posted
I was recently asked by my administration to perform what would seem like an innocuous task. I was supposed to help my House (team of four core subject matter teachers and a special ed inclusion teacher) to create a list of "at risk" students, along with measures we have taken as a House to intervene and help them out individuallly. Moreover, we were supposed to focus specifically on African American males.
The thing that troubled me, though, was the preamble for this request. It started along the lines of "Due to the high number of African American males in our special ed program, we want you to..."
It made me stop and think. What the school was asking us was what measures we had taken to help students *short of referring them for testing*. Essentially, they didn't want these students tested or placed into special education - they wanted us to address their problems through interventions that didn't involve the Child Study Team (CST - basically, the special ed department).
Is this really what we want to be doing?
All of the African American male special ed students in our House need all the help they can get, because of cognitive and perceptual disabilities. Some of our African American students are struggling desperately to succeed, but are obviously having difficulty beyond simple lack of understanding.
Is it not our *responsibility* to see if these students have a learning disability, rather than try to "get them through" without getting help? Instead the administration seems determined to stall special education testing in our building and address such problems *without* having students tested for actual, tangible learning problems.
(breath)
Education isn't doing so hot, right now. Test scores are going down (used only as an indicator, not as a goal) and our students are having trouble performing in many areas. On top of this, education is becoming less rigid and structured, and more progressive. Problem solving is more and more important, as is group interaction, teamwork, and classroom dynamic.
In my classes, these changes are losing some students. Specifically, there are several students who show many obvious signs of ADD/ADHD, but have not ever been tested. There are others who seem to have perceptual problems, spatial relationship problems, speech impediments, etc, etc. In more fluid environments, these students are having a harder time finding their niche - or even following the course of the lesson.
Is it not in our greater interest to test these children at an early age for cognitive and perceptual difficulty? Many students, if diagnosed early, can make adjustments to their home and school life so that they can succeed despite their setbacks. However, many special ed kids are lost in the mix, or perform in the midrange until middle or high schools, when they suddently take a sharp downturn.
Quite frankly, diagnosing a child at 13 or 14 is doing that child a disservice. Why couldn't we have caught this at 7, and headed off the difficulties six years sooner? Why did that student have to suffer those six years and "get by", rather than being given ways of adjusting to their learning issues (or medication) that could help them thrive?
My point: I think all students should be tested for special ed in grades 1 through 4. Every one. Test them for ADD/ADHD, aspergers, LD, NSLD, ED, dyslexia, perceptual motor problems, the works. Work up a full diagnostic on the student, and then consult with the parent.
Most students will come through this without any problems, and parents might even gain insight into their child's learning processes. For instance, that their child learns very quickly when things are visual, but not as quickly when things are just spoken. Non-special ed students would benefit, too.
But, more importantly, the ADHD student, who before was seen as "unfocused" or "disruptive" or "lazy" would be identified. The parents could pursue any number of treatments, but the child wouldn't struggle until it got so bad that they were simply not keeping up at all.
Now, we test for eyesight, hearing, scoliosis, MS, head lice, etc. And, when eyesight is found lacking, students can get glasses. When their hearing is low, they can get hearing aids. Etc, and soforth. Why not then test for all the various special education classifications, and then find ways to adress them?
Granted, this would require *loads* of money for special ed services in the lower grades... but maybe, just maybe, they won't be forced into basement rooms with minimal funding and manpower.
I know this is long, but what do you all think about this? I know there are some educators out there, and I'd like to hear your opinions.
Posts: 75 | Registered: Mar 2003
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The only thought I can offer is that your wish is kind of "pie in the sky": you acknowledge that it would cost scads of money, but you say it would be worth it. Administrators can't deal with hypothetical worth, but with the actual money that they have. And it's a sad fact (AFAIC) that education of children is not a priority in this country.
I mean, in a similar vein, I think we should have DRASTICALLY smaller class sizes. I mean, we keep talking about twenty-five like it's an impossible dream, and I think if we REALLY were serious, maybe we'd be looking at 10. Pie in the sky, of course, but that's my point.
Posts: 1112 | Registered: Jan 2003
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posted
See, now, our district has some funds, and some things aren't pie in the sky.
For instance, my average class size is, don't kill me, 15 students. I have all the technology I could want, and our school has things like a full music program, theater program, television studio with TVs in every room for morning announcements, etc.
But, special ed testing is discouraged and stalled to the point of stopping. Last April, we recommended a girl who was (and still is)obviously limited and failing most of her classes. It took until February for her testing to be finished (with more failed classes), and when we met with the parents, the CST said the student was "average" about 35 times.
Only later did we find out that she was "average" only among *other classified students who took those tests*. So, among all the special ed students in the building, she was smack in the middle.
Unfortunately, the parent came away with the idea that her child was average and could do the work, though she had some small perceptual problems. The CST even said that an 84 IQ was average to low average... when a 79 is cognitive impairment, iirc.
They don't *want* more special ed students. They want less - and they've waged a campaign of declassification lately, even. The administration is stigmatizing these students more than anyone else, when they should be offering every measure of help within their means to discover and address these students problems.
