13.1 Appendix b: deciding for yourself about the research  (Page 6/20)

References

Bohn, A. (2003). Familiar voices: Using Ebonics communication techniques in the primary classroom. Urban Education, 38 (6), 688-707.

Martinez-Roldan, C.&Malave, G. (2004). Language ideologies mediating literacy and identity in bilingual contexts. Journal of early childhood literacy, 4 (2), 155-180.

Students with special educational needs: how well does inclusion occur in high schools?

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act applies to all levels of schooling, from kindergarten through twelfth grade, and one of its revisions (Public Law 101-336, 104 Stat. 327, 1990) further addressed the needs of secondary schools by including provisions for school-to-work transitions for students with disabilities. Yet progress at including such students has generally been more rapid and complete in elementary schools—especially at the youngest grade levels—than in secondary schools. The reasons for the difference do not necessarily have to do high school teachers’ attitudes about disabilities as compared to elementary teachers’ attitudes. Much of it stems from differences in how the two levels of schooling are structured, with secondary schools being much larger and organized by a complex timetable of classes that tends to sort students—and even teachers themselves!—by academic background (Kelly, 2004; Oakes, 2005). One effect of this organization is to make it harder for special education and general education teachers to collaborate, and therefore to integrate learning experiences for students with disabilities into high school as a whole.

Yet some teachers and schools manage to collaborate anyway. A research study by Joseph Stowitschek and his colleagues explored the factors that account for comparative success at including students with disabilities in secondary school (Stowitschek, Lovitt,&Rodriguez, 2001). The researchers were interested, first, in how much teachers actually do collaborate to design and carry out programs for youth with disabilities, and second, in what specific circumstances or practices were associated with collaborating successfully. They chose three contrasting high schools to study in detail: a large urban public high school, a rural public high school in a small town, and a private urban high school. For each school they collected information from a wide range of staff—special education teachers, general education teachers, administrators, parents, and students with disabilities themselves. The information came from surveys, interviews, reviews of official school documents, and observations of classrooms.

What did they find? Among other things, they found that special education teachers at all of the schools strongly supported inclusion of students with disabilities to the fullest possible extent; they did not, that is, seek to strengthen or increase the schools’ reliance on segregated special education classes. They also found significant interest and support from parents of the students with disabilities in the educational programs of their children. These factors suggested that change toward fuller inclusion may continue in the years ahead.