Browsing by Subject "Special education educators"

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IEP team's knowledge about student characteristics, legislation, AT devices and AT services on considering assistive technology in the IEP development for 3rd to 5th grade students with learning disabilities in reading and writing
(2007-12) Ko, Hui-ching, 1973-; Bryant, Diane Pedrotty
Across grade levels, students with learning disabilities (LD) experience challenges with aspects of their academic learning in terms of reading and writing. In many cases, these challenges can be addressed by utilizing assistive technology (AT) applications as a potential solution. According to the reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act in 2004, AT should be "considered" in the development of the Individualized Education Program (IEP) to meet the requirement of providing a free and appropriate public education (FAPE) and to assist students in accessing the general education curriculum. The law requires IEP teams to consider AT to determine whether AT devices and services are necessary; therefore, IEP team members play an important role for considering AT and how AT should be specified in the IEP (Golden, 1998). The IEP team members include school administrators, teachers, and professionals who are responsible for developing, reviewing, and revising the IEP for students with disabilities. Thus, the IEP team members should have essential knowledge to inform AT decisionmaking (Bowser, 2003). The Technology and Media Division (TAM) of the Council of Exceptional Children (CEC) lists standards and teacher competencies regarding knowledge and skills of AT for practitioners and related professionals to follow. The standards include obtaining knowledge about AT legal foundations, students' characteristics, instructional content, technology applications, and related services for providing technology. In order to know whether IEP team members possess knowledge for considering AT for students with LD, the purpose of this study was to examine IEP team members' knowledge regarding characteristics of students with LD, AT legislation, AT devices, and AT services for considering assistive technology in the IEP development for 3rd grade to 5th grade students who have been identified as having learning disabilities in reading and writing. Participants (N=1050) including school administrators, general education teachers, special education teachers, diagnosticians, and speech/language pathologists from three school districts in a southern state were surveyed. Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) was used to analyze the data. The results showed that participants were somewhat knowledgeable about the characteristics of students with LD, AT legislation, AT devices, and AT services when considering AT in the IEP development. Training in terms of quality and quantity was suggested by researchers to provide IEP team members who are serving students with LD better preparing for considering AT in the IEP team meetings. Future research should focus on conducting a similar study with different IEP team members and with different disability groups rather than just learning disability.
The nature of teacher-student interactions during communication intervention for young children with developmental disabilities including severe/multiple developmental disabilities
(2008-08) Chen, Ying-Shu, 1963-; O'Reilly, Mark F.; García, Shernaz B.
Teachers’ responses as well as the children’s types of disabilities have a great impact on how often and in what ways the children will communicate with the teachers. (Lee, 2001; Wu, 2003). Limited research on teacher-student interactions in special education classroom settings raises a series of questions regarding the teachers’ perspectives, teacher training, children’s communication behaviors and their learning of social communication skills. The purpose of this study was to explore the nature of interactions between teachers and young children with developmental disabilities including severe/multiple developmental disabilities (SMDD) during communication interventions and how both were mutually influenced by such interactions. Specifically, the guiding questions were: (a) How did teachers interact with young children with developmental disabilities during interventions? (b) Why did the teachers choose certain types of responses and strategies/techniques during interventions? and (c) What were the outcomes of the communication interventions for young children with developmental disabilities including SMDD? Using naturalistic inquiry as the research method, and drawing on sociocultural theory, this research constructed a case study of teacher-student interactions during communication intervention in one classroom in south Taiwan. Participants included three special educators and four students with developmental disabilities. Data sources included classroom observations, interviews with teachers, and document analysis. Data were analyzed using the constant-comparative method and discourse analysis. The findings revealed that the three teacher participants made efforts to shape the young children’s learning attitudes and behaviors. Yet, how they responded to the individual child was varied in terms of the young children’s disabilities, their capabilities for communication, and their specific challenging behaviors. The communication interventions resulted in some positive outcomes of the children’s social communication skills. However, the teachers’ lack of knowledge and training of implementing assistive technologies limited their ability to carry out effective communication interventions for the child with SMDD. Further, the teachers’ concerns for the children’s utilization of appropriate social communication manners were influenced greatly by their own their professional training and perspectives which might be influenced by Chinese culture and Confusion’s philosophy. These findings have implications for further research, classroom practice, and teacher education.