But, to the core point, where's the money going to come from. Well, I say take it from standardized testing (hey, look up there at that pie sailing past that cloud!)... since that is the most counterproductive and expensive thing we're doing with education.
Though I don't see any money coming for the programs they're already mandating... not that I particularly *want* them funded, mind you. It's just that, as you said, education is not a priority. Ignorance is breeding ignorance.
(I've switched "put off my Landmark" nicks for a while, to give Procrastination less overexposure )
posted
Education SHOULD be a higher priority. In an ideal world funds would be funneled out of useless things that don't work and into things that do. It can't hurt to push your ideas out there. Talk to people in your schools and in other schools. Maybe petition. Talk to parents as well, and suggest testing in a gentle way that does not make them say, "There is nothing wrong with my child!" They SHOULD screen these kids at an early age. Like this one boy I tutored. Could not read a single word. screening for the problem at an early age avoids negative set patterns and is better for the child and cheaper for the system in the long run.
Posts: 9942 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
New Jersey schools, eh StallingCow/Procrastination? I'm jealous.
I'm with you, except for worrying about where the money comes from. Taxpayers probably wouldn't support it. Also, another thing I'd worry about is an increase in ADHD misdiagnosis/false positive diagnoses. It seems America tries to throw medication at problems too often.
Posts: 1592 | Registered: Jan 2001
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posted
Get parents to demand that their kids be tested. Look for pro bono educational advocates. When they come knocking, and all of a sudden, things start to get done.
Posts: 10890 | Registered: May 2003
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posted
Yes, denial is a powerful thing. Gazillions of parents would be knocking down the school system's door saying we DON'T WANT our children to be tested because we *know* little Johnny is perfectly normal.
For a personal example, I fit probably 85% of all the Asperger's criteria out there. And you only have to have a few of the characteristics to be actually diagnosed. I asked my mother "Do you realize that I probably have Asperger's?" Her answer was "You are perfectly normal and people just don't know how to raise their children these days!"
To her credit, she instinctively (well not entirely instinctively she does have a Master's degree in education) used every single technique that the experts reccommend to help Asperger's children adapt to "normal" life as adults. But she reacts violently to acknowledging that I have distinctly different thought patterns than most of the rest of the world that might have a "label".
Because when I used to work in a school setting (as an aide) it was apparent that district received MORE federal funding for special ed needs than for regular students. So I thought there was more of a push to have more student identified, because it meant an increase in funding for those students.
However, on the opposite side, there is a huge need for teachers of special ed programs. Our district last year had like 22 special ed openings, but only like 5 applications submitted. There just aren't enough teachers trained in special ed to fill the need.
The only reason I can think of that they would discourage it is that once a student is identified and an education plan for that student is in place, the district MUST fulfill that education plan and make accomodations for that student. If there aren't enough staff members on board in order to keep up with demand, then they would be in serious trouble for violating the IEP.
quote:Yes, denial is a powerful thing. Gazillions of parents would be knocking down the school system's door saying we DON'T WANT our children to be tested because we *know* little Johnny is perfectly normal.
Just a word in defense of denial - depending on the way in which a particular district or group of teachers deals with a label, parents' fears about negative consequences of labeling outweighing the positives can be well-founded. A lot depends on context.
I hope this thread is still active tomorrow. I'm pretty much offline for the rest of the day. I gotta go see a movie and probably end up leafleting it with some other people tonight.
quote:For a personal example, I fit probably 85% of all the Asperger's criteria out there. And you only have to have a few of the characteristics to be actually diagnosed. I asked my mother "Do you realize that I probably have Asperger's?" Her answer was "You are perfectly normal and people just don't know how to raise their children these days!"
AJ, I'm looking forward to meeting you more than ever. A lot of my best friendships have been with Aspergery people, including a family that "adopted" me while I was a graduate student in Syracuse. The father and son are both (as they like to say) "asparaguses."
I'm not sure exactly how the reasoning at your district goes, but I'd bet there're some clauses related to percents of students in different categories doing badly, or somesuch.
One possibly strategy, for instance, would be to get as many kids as possible labeled not disabled in the beginning, then have as many kids as possible labeled disabled. Suddenly the scores for the 'normal' kids would rocket up, and the overall scores on the test would increase as well, since about 1% of the disabled students would be able to take a different test. Showing a high improvement rate would result in more federal funding.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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In this case with my mother though. I'm an adult. The only thing to lose for her is ego. I mean Asperger's or not, I have survived and am coping with life reasonably well. (Though I think sometimes she underestimates the difficulty.) I have a productive job that does suit me perfectly, and am basically supporting myself and contributing to society.
So there isn't really any "negative" connotation in this specific case to me having Asperger's or not, since I'm clearly functioning well. To me, as an adult, it was more about learning about a set of brain patterns which I have and finding out more about them.
