Teaching Self-Protection to Students With Disabilities

Abstract

The United States has made many advances in establishing a culture of acceptance and inclusivity for individuals with disabilities. Through best practices in K-12 education, students with disabilities are becoming more independent and empowered, however, there are many potential risks students with disabilities face, especially in the area of sexual assault or abuse. Individuals with disabilities are three times as likely to be a victim of serious violent crimes than any other population in the United States. To protect these individuals and to help them protect themselves, a potential strategy is to implement a self-protection unit in their physical education. A self-protection unit will teach students four areas of knowledge: awareness, prevention, escape, and recovery. The purpose of this paper is to educate physical education teachers on the incidence of sexual assault and abuse of individuals with disabilities and how they can implement and teach self-protection skills to students with disabilities in physical education.