55). Hence, good ideas need to be brought to the fore so special education teachers can help students progress in a society that is too often indifferent to their needs. King-Sears presents and then rebuts two fallacies vis-a-vis that students with disabilities cannot master content that "…at times seems to be swiftly passing them by" (56).
The first fallacy -- students with disabilities can't learn general education curriculum -- can be dismissed because it has been shown through "…group work, monitoring and facilitating group thinking, and recursive opportunities for students" that children with learning disabilities can indeed learn (King-Sears, 56). This is true particularly if those disabled students have access to their peers, access to specially designed instructional content, and access to "assessment" strategies showing them what they have learned (which gives them direct...
The second fallacy is that teachers are legally required to cover the curriculum as quickly as possible and slowing down for disabled students isn't realistic. Rebuttal to this is simple: using a collaborative strategic reading strategy -- small groups getting instruction after the whole class is complete -- allows for slower learners to get caught up.
In
conclusion, in order to strengthen and illuminate their pedagogic impact, special education teachers should seek ideas and programs that bring innovations into the
classroom. Two ideas presented in this paper include: a) a program of intensive parent
training can greatly augment the hands-on help that disabled children receive; and b) teachers need to find ways for children with mild disabilities to participate in general education classrooms to a greater degree than they are at the present time.
Works Cited
Ingersoll, Brooke, and Dvortcsak, Anna. (2006). Including Parent Training in the Early
Childhood Special Education Curriculum for Children With Autism Spectrum Disorders.
Journal of Positive Behavior Interventions, 8(2), 79-87.
King-Sears, Margaret E. (2008). Facts and fallacies: differentiation and the general education curriculum for students with special educational needs. Support for Learning, 23(2), 55-62.