When I look at the description of the Asperger's child and compare it to my childhood it is eerie. It was down to the fact that the only real sport Asperger's children tend to be succesful at is swimming, because of the way the water buffers jerky coordination. But knowing why those things happened helps. Knowing that while some things can be improved through practice, some things I can just expect to struggle a little more than most other people helps me from getting frustrated. Since I can't possibly do extensive practice to improve every single coordination skill I need, it makes me much less critical of myself when I see that other people can do something so easily that is hard for me to do.
I'm sure some of it is just general klutziness, but my friends who have been around me for years, know that it is generally a bit more extreme than clutziness. For example, two nights ago, Steve was working out doing some floor exercises. He got a crink in his hip. As I walked over to him to help him work out the crink, I managed to step on the second toe (and only the second toe) of his other foot, and dislocated it, leaving him rolling on the ground in twice the pain he was in before. I felt horrible! Obviously I had no intent to dislocate his toe! Yet somehow after nearly 5 years of being around him I still don't posess the spacial awareness to realize that my foot was anywhere in the vicinity of his toe. (Lack of spacial coordination with relation to your own body is extremely characteristic Asperger's even if you can mentally visualize 3 to N dimensions easily.) It wasn't like he moved his foot under mine as I stepped either. We managed to get it popped back in, and he's taped it and been hobbling around for the last two days.
I do feel bad about it. But I do things like this ALL THE TIME. I realized that while I do my best I can't beat myself up every timeover these things, that are actually normal patterns for asperger's but beyond my conscious brain control, or I would live my life afraid to move. Sometimes I do wonder why Steve bothers staying with me, since he is the hapless victim of my klutziness as often as I am myself. On the other hand I'm glad he decides to stick around.
<grin> While he doesn't have the coordination problems I do, he actually scores higher on the Asperger's self test than I do, much to the surprise of close friends, since he's considered the "normal" one in the relationship.
posted
Looking over the requirements, it appears that anyone who would qualify for not taking the standard test is going to fall under anyone's special education needed definition -- under 60 IQ.
So the overall test scores wouldn't change appreciably due to numbers of students, however it would still apply that suddenly the 'normal' students scores would skyrocket, and also as more special education students again received assistance as special education students instead of being stuck in with normal students, their scores would probably improve, increasing the overall test average.
Plus, Having a high percentage of your special education students not taking the standard test, and later on having a much lower percentage of your special education students not taking the standard test would probably look really good on the report.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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posted
Parents with labels are funny. My mom is kind of proud of my brother's AS now but when he was 11 or so and really struggling with the school system, she just yanked him out and moved most of the family to another state because she was afraid repurcussions from the school system. I guess that's the trouble with parents, is a lot of them have similar traits to what is getting the child in trouble. At least with the behavioral syndromes.
It's also why the Spec Ed teaching positions are so hard to fill. My sister in law went into it having a fair idea what to expect from her students, but the parents drove her crazy. So she left elementary, working with severe cases, and is doing high school now. I think it's such a tragedy, but I know my Mom is just the sort that could have had that same kind of interaction with a teacher.
Posts: 383 | Registered: Nov 2003
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posted
Like I said before, I really think denial would be a serious obstacle...I mean, my parents consider it some sort of shameful thing that I go to _therapy_. I can only imagine what would happen if they had a child who needed a special ed program.
Posts: 9057 | Registered: Nov 2000
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Our district did not make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) in the area of special education english and math scores. What this means is that our students didn't *improve* enough. Not that they didn't pass, or that not enough of them passed... but that there was not a significant percent *increase* in their scores from last year.
But expecting special ed scores to *increase* from year to year is ridiculous.
If, in 6th grade, 20 students are in special education, and in 7th grade 10 more are added, what happens to the scores in 7th grade? These students were likely added because they were failing their classes, or having extreme difficulty. Put them in a testing bracket with students who have been making progress for years already, and scores go down.
And, with No Child Left Behind (NCLB), scores aren't allowed to go down. Ever. If they do too often, your school has to pay to have students bussed to other districts.
With this in mind, it's couterproductive to the success of your school to classify students. Those coming into the school have had a couple of years adjusting to new learning styles or with handling their disability... students classified *during* middle school will always bring the average score for that year down. The most students you classify, the more that score goes down.
If those students are left in the general population, their low scores are balanced by the greater numbers and greater average scores of the rest of the school.
It's a numbers game, and that's a travesty. No one cares if these students learn... just that they don't reflect badly on the school.
In essence, though, NCLB hampers the ability to teach. With such focus on numbers and test-taking, the idea of "helping" students goes out the window. A school needs to focus on achieving AYP, otherwise their funds will go to sending students elsewhere - likely many of the brighter students, again lowering the AYP and creating a downward spiral.
Posts: 106 | Registered: Apr 2004
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That's a major obstacle. We have children that are failing every subject, badly. They need help. More time on tests, more individualized attention, and a curriculum more suited to their learning needs. Yet, when we bring this up with parents, they balk.
Responses vary, but denial is inherent. She's lazy. He's just not motivated. You're not inspiring her. He's just going through a phase. She's just very social. You give too much work. You are too demanding. You give too much homework. You don't give enough time on tests. Etc, etc...
