"Can't" and "Won't Part One Who's Down with ODD? by JR McCarthy

In Special Education, which is supposed to be my trade, no distinction is more important than the distinction between the student who can''t, and the student who won''t.

In Special Education, which is supposed to be my trade, no distinction is more important than the distinction between the student who can''t, and the student who won''t. Some kids simply "can''t": they cannot read with comprehension, or write with clarity, or remember names and dates, or negotiate simple sums. Many students "cant" do something. A fair number "cant" do a number of things. A few "cant" seem to do anything. It is tragic, but, as is so often the case with tragedy, it is cut and dried.
Here is the need for Special Ed. In a nutshell: the persistent inability of a child to achieve the appropriate academic or cognitive level is not necessarily a consequence of incompetence - not the child''s, not the teachers'', not even the system''s. Furthermore, confronting these inequities early in formation doesn''t seem to make a great deal of difference. I teach adolescents with special needs, and for better or for worse, by the time they get to me, or by the time I get to them, they have been assessed and examined many times, and by many teams of specialists. So much analytical data has been generated about them, and so much adjustment of their individual educational programs has ensued, that I have a fairly realistic idea about the level of their abilities even before we have a chance - the kid and I - to feel each other out. Thus, there will be some sorrow, but little disappointment, when I see for myself that this is indeed a young man or woman who, in terms of academics, "can''t"
An encounter with the child who "won''t" is another matter - and invariably, quite a trip.
Some kids, it seems, simply "won''t". They won''t work, or try to work, and they won''t learn or try to learn. Furthermore, they won''t let others work and learn in peace, and they do not negotiate. Most charming of all, their obstreperousness is matched only by their defensiveness. They do not abide correction of any kind, and they are outraged by your insinuation that their behavior is less than impeccable.
Of all the curious and provocative notions I had to digest in my quest to become a special educator, none was more alarming than "Oppositional Defiance Disorder", also known as ODD. No less a medical authority than the Mayo Clinic has given its imprimatur to ODD - to the notion that for some kids, the "won''t" is really a "can''t": they can''t accept authority or structure of any kind, and they cannot seem to resist the urge to discourage or obstruct others from doing the same. Clinicians aver that ODD develops by dint of anxiety, or depression, or that perennial scourge of individual progress and social tranquility, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. They also often assert that, barring the application of brainwashing and pharmaceutically-induced docility, they will never change.
ODD is an alarming state of affairs for this reason: the "can''t" I spoke of earlier in relation to academic skills might be said to be divided into either the ''formative can''t or the ''organic can''t. (Don''t even bother to look: the terminology, as far as I know, is my own.) The ''formative can''t'' is primarily, and may be exclusively, the consequence of a poor or spotty elementary education. The ''organic can''t'' is primarily, and may be exclusively a consequence of bona fide learning disabilities. God knows that learning disabilities are aggravated by poor or spotty education, but they are not caused by them.
It is not easy to work with the child whose authentic delays hinder his progress, but it can be done. If the instructor is patient and skilled, and if the child is patient and determined, measurable progress can be made. Furthermore, it often happens that the demonstrable progress of one student serves as motivation to another, and hope, though it may grow slowly, will grow exponentially.
The "won''t" I have spoken of, on the other hand, becomes a most disquieting "won''t" when it is subjected to the same analysis. To whit: if a kid "won''t" because he was never taught respect for, or deference to authority, all you have to do (simple it is, easy it ain''t) is teach him. If a kid won''t respect or defer because - for myriad psychological and neurological reasons - he cannot respect or defer, what can be done for him? Respect and deference do not exist in a vacuum, and only the most miraculously successful treatment of O.D.D. serves any purpose other than the long-term pacification of the child so afflicted. In terms of the importance of respect and deference in the big picture of human interaction, nothing is really either taught or learned.
It hardly needs to be said - and it has been said by all of the behaviorists - that without the wherewithal to choose to cooperate freely with the rule of law, nothing much besides the fear of the consequences reliably stands between the child who "won''t" and criminality. This is all the more true if the child who "won''t" is really a child who "can''t. What, then, is the prognosis for the child with ODD?
In the twenty four years that I have been in education, the population in American penitentiaries has tripled. 6.6% of all Americans have been to prison, and five hundred Americans out of ten thousand are currently locked up. In the ten years between 1995 and 2005, violent criminals went from being 47% to being 52% of the population in our penitentiaries: violent criminals now outnumber the total population of drug offenders, property offenders, and offenders of the public order. (offenders of the public order, that is, whose offense did not involve violence.)
Rates of recidivism, the tendency of convicts to return again - and again - to prison for the same offence, or a similar offence, are set by a number of reliable entities at anywhere between 70 percent and 90 percent, depending on the nature of the crime.
Here is a brutal truth from the classroom, which is the beginning of the journey to both the town house and the jail house: sometimes we come to the point where nothing can be done for a child. At that point, something has to be done with the child. Woe be on to us when the focus of our concern can no longer be who the child is, because of what the child has done. That, alas, is the point at which the jails start to fill.

J.R. McCarthy

JR McCarthy is a published author and also a staff writer for ArtistsILove.com