Special education system

Rather than refer to children who are receiving support through the special education system as children with disabilities, this Competency uses the phrase children with exceptionalities. The term children with exceptionalities includes children who are experiencing identified challenges with development, emotions, and/or learning because of one or more specific exceptionalities. (Often children are screened and identified with more than one exceptionality.) The early childhood field also uses the term children with varying abilities in an effort to acknowledge that everyone varies in their abilities and not only those children who are officially identified with exceptionalities.