Rarely does a parent say "my son is having difficulties, what can I do to help him?"
Those that do are angels sent from on high. A girl in our school was diagnosed as dyslexic, with some additional perceptional difficulties. Her mother noticed that she was having trouble reading - and even though she was passing first grade (barely), her mother requested that she be tested, and subsequently retained.
Now, she's a year older than the other students in the house, but she's one of the most focused and determined students. She knows where she has difficulty and has developed several years worth of strategies to compensate. She no longer has any need for the resource room and she doesn't need a special ed inclusion teacher to help her. Essentially, she's special ed in name only at this point.
She's a success story, and it's because her mother noticed a problem and addressed it - rather than making up excuses.
Contrarily, another student was failing every class badly (20-30% range), and was clearly having difficulty grasping and retaining even basic concepts. The parents adamantly refused to agree to having her tested, or even to having the school social worker speak with her. "There's nothing wrong with her. Your House is just too strict and gives too much work." She has subsequently transferred to a new House in the building, and has continued to fail. The parents still refuse to sign an agreement to have her tested.
Parents often think that their student being identified and classified as special ed means their genes are bad somehow, and that their child's lack reflects badly on themselves. It's an ego thing.
Unfortunately, not enough parents can see through this to notice their child's difficulties and get them the help they need.
Posts: 106 | Registered: Apr 2004
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posted
I talked to a woman the other day who is having trouble with her son's school. Apparently he is in 5th grade in a private school and has been getting all As this year, and As and Bs the past 2 years. His mom noticed he couldn't write his thank-you letters for Christmas without a LOT of help and she demanded he be tested. Apparently his reading/spelling is at second-grade level and he appears to be dyslexic. They are now recommending he switch to another school for full-time special education.
Furthermore, it appears that his last 3 teachers have been hiding this from them. They have been giving him different assignments from the rest of the class. He has never done a book report, for example. The other 5th graders do one every six weeks. The teacher has actually reassured her this year that he was doing just fine.
I just don't understand this. $3000 tuition a year for FIVE YEARS and they haven't provided him with any of the help he needs.
Posts: 1990 | Registered: Feb 2001
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posted
Wow, I'd be highly ticked off. Although, I wonder why it took so long for her to notice? Was she not seeing assignments that were sent home? Even if the teacher said nothing, I think I'd know there was a problem before then. If the teacher was sending home easier assignments, I'd be asking why.
Posts: 14428 | Registered: Aug 2001
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posted
Last year he had a reading tutor, and they thought that fixed the problem. I think she just didn't know what sort of homework fifth graders are supposed to have. Plus, she didn't really WANT to know how behind he was. I don't understand why she wasn't picking up on it earlier this year, tho. She's a nurse, too.
Posts: 1990 | Registered: Feb 2001
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posted
The problem with the desire to avoid labelling kids definitely sounds like an attempt to play numbers with the NCLB legislation. The worst part of all is that this numbers-playing is counterproductive to the original intent behind NCLB, and on top of the changes to the original plan placing more difficulties on actually getting the much-needed funding, as well as the great deal of teachers in fields like history and English and phys-ed who are non-degreed or undercertified, the whole plan is becoming more harmful than even those who opposed it from the start claimed it would be.
As far as the children go, I would have to partially agree with those who say that it's less that there are more children with problems now, which is what it's beginning to look like on paper, and more that most kids are not learning to develop critical skills at a young age, when such habits would stay with them for the rest of their scholarly career and forward. There is only so much a school or a teacher can do, yet more and more of the responsibility to instill these skills is put to the schools and teachers, while the allowances of what they can and cannot do are being limited. Even just positive reinforcement techniques are being hamstrung. Pop-culture and mass-media are easy targets for blame, but kids are generally garbage-in/garbage-out by nature, with the biggest influences being their immediate surroundings, not something on television or movies. It may sound cheap or pad to place heavier blame on poorer parenting styles of late, but the more litageous nature of communities combined with a daycare attitude regarding primary school really contributes heavily to the lack of responsible problem-solving skills being passed to many kids today. You can't tell people this, however, because it's perceived as insulting, which means someone stands a chance of a lawsuit for saying so. School seems more a mix of double-standard and nnumbers game than it does teaching kids to survive in the world any more.
Posts: 346 | Registered: Jan 2003
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$3K a year for tuition isn't that much for private school. It's exactly what we pay, and our school is only that inexpensive because they own their own building and only pay the superintendant, his assistant, the teachers and one janitor. All teacher's assistants, the librarian and her assistants, recess duties, lunch servers, etc are volunteers. Primarily parents. Part of the "tuition" is a required 30 hours of service to the school (most parents do a lot more than that), 5 of which must be used for recess duty. In return, the school pays for all books and materials, though we pay for the usual school supplies. Considering that the public school's cost about $3K per student per month (figure from memory so it could be a bit off), I figure our school is extremely thrifty.
Considering how involved we HAVE to be to keep the tuition down to $3K/yr, I can't imagine how they could hide the boy's learning difficulities.
