2000 in Review: A Synthesis of the Special Education Technology Literature

Abstract

Scholars and practitioners alike are challenged by the pace of change and the challenge of staying apprised of current developments in their discipline. Despite the ease of accessing the World Wide Web and its ever-increasing supply of information, the professional journal continues to serve an important gatekeeping function that validates and manages a discipline's emerging knowledge base. The purpose of this study was to examine the extant knowledge base that contributes to recent additions to special education technology knowledge. Research synthesis methods were used to examine two questions: How widely scattered is the literature on special education technology? What have we learned lately? The table of contents from each issue of 31 journals in special education technology, special education, and educational technology published in 2000 were studied. The procedures yielded a corpus of 906 articles of which 197 articles (22%) were judged relevant for this review by contributing to the emerging knowledge base on special education technology research and practice. Analysis of the literature scatter revealed relevant literature could be found in 29 journals but that a core set of four journals contributed 55% of the relevant articles. Content analysis of the relevant articles revealed several recurrent themes in the literature: (a) augmentative and alternative communication (AAC), (b) accessibility (c) assistive technology, (d) implementation issues, (e) Internet applications and web resources, (f) preservice teacher education, and (g) technology integration. The value and limitations of this synthesis methodology are noted along with the implications of this work for future research.