CHAPTER ONE

CREATING RESPONSIVE LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS

Four Beliefs

• All individuals are capable of learning.

• The teaching talent to help all students learn according to their potential exists in most
schools today.
• The knowledge gap between what is known about effective teaching and what routinely
is practiced in classrooms is enormous.
• All students need a safe, caring, and positive learning environment.

Students at Riskfor School Failure

• Students with disabilities
• Special education
• Early intervening services

• Students from low socioeconomic backgrounds

• Title 1

• Students from cultural and linguistically diverse backgrounds

CHARACTERISTICS OF STUDENTS AT RISK FOR SCHOOL FAILURE

• Cognitive and metacognitive Deficits
• Low academic achievement
• Poor memory
• Attention problems and hyperactivity
• Poor Social Skills
• Poor self concept
• Poor motivation
• Debilitating mood states
• Adaptive behavior deficits
• Disruptive behavior

INDIVIDUALIZED EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMS (IEP)

Individualized Instruction – Instruction that enables the student to work on appropriate
tasks or content over time under conditions that motivate.
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Students receive daily instruction tailored to their educational needs.

Categories of Disabilitiesthat Qualify for Special Education

• specific learning disabilities
• speech or language impairments
• mental retardation
• emotional disturbance
• multiple disabilities
• hearing impairments
• orthopedic impairments
• other health impairments
• visual impairments
• Autism
• deaf-blindness
• traumatic brain injury
• ADHD—These students receive services under “other health impairments” or Section 504
of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973.
• If I had a student with ADHD or ADD I would help to find them tools to use while doing
their work for example a standing desk or an ADHD seat cushion. They would also be
allowed to take breaks to move around. A set schedule so they know exactly what they
need to be doing and where they need to be.

IDEAIndividuals with Disabilities Education Act

4 Basic Educational Rights
• Non-discriminatory assessment of the parameters of the specific disability, with no
single measure being the only criterion for evaluation.
• Right to FAPE (free, appropriate public education)
• Placement in the “least restrictive environment”
• Provision of supplementary aid and services

INDIVIDUALIZED EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMS

• Must be designed and implemented for each student (age 3 through 21) with a disability.

• Legislative intent is to serve three primary functions:

• Management: Planning tool
• Communication: Multidisciplinary team
• Accountability: Student progress

2004 Reauthorization of IDEAIEP must state the following:

• PLOP (present levels of performance)
• Annual academic and functional goals
• Special education and related services, supplementary aids and services, program
modifications or supports for school personnel
• Extent to which student will not participate with nondisabled children

2004 Reauthorization of IDEA(continued)

• Individual accommodations
• Reasons the child cannot participate in regular assessments
• Projected date for the beginning of services, and frequency, location, and duration of
services
• Postsecondary goals based on transition assessments when the child is 16 years of age
Public Law 99-457
• PL 99-457 provides an individualized family service plan (IFSP) for infants and toddlers
(birth through age 2) with disabilities.

• The IFSP documents the early-intervention services required by these children and their
families.

COMPONENTS OF AN IEP
• Levels of performance
• Curriculum-based measurement

• Annual Goals

• Short term objectives

• Description of services

PARTICIPANTS IN IEP MEETINGS

The law specifies who must participate in IEP meetings:
• A representative of the school who is qualified to provide or supervise special
education (other than child’s teacher) Principal, Sped director, Superintendent
• The student’s teachers (special education and general education)
• One or both parents
• The student, when appropriate
• An individual who can interpret the instructional implications of evaluation results
• Others at the discretion of the parent or school personnel
PARENTAL PARTICIPATIONSpecific Steps:
• Notify parents early enough.
• Schedule meeting at a mutually agreed upon time and place.
• If neither parent can attend, use other methods (phone calls or home visits)
• If a meeting is held without a parent in attendance, document attempts to involve the
parents.
• Provide a copy of the student’s IEP to the parent upon request.

** When appropriate, the student is to participate in the planning of his or her IEP.

COMPUTER GENERATED IEPS

• Create new IEPs
• Monitor procedural safeguards
• Update Records
• Analyze and interpret test data
• Monitor academic progress

EDUCATIONAL SERVICES AND RELATED PRACTICES

Least Restrictive Environment

According to IDEA, the term least restrictive environment (LRE) means that, to the extent
appropriate, students with disabilities should be educated with students without
disabilities.

LREContinuum of Services
3 Major Categories
General Class
Special Class
Special School

U.S. Department of Education (2009)

In 2004-05 school year, the percentages of students with learning disabilities ages 6-21 served
in various educational environments were as follows:

52.1% in general education classrooms for most of the day

35.4% in separate rooms for 21-60% of the day
15.8% in separate classrooms
1 % in separate environments

CONTINUUM OF EDUCATIONAL PLACEMENTS FOR STUDENTS WITH DISABILITIES

LEAST RESTRICTIVE ENVIRONMENT
• The General Education Classroom
• Special materials and consultation
• Itinerant services
• Resource room assistance

• RTI

REINTEGRATION OF STUDENTS
• Evaluate each student’s needs and progress.
• Ensure that instruction is based on scientific research.
• Ensure evidence-based instruction (RTI model)
• Consider social consequences.
• Teach essential social skills.
MOVEMENT FROM MAINSTREAMING TO INCLUSION
• Rationale for Regular Education Initiative (REI)
• Rationale for Inclusion
• Rationale for Continuum of Alterative Placements
• Research
• Perspective on the Movement from Mainstreaming to Inclusion

SUCCESSFUL INCLUSION AND SUCCESSFUL ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT OF STUDENTS WITH

MILD DISABILITIES
• Teachers Teaching Teachers
• Collaboration between general education and special education teachers is
required.
• RTI
• Strategies for increasing consultation time
• Collaborative consultation
• Assistance teams
• Coaching
• Peer collaboration
• Cooperative teaching
• Communication skills for collaboration
SUCCESSFUL INCLUSION AND SUCCESSFUL ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENT(continued)
• The Special Education or At-Risk Teacher
• Collaboration

• Parent Teacher Collaboration

• Establish cooperation
• Develop culturally responsive relationships
• Parent-teacher conferences
• Parents as teachers
Teacher-Parent Collaboration
• Students with learning problems are more successful when parents and teachers
work collaboratively. When parents are involved with their child’s education at
school, the home becomes the supportive foundation that the student needs to
face the daily challenges encountered (Mercer & Pullen, 2009).

INSTRUCTIONAL VARIABLES RELATED TO STUDENT LEARNING

• Focus on time for learning
• Ensure high rates of student success
• Provide positive and supportive learning environments
• Plan and maintain a motivational environment
Dr. Hiam Ginott (Milwaukee Public Schools, 1990, p. 3 reminds teachers of the need to
recreate caring environments:
I have come to the frightening conclusion that,
I am the decisive element in the classroom.
It is my personal approach that creates the climate.
It is my daily mood that makes the weather.
As a teacher I possess tremendous power to make a child’s life miserable or joyous.
I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration.
I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal.
In all situations it is my response that decides whether a crisis will be escalated or de-
escalated,
And a child humanized or de-humanized.