It's tough not to fall into denial. The thing is though that some stuff that's being called a learning disability is just something the kid will have to live with, and in the grand scheme of things really isn't that important. My son would receive special services if we had kept him in public school. I'm glad we moved him out, because although our private school does offer an after school program for special needs (additional tuition for that program), so far he hasn't needed it. He's doing fine. The main thing that helped him was that in moving to the new school, we decided to have him repeat the 4th grade. Testing qualified him for the 5th, just barely. But he fits in better with the 4th grade class maturity wise, and he's doing very well academically (when he chooses to do his homework, which this late in the year is getting a bit sketchy). It was the right choice. I wonder if he really needed to spend all those hours in special education classes after all, as it didn't appear to make much of a difference. I think he just needed to stay back one more year.
Retention is such a hot button for some people, and I wouldn't say that it should be a sweeping first choice -- it only worked for us because we changed schools. And I wouldn't recommend it unless you could do that. It would be too embarrassing for the child otherwise. But I think that in some cases, it is a better solution than receiving special services, pulling them out of their mainstream class and taking time away from regular studies.
Personally, I don't think that American Education can be saved without the dedication of concerned parents. Parental support is the key to a child's education success, and without that, the schools are only going to be able to do a substandard job.
Posts: 5948 | Registered: Jun 2001
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posted
See, daycare and parental litigiousness are not the problems in my community. Single parents who work three jobs and never see their kids are one problem (which can't really be solved). Parents who don't see education as important because *they* got by just fine are as big of a problem. And, beyond this, neighborhood cultures that don't value education at all don't give students any desire to think about school outside of the classroom.
On the whole, the parents who have the money for daycare and litigation are the *good* parents who tend to place value on education and who motivate their children. Students coming from those environments deal more with entitlement issues than motivation, basic skills understanding, or caring about the subject.
In all honesty, I'd rather a litigious parent that is involved with the student's education and aware of the expectations and environment of the school than an apathetic one that takes no interest in their child's education whatsoever.
But, you are right in that more and more is being expected of teachers, with less and less freedom to meet those expectations.
Posts: 106 | Registered: Apr 2004
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posted
You say that the daycare mentality is not a problem, then go on to explain how parents are not involved with their kids' education. If the parents are being uninvolved or not caring, then that is the daycare mentality.
Posts: 346 | Registered: Jan 2003
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posted
Hm.. it's not a *healthy* mentality, but it's certainly preferable to those I listed.
It seems that socioeconomic status counts for a lot, in and of itself. Students with educated parents, often college-educated, who have successful jobs that allow them to live in some level of comfort - well, those students tend to succeed academically.
Now, a genetic argument could be made by those nature over nurture types, but I'm not going in that direction. Students who see their parents as educated and successful will have a tendency toward the same.
Parents who can afford daycare and lawyers also tend to be those parents who get upset when their children don't perform to a certain level. Now, they may blame everyone in the world but themselves for their child's lack, but that's still better than accepting F's and D's without a second thought.
That's why I brought up entitlement. Those parents (and students) have a feeling that they are *entitled* to success, and that it is the responsibility of the teacher to make sure the child succeeds.
But, even so, parents who are litigious tend to be more aware. They call the school, arrange meetings, and get on the principal's case. They are the ones who *get* their kids tested for ADD, ADHD, and the like, because they *want* the legal benefits of those programs. They want the extra help other kids don't get; they want the extra time on tests. They want the best money can buy for their children - even if their quality time at home is lacking.
While these parents are a pain in the butt, for sure, and don't exactly do anything to *help* education as a whole, I'd prefer them to the alternative.
The lawyer/nanny crowd is an entirely different animal than the latchkey/school-isn't-important crowd.
Now, I would *love* for all parents to be caring, involved, repsonsible people, but I know that's unrealistic and totally out of the school district's control.
What *could* be controlled, which is my point in this thread, is the means of identifying problems. As it stands now, without explicit written consent on the part of the parent, the Child Studty Team can't even test a child. That's ludicrous. (especially when it comes to that second group of parents)
The thrust of my argument is that we should test *all* students and take the identification out of hte parents' hands. The school would then *let them know* what the tests found. An IEP would be developed for accomodating the child's needs in the classroom, and subsequent action could be left in the parents' hands (i.e. counseling, behavior modification, medication, etc).
If nothing else, the teachers and parents would know about any problems. If the parents disagreed with the results, they could request more testing as a second opinion, but if nothing else, the teacher would be aware of the child's difficulties and could address them accordingly.
Posts: 106 | Registered: Apr 2004
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posted
I did want to address anothing thing you said, though:
quote:it's less that there are more children with problems now, which is what it's beginning to look like on paper, and more that most kids are not learning to develop critical skills at a young age
Whether there are more children with problems now or not, I don't know. It is certainly possible. There are certainly more people with glasses now than there were two hundred years ago - partially because of the ease of correcting the problem. We've been correcting emotional problems with medication for a great number of years now, and I'd imagine second and third generations have come down from people who would not normally have had a stable enough life to have children (without medication).
But I digress.
