Adam, Adam, Adam, and Adam: The Cultural Construction of a Learning Disability A model for your first paper in the following ways: Analyzes close observations of events and interactions That analysis, supported by evidence from those observations, form the basis of its larger arguments Has an introduction and conclusion which conveys the main points of the authors Has a title which speaks directly to its main argument Has examples of how to produce dialogue and interaction on the page, including how to show gestures, tone, and facial expressions (all of which, in addition to the actual words used, are meaningful to the participants in understanding what is going on)

Howard Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligences, Frames of Mind (1983) Linguistic Logical-mathematical Musical Bodily-Kinesthetic Spatial Interpersonal Intrapersonal We added: Memory Attention Coordination with others’ actions Wisdom Responsibility Speed vs. slow and careful What kinds of intelligences are valued in Adam’s school? What kinds of intelligences does Adam exhibit in school?

Thinking depends on cultural tools developed by other people through time and learned through participation in sociocultural activities from others Language, p. 264 Number system Methods for doing calculations (paper and pen, calculators, cellphones) Counters (digits)

Making Banana Bread: What cultural tools were available to students to complete the task?

In the wild, cognition is distributed across people and is generated collaboratively People do tasks together in mature and complex activities People may come to new ideas collaboratively The accomplishment of the task depends as much on social intelligence (timing, coordination, knowledge of personalities and the task) as on verbal or logico-mathematical reasoning (Rogoff, p. 270).

Making Banana Bread: How is completing the task as much a social task as a cognitive one (defined narrowly here as measurement and literacy)?

Learning Disability is a Cultural Category: people use cultural (institutional) resources to build scenes in which Adam can be visible as learning disabled What does it mean for learning disability to be a cultural category? How is Adam positioned and recognized by people around him as learning disabled? In which sociocultural activities is Adam learning disabled and in which sociocultural activities is he not? What are the social and emotional consequences of the social identity as a learning disabled child?

This chapter comes from a book written by the same authors called Successful Failure: The Schools America Made What does this title mean? “Before any teachers of children enter the schools every September, failure is in every room in America. There is never any question of whether everyone is going to succeed or fail, only of who is going to fail. Because everyone cannot do better than everyone else, failure . . . acquires its share of the children. . . . Among those who fail are those who fail in ways that the system knows how to identify with tests, and these children are called special names. LD acquires its share of the children” (McDermott and Varenne, p. 295)