namely the process to determine the condition/ability of students with special needs in the academic field.
On the other hand, in non-academic assessments, the conditions we want to know are their abilities in non-academic fields starting from their obstacles and others comprehensively and accurately. For the developmental assessment type, here we want to know the condition of students with special needs, the conditions we want to know are related to their intellectual abilities, emotions and also their behavior.
In conclusion, these two processes are important to do, because we can make plans for students with special needs. more concise, assessment is screening, while identification is screening. This is my brief explanation regarding identification and assessment for students with special needs.