Including Students with Special Needs: 1

Accommodations

are changes in how the student learns key curriculum. For example, a student may be assigned fewer math problems because he takes longer than other students to complete each one.

Mainstreaming

involves placing students with disabilities in general education settings only when they can meet traditional academic expectations with minimal assistance or when those expectations are not relevant.

Physical Integration

placing students in the same classroom as non-disabeled peers should be a strong priority, and the removing them from that setting should be done when absolutely necessary.

Asperger Syndrome

usually considered a type of autism, is receiving increased attention among professionals. Individuals with this disorder usually experience difficulty in social interactions and communication, and they often have a very narrow range of interests.

Americans with Disabilities Act Amendments

(ADAA) in 2008, is the most significant disability legislations ever passed. It protects all individuals with disabilities from discrimination, and it requires most employers to make reasonable accommodations for them. This also protects you from discrimination when you look for a teaching position.

Adequate Personnel

Because inclusive schooling relies so heavily on the strong collaborative relationships among educators, staffing often is a critical issue. First, in many locales the overall size of the classes has increased because of the budget constraints. This leads to teachers having less time to spend with any individual student, including those with disabilities.

Hearing Impairments

Disabilities that concern inability or limited ability to receive auditory signals are called __________ _________. When students are hard of hearing, they have a significant hearing loss but are able to capitalize on residual hearing by using hearing aids ad other amplifying systems.

Visual Impairments

Disabilities that concern the inability or limited ability to receive information visually are called ___________ _________. Some students have partial sight and can learn successfully using magnification devices and other adaptive materials; students who are blind do not use vision as a means of leaning and instead rely primarily on touch and hearing.

The First Federal Special Education Legislation Public Law 94-142

In 1994 congress passed PL94-142, the Education for All Handicapped Children Act (EHCA), thereby setting federal guidelines for special education and laying the foundation on which current special education practice rests.

Americans with Disabilities Act

In July 1990, President George H. W. Bush signed into law that Americans With Disabilities Act ADA. This civil rights law was based on the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, but it further extended the rights of individuals with disabilities.

Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 (ESEA)

Most recently reauthorized in 2002 and sometimes referred to as the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLBA) it is the law that has the goal of ensuring that all students, including those who live in poverty, have equal access to a high quality education. Although the law directly addresses only schools whose students live in poverty, it generally mandates higher academic standards and increased accountability for all students including those with disabilities.

Instructional Integration

Most students should be taught in the same curriculum used for students without disabilities and helped to succeed by adjusting how teaching and learning are designed and measured. For some students with significant intellectual disabilities, instructional integration means anchoring instruction in the standard general curriculum but appropriately adjusting expectations.

Students At Risk

Often the general term ___ _______ reverts to students whose characteristics, environment, or experiences make them more likely than others to fail in school. Students whose primary language is not English (ELL) sometimes are considered ___ ________, and they may need assistance in school learning. Other students in this category would be students who are slow learners (below average in progress) but do not have a disability. They are not eligible for special education. Homeless students are also _____ ______.

Social Integration

Relationships should be nurtured between students with disabilities and their classmates and peers as well as adults.

Revisions and Refinements to Special Education Legislation

Since 1975, PL 94-142 has been reauthorized several times. As each reconsideration of the law has occurred, its core principles have been upheld. At these same time, the law has been extended and its provisions clarified. For example, in 1990 the name of the law was changed to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) to reflect more contemporary person-first language. In addition, the term handicapped was substituted and removed from the law and was replaced with disability.

Other health Impairments

Some students have a disease or disorder so significant that it affects their ability to learn in school. The category of disability addressing their needs is called other health impairments.

Students Protected by Sections 504

Some students not eligible to receive special education services are entitled to protection through section 504 and receive specialized assistance because of their functional disabilities, as described previously. Many students with learning disabilities or emotional disturbance also have ADHD. ADHD students are most likely in this category.

Deaf-Blindess

Students who have both significant vision and hearing loss sometimes are eligible for services as deaf-blind. These students have extraordinarily unique learning needs, particularly in the domain of communication, and because of the highly specialized services they require.

Orthopedic Impairments

Students with ___________ ____________ have physical conditions that seriously impair their ability to move about or complete motor activities. Students who have cerebral palsy are included in this group, as are those with other diseases that affect the skeleton or muscles. Students with physical limitations resulting from accidents also may be orthopedically impaired. Students with orthopedic impairments are difficult to describe as a group because their strengths and needs vary tremendously.

Supplementary aids and services

Students with disabilities are entitled to this. This means they must receive as needed supports such as preferential seating, access to computer technology, and instructional adjustments. No cost to parents.

Traumatic Brain Injury

Students with this have a wide range of characteristics and special needs, including limited strength or alertness, developmental delays, short-term memory problems, hearing or vision losses that may depend on the specific injuries they experienced, and their needs often change over time.