I think we are more aware these days of when a child is failing, and that there must be some *reason* for this to be happening. There have always been stories of the "class clown" or the students who were "bad eggs" or those who just couldn't keep up. Did the class clowns of the 50's have undiagnosed ADHD? Did the "bad eggs" have bipolar disorder, or were they emotionally disturbed? Did the slow students have dyslexia, or cognitive impairment, or perceptual motor problems?
We've discovered that there are actual medical and psychological things going on in children's heads, and we are more and more aware of their occurence. More are being identified now because we know better what to look for.
Ideally, those children who slipped through the cracks in the past (when standardized test scores, passing rates, and the like were not nationally scrutinized), can now be given the tools they need to succeed.
Posts: 106 | Registered: Apr 2004
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quote: But, even so, parents who are litigious tend to be more aware. They call the school, arrange meetings, and get on the principal's case. They are the ones who *get* their kids tested for ADD, ADHD, and the like, because they *want* the legal benefits of those programs. They want the extra help other kids don't get; they want the extra time on tests. They want the best money can buy for their children - even if their quality time at home is lacking.
I'd like to qualify that statement, SC. Only SOME parents are aware of their legal rights because they love their kids.
My mom's a teacher's aide who works with Severely Emotionally Disturbed (SED) kids. They and their parents are very aware of their legal rights because that's what allows them to bilk the government out of all the money they can get. It's not about little Johnny doing well in school. It's about mom and dad getting a check every month cause little Johnny's crazy.
I volunteered there one summer. Those kids aren't crazy. They're ignored. They're so starved for love they misbehave because it's the only time mom and dad can sober up long enough to pay attention to them. I think some of these kids only see their parents sober at court.
I would say it's more our definition of special ed that needs some work. And our expectations. What good does it do to say to anyone, "It's ok for you to throw a temper tantrum when you don't get your way. You can't help it." In the real world, these kids get arrested and go to jail because their parents and the school system have never made them grow up. And they don't want to.
Like with most things, the problem is seperating the people who want to do better from the people who have chosen to be losers. We can and should help the people who want to succeed. The rest, we can't help because they're not willing to put in the effort to do better.
While special ed can save the children who want more for themselves, I don't believe it can save America.
Emotionally Disturbed and Severely Emotionally Disturbed kids scare me, actually. For the most part, they come from home environments that are abyssmal (we have one who was born while his mother was on crack, and who was taken away from her a few years ago because of her habit).
I've seen ED kids with very loving families who are essentially good kids, they just sometimes having trouble understanding appropriate from inappropriate. Then I've seen those ED kids like the one you mentioned who are totally out of control, violent and will likely be in jail within five years of leaving school - if not sooner.
A revamp of special education is TOTALLY necessary. Especially if this dream of universal testing were to become reality.
Individualized Education Plans (IEPs) can be good or bad. I've seen positive and negative accomodations that need to be made, depending on the student.
The good: - Student should sit close to the board - Student must ask the teacher to sign a behavior sheet at the end of each period - Student will have a resource period at the end of the day with a special education teacher. - Student should be allowed to have a second book to keep at home.
The bad: - Ignore inappropriate behavior as best possible. - Notes from another student should be photocopied so the spec. ed. student has them - Spelling, grammar and punctuation errors should be ignored. - Student should be allowed to retake any test on which they receive less than 70%.
The problem is there are few hard and fast rules about special ed, and those that exist change almost on a weekly basis. Beyond this, general education teachers have little training in how to deal with special education students or in how to deal with inclusion teachers within the classroom.
So, my laundry wishlist grows:
- Mandatory testing of all students in the early grades - An overhaul of the special education system to make it more structured, and to limit excessive accomodations - Training of teachers in how to deal with accomodations - Some way to fund all of this.
Hey, maybe lotto could be tied directly to the schools? That'd sure bring in some extra cash.
Posts: 106 | Registered: Apr 2004
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I'm with you, SC. Funding of our schools is definately part of the problem. The schools back home in Citrus County, FL were great because we didn't have a lot of people, but between the power plant, two hospitals, and a pile of doctors and lawyers to take care of the retirees, we had a huge tax base.
Other parts of Florida have to come up with wacky schedules to try to cram more kids into a school than it was ever designed to hold. It's not very fair that other kids didn't have enough textbooks to go around while I took field trips to museums every year and made a stained glass window.
But it's the folks with the money who influence the lawmakers. They'll never allow anyone to equally share property taxes across the state. So we'll have to find extra money to help kids in poorer areas. And how many lawmakers are going to work very hard to find money to actually do something useful for the poor?
It's like that bit in Bulworth where he goes to the black church. They asked him something about why the Democrats hadn't done more to help their neighborhood. And Bulworth responds, "Well, you didn't contribute any money to my campaign."
Posts: 2283 | Registered: Dec 2003
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Some states do exactly that -- tie gambling to school funding, which, I'm sorry, but I find disgusting. Our state tried to tie cigarette taxes to school funding, which was just awful. Encourage the bad habits of others so your kid can get a decent education? Yuck.
