Special Education Classrooms Research Articles

The Impact of Co-Teaching Models in Inclusive Special Education Classrooms

Two or more teachers, typically a general education teacher and a special education teacher, co-teach a class so that they can better meet the needs of their students. Collaborative teaching is another name for co-teaching. examines the impact of co-teaching methods in inclusive special education classrooms, with special attention to the pros and cons of using a team-based approach to teaching. perspectives and lessons learned from teachers, researchers, and other special education professionals who have used co-teaching strategies in the classroom. This article reviews the research and scholarly literature on the impact of co-teaching on students with disabilities in inclusive settings.

Editorial – Dr Coral Sirdifield and Charlie Brooker

Teacher self-efficacy (TSE) is a frequently studied construct due to its positive relations with student outcomes. However, TSE of teachers in inclusive early childhood special education (ECSE) classrooms has seldom been studied. To fill this gap, we examined the extent to which (a) teachers exhibited differing levels of TSE for students; (b) children’s characteristics, particularly disability status and learning behaviors, were associated with TSE; and (c) relations between children’s characteristics and TSE remained consistent across an academic year. Thirty-seven teachers of inclusive ECSE classrooms completed surveys to ascertain their student-specific TSE and children’s learning behaviors for 114 children. Results indicated that teachers had different levels of TSE for students in their classrooms. Children’s characteristics, particularly their attention/persistence, were related to TSE, with more relations shown between TSE and children’s characteristics at the start of the school year than at the end. Implications for teacher professional development are discussed.

‘It’s dynamite!’: The role of popular music and the home–school connection in the special music education classroom

When teaching children with disabilities, the home–school music connection can be the key to keeping our students engaged and motivated while increasing students’ self-regulation and positive interactions with peers. This article aims to shed light on classroom experiences with popular music of two third-grade students with sensory processing disorder and on how ‘music sharing turns’ influenced their overall engagement and ability to self-regulate in music classes. Music sharing turns, a weekly music ‘show and tell’, provided opportunities to bring popular music and activities they enjoy at home into the classroom. The results show that the participants were easily engaged and experienced greater self-regulation and awareness of others during music sharing turns. Music sharing turns also provided a predictable environment for peer interaction with opportunities to take on leadership roles within the classroom while remaining open-ended in a way participants could make their own.

Descriptive Inquiry at the Margins

In this autoethnographic article, I describe the ways in which I have used and adapted Descriptive Inquiry and the descriptive processes to further understand and support the needs of marginalized populations across three settings: a bilingual special education classroom in an urban school district, a research study with Spanish-dominant mothers, and a professional learning community in a racially integrated suburban school district. Using each setting, this article will describe the way Descriptive Inquiry and the processes have been adapted for use within (1) multitiered support systems for multiply marginalized learners, (2) research studies to elicit narratives from adult participants, and finally, (3) professional learning communities to unpack and understand teacher and student positionality in cross-racial relationships. Throughout the article, I show these adaptations/modifications were in keeping with Patricia Carini’s and Descriptive Inquiry’s core values and beliefs. The article closes with thoughts on how to honor, sustain, and grow Carini’s work while also attending to issues of injustice and inequity in education.

개별차원의 긍정적 행동지원이 자폐성장애 중학생의 수업방해 행동에 미치는 영향*

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of individualized positive behavioral supports on class disruption behaviors of a middle school student with autism spectrum disorder. The subject was a middle school student with autism spectrum disorder. The multiple probe baseline design across behaviors was used for the research design. The study was carried out in the order of baseline, intervention, maintenance, and generalization. For developing individulized positive behavior, the team of PBS was formed. Based on functional behavior assessment for the subject, multi-factor interventions including intervention of antecedents and setting events, alternative behavior instruction, consequences intervention, and crisis management plan were developed and implemented in special education classroom. The results study were as follows: First, individulized positive behavior was effective in decreasing the class disruption behaviors of the middle school student with autism spectrum disorders. The effects of the intervention were maintained after the completion of the intervention and generalized to language art class. This study suggests that individulized positive behavior can help reduce the class disruption behaviors, maintain the intervention effects, and generalize the effects for middle school students with autism disabilities attending general middle schools.

Teacher Extratextual Talk During Shared Reading with Students with Extensive Support Needs

ABSTRACT This descriptive study examined the extratextual utterances of 10 special education teachers as they engaged in shared reading with groups of their students with extensive support needs (ESN) in special education classrooms. The independent variables were grade band (i.e., elementary, middle, high) and students’ expressive language (i.e., high versus low percentage of students who combine words, signs or symbols to communicate). The dependent variables included teachers’ book-related extratextual utterances and book-related extratextual questions coded in five mutually exclusive categories (i.e., explicit reference, background only, integrated references, integrated background, and print related). Approximately half of teachers’ extratextual utterances were book related, with explicit reference and background only questions composing 84.4% of all book-related questions. Cross-sectional comparisons of grade bands revealed no significant differences in the percentage of book-related, extratextual utterances or questions (p = .188, = .38; p = .099, = .48, respectively). Cross-sectional comparisons of groups with high and low percentages of students who use language expressively revealed no significant differences for book-related, extratextual utterances or questions (p = .202, g = .77; p = .160, g = .89, respectively). The implications for teacher practice in shared reading with students who have ESN are discussed.

The Relationship Between Special Education Placement and High School Outcomes

Propensity score matching was used to create intervention and comparison groups to compare academic outcomes of students with disabilities in the U.S. state of Indiana placed in more inclusive settings with those placed in less inclusive settings. Student and school demographic and outcome data were analyzed from the eighth grade in 2013 through graduation in 2018. Students with disabilities spending 80% more time in inclusive classrooms did better in reading and math than peers spending more time in special education classrooms. The study shows differences in diploma types of students in more inclusive settings than those in less inclusive settings, indicating that students in inclusive settings engage in more rigorous course of study and are more prepared for successful post-secondary educational and employment opportunities.

Emotional Geographies of Exclusion: Whiteness and Ability in Teacher Education Research

Context: Geographies of exclusion (e.g., segregated special education classrooms, school district