Learning Disabilities (LD)

Students with this have dysfunction in processing information typically found in language-based activities. They have average or above-average intelligence, but they often encounter significant problems learning how to read, write, and compute. Sometimes these students seem to be unmotivated or lazy when in fact they are trying to the best of their ability.

Mental Retardation

Students with this have significant limitations in intellectual ability and adaptive behaviors. They learn at a slower pace than do other students, and they may reach a point at which their learning levels off. Most individuals with this disability can lead independent or semi-independent lives as adults and can hold appropriate jobs. This can also be called an intellectual disability.

Multiple Disabilities

The category used when students have two or more disabilities is called ___________ ___________. Students in this group often have an intellectual disability as well as a physical disability, but this category also may be used to describe any student with two or more disability types.

Scheduling

The limited number of educators leads directly to problems in scheduling the inclusive programs and services needed by students with disabilities.

Current Special Education Legislation

The most recent reauthorization of the IDEA, signed into law in 2004 and sometimes called the Individuals wit Disabilities Education Improvement Act, mandated yet further refinements in special education. For example, this legislation streamlined some procedures and paperwork, and it also specified that all students with disabilities must participate in all assessment conducted by local school districts with needed supports provided. The law also established that special education teachers must be highly qualified if they teach core academic contact to students with disabilities.

Time for Shared Planning

The success of inclusive practices ultimately relies on the extent to which general and special education teachers can collaborate to design instructional strategies.

Autism

These students usually lack appropriate social responsiveness from a very early age. They generally avoid physical contact and they may not make eye contact. They may need highly routinized behavior. Some of these students have above average intelligence.

Emotional Disturbance

When a student has significant difficulty in the social-emotional domain-serious enough to interfere with the students learning---__________ ____________, also sometimes called an emotional and behavior disorderEBD exists. Students with this disability may have difficulty with interpersonal relationships and may respond inappropriately in emotional situations. That is, they may have extraordinary trouble making and keeping friends; they may get extremely angry when peers tease or play jokes on them; and they may repeatedly and significantly show little or inappropriate emotion when it is expected, such as when a family pet dies.

Speech or Language Impairments

When a students has extraordinary difficulties communicating with others for reasons other than maturation, a ______________ impairment is involved. Students with this diability have many trouble with articulation, or the production of speech sounds. They may omit words or mispronounce common words when they speak. Fluency also comes into play.

Section 504

__________ ______ of the Vocational Rehabilitation Act of 1973 is a civil rights law that prevents discrimination against all individuals with disabilities in programs that receive federal funds, as do all public schools. For children of school age this ensures equal opportunitiy for participation in the full range of school activities.

Least Restrictive Environment (LRE)

a provision in the federal law that has governed special education for nearly four decades. The LRE provision guarantees a students right to be educated in the setting most like that for peers without disabilities in which the student can be successful with appropriate supports provided.

Low incidence disabilities

are those that are less common and include all other categories: moderate to severe intellectual disabilities, multiple disabilities, hearing impairments, orthopedic impairments, other health impairments, visual impairments, deaf-blindess, autism, traumatic brain injury, and developmental delays.

High-incidince disabilities

are those that are most common, including learning disabilities, speech, or language impairments, mild intellectual disabilities, and emotional disturbance. Account for 80% of disabilities

cross categorical approach

characteristics of students with disabilities are discussed in more detail in Chapters 6&7, where more attention is paid to students learning needs than to their labels.

Brown v. Board of Education

decision in 1954, the US supreme court ruled that it was unlawful under the Fourteenth Amendment to discriminate arbitrarily against any group of people.

RTI Response to Intervention

is a new and alternative way for students to be identified as having a learning disability. Rather than relying just on test scores, this permits states to decide to base that decision on whether or not increasingly intensive interventions implemented to address the students academic problems have a positive impact on learning.

inclusive practice

is founded on the belief or philosophy that students with disabilities should be fully integrated into their school learning communities, usually in general education classrooms, and that their instruction should be based on their abilities, not their disabilities. Inclusive practices have three dimensions.

Developmental Delays

is somewhat different than other disabilities recognized as IDEA. It is an option that states may use for children 3-9. This category includes youngsters who have significant delays in physical, cognitive, communication, social-emotional, or adaptive development, but it is applied instead of one of the more specific disability categories.

Special Education

is the specially designed instruction provided by the school district or other local education agency that meets the unique needs of students identified as disabled according to federal and state eligibility criteria.

Modifications

refer to what the student learns and usually implies that some curriculum is removed. For example, a student with a significant intellectual disability may not learn all the vocabulary in a science unit, focusing instead on words that he is likely to encounter in day-to-day life.

Students who are gifted or talented

students who demonstrate ability far above average in one or several areas, including overall intellectual ability, leadership, specific academic subjects, creativity, athletics, and the visual or performing arts-are considered ________ or ______.

Related Services

students with disabilities also may receive _________ _______, that is assistance required to enable students to benefit from special education. Examples, speech/language therapy, transportation, to and from school in a specialized van or school bus, and physical therapy. No cost to parents.