Posts: 5948 | Registered: Jun 2001
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Hm... maybe we can put a spread on all the high school sports competitions, too.
I didn't realize what I had meant as a joke actually happened in some places.
Seriously, though, there needs to be a better way to fund schools. Having the general public vote on school budgets is a joke, since none of them have any idea what they're really voting for. Those that vote yes just think they're "helping education" and those that vote no are concerned with rising taxes.
But what is *in* the budget? No one could really tell you.
I mean, just cutting down on all the useless paper handouts would be huge - I can't imagine all the paper we waste in our school, when it could all be put on a closed network computer program, or somesuch.
Posts: 106 | Registered: Apr 2004
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You may be right, SC. Most of the cases I've seen, not being a part of the education system, have been more a product of environment than a real medical condition. Maybe the problem now, with the numerous ways to address issues with children, lies in adequately identifying it instead of passing the buck. I can agree with that, since it means more involvment to a better means for the end for kids in school.
Posts: 346 | Registered: Jan 2003
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I just don't think that funding is the biggest problem that public schools face. I think that having large, unwieldy, ineffective bureaucracies running the districts is a bigger problem. There are many, many districts that have plenty of money and plenty of low-performing students because funds are so misspent. The classic example of this is the NYC public school system, although Mayor Bloomberg is following in Mayor Guiliani's footsteps and working to correct that particular problem.
I currently live in a relatively well-to-do suburb of Richmond. The school district is so wealthy that they purchased iBooks for every middle and high school student. There is currently a plan to supply 5th graders with iBooks for next year, which will probably be defeated as the iBook experiment is an abyssmal failure (as I predicted it would be 2 years ago). Despite all this money, we have many, many students performing below grade level. Most of my 4th and 5th graders don't know their multiplication tables and cannot add two digit numbers in their heads. These are 3rd grade skills! What really bothers me is that most of these kids are on the Honor Roll at their schools. I just do not understand how that can be.
As to special ed, we need better monitoring, testing, and programming, no doubt. However, we also need less blanket concessions for some of those students. I had one of our first graders inform me that, "I don't have to pay attention because I have ADHD." He is not the only one with that kind of attitude.
Oddly, we have plenty of special ed teachers in the mid-Atlantic region. When I was doing teacher recruiting for my old company, I had special ed teachers coming out of my ears and almost no math teachers.
Posts: 3037 | Registered: Jan 2002
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AJ, if you have Asperger's, you must handle it extremely well. I'm always surprised to hear about people with that disorder who can (for instance) function in a romantic relationship. My sister has a general social learning disability that includes some features of Asperger's, and I have a hard time even imagining her with a guy. She has such a unique view of human interactions. In some ways she's very much like a 12-year-old, although she's a college freshman this year.
It's interesting, actually, to consider how there is really a spectrum between cases of disability like hers and personalities which fall within normal parameters. Heredity has some strange effects. I have a lot of the features that she does in very minor form -- I can be pretty bad at picking up on social cues, like when people gesture for me to be pay attention to something. I can also be quite single-minded and withdrawn.
Posts: 4600 | Registered: Mar 2000
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quote:"I don't have to pay attention because I have ADHD." He is not the only one with that kind of attitude.
I hate that attitude. And a lot of the time, it comes from the parent.
We have one parent who currently is asking for the world, rather than working with her son so that he can succeed. (the student really needs a paraprofessional aid with him all day, and needs to be pulled out into a separate classroom with a smaller class size). He is ED and ADHD, with some other problems thrown in.
But she wantsa lot. Namely: A separate student to take notes for him. The ability to take tests over two days. The ability to retake tests the day following the answers being reviewed, for a higher score. The ability to take tests at home. The ability for the parent to adjust homework assignments. Etc.
It's ridiculous.
ADD and ADHD are things that students can overcome with the right training, medication or behavior modification (depending on the case). They are *not* things that are excuses for poor behavior, or for not working at all. It's like saying "He can't take notes because he can't see the board"... well, the answer to that is getting glasses, isn't it?
That's where Special Education departments really need to step in and toe the line. They can't cave to parents and give out ridiculous accommodations, and they must get involved with the parents and get them to make the right decisions.
Special Education problems are not an excuse. They're an obstacle. Students must learn ways over, under or around them - not just stop moving altogether.
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SC, what that mother is doing is worse than what you're running into. She's setting him up to expect that the world bends to his will in all things, and to expect that that's the way it should be. She's making him unemployable, a divorce magnet, incapable of thinking for himself and solving his own problems. To me, it's a *crime* that the school system even entertains her demands. Because most of the real world doesn't work like that. I know they have to, the way things are set up, but I still think it's a crime.
SC, the thing about saving money just by cutting down on paper handouts is a drop in the bucket. Textbooks do not have to be as expensive as they are...and from what I've seen, they're terrible anyway. Why not buy cheaper, black and white printed textbooks for the lower grades, than spend hundreds per book on 4 color books so glutted with graphics and extaneous information you can't even figure out what that page is trying to tell you? Seriously...I taught my son from the homeschool math curriculum put out by Saxon. Plain black and white...with manipulatives and workbooks, teacher's manual and grading schedule, the whole package for a year was a little over $200. That was an entire math program for several children. It was dead easy to teach from and in three months turned my son from being bottom of the class to start off the next year at the top of the class, skills wise. Fully invested in his new math abilities, I wanted to make sure that the public school's book wasn't going to confuse him, so I borrowed their text book. It was so glutted with color and stupid "world facts" that had NOTHING to do with math, it was hard to tell what the lesson was for that page.
It's not a matter of the schools not having enough money -- I am seeing first hand how a well run school with limited funds can perform -- it's a matter of that money going to the right places to do the most good.
Posts: 5948 | Registered: Jun 2001
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Yes. Money is not the answer. Efficient use of money is part of the answer, though.
Newark city schools are a black hole of funding, and they think throwing more money down that hole will help. It won't.
Now, our textbooks, quite frankly, suck. Not only are they convoluted and teach things that will never be used again past the 7th grade (line plots and stem and leaf plots, rather than bar graphs and pie graphs), but they also have incorrect answers in the back of the book at times, or problems that aren't on the right level for that chapter.
It's aggravating. Plus, the language in the textbooks, and the setup, makes it very difficult for students to extract information, as you said.
The whole idea of "teacher on special assignment" is a farce, too. We have two of those - teachers who were pulled from the classroon, but who can't be fired because of tenure. One goes around setting up slide projection presentations for speakers, and the other sits in the high school running attendance sheets through a machine. And these two are getting salaries in the $60k range, at least, and full benefits.
We could hire four new teachers if we get rid of those two pieces of deadwood.
Posts: 106 | Registered: Apr 2004
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"But expecting special ed scores to *increase* from year to year is ridiculous."
hear hear! We are in the same boat, FC(SC, P).
Someone figured out that we did not make AYP based on TWELVE students. Now, the suprintendent has focused all extra energy, throughout the system, on math, math, math. The other thing that makes NO SENSE is that there is a strange idea that putting the special ed. kids in with the regular teachers will make their scores improve. What they are implying is that special ed. teachers are not doing well with these kids because they are not regular ed. teachers. Huh?
I bet if I handed the MCAS(Mass.) 6th grade math test to 100 randomly picked adults, a whole bunch would fail. It is hard for the students with no learning challenges. Imagine what it is like for a dysgraphic child. There is no amount of "inclusion" that will help that. they need specialized teaching, which is why they are "special" education students.
My beef is not with inclusion, but with the fact that so many administrators think it means putting kids in with everyone else. It doesn;t. If you, as a math teacher, have a special ed student, a teacher should be coming in and doing the modifications for you. They should know your curriculum, be assigned to you and a few other teachers, and make an outline FOR the kids. To ask the classroom teachers to do all this is crazy, but that is how inclusion is being interpreted, especially when there is no funding for more staff.
Posts: 10890 | Registered: May 2003
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I disagree that parents resist having their kids tested. Many have been tested and were on ed. plans in elementary school, but the file was dropped down, and the yearly meetings never happened.
Also, things change in a huge way between elementary school and middle school. For some kids, switching classes is enough of a death knell to knock themn out of the loop, especially kids with ADD/ADHD. They go from one teacher they know well, to four or five teachers who don't have time to really get to know them in the same way. Also, there is often very poor communication between elementary and middle schools.
Posts: 10890 | Registered: May 2003
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quote: To ask the classroom teachers to do all this is crazy, but that is how inclusion is being interpreted, especially when there is no funding for more staff.
I agree, and that's what my school is trying to do as well: make the regular teachers create (and teach) two lession plans, one for their regular students and one for their special ed students.
I'm not a teacher so I don't know what is really going on, but as a student I don't like what I see. We have a lot of special education kids, but we also have this (horrible) thing called "integrated classrooms" which means that the special ed students get taken out of class by their "helper" if the work is too hard for them and get different tests but the gifted kids are held back to the level of the class average... which includes the special ed students. We don't have nearly enough aids to teach seperate special ed classes although we do have "academic support" classes available to anyone who wants to take it and it's basically a study hall with one or two aides there to help anyone who wants it.
However, the main problem is, and I think someone has said this before, that the kids don't care about school at all. They've been taught all their lives that school isn't important and that they'll never get into college even if they did apply so they shouldn't bother.
Posts: 3420 | Registered: Jun 2002
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You know, I made a thread about "differentiated instruction" waay back in the day, but it seems to have been purged from the archive already.
Dang it.
I've got plenty of issues with what you just described, Dragon. Heterogeneous grouping is of the devil, I swear. Posts: 106 | Registered: Apr 2004
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SC, If it helps, you can use my excuse that being on the Internet is a PREwriting activity. A warm-up, if you will.
Posts: 10890 | Registered: May 2003
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We don't have nearly enough aids to teach seperate special ed classes although we do have "academic support" classes available to anyone who wants to take it and it's basically a study hall with one or two aides there to help anyone who wants it. ![[Grumble]](graemlins/grumble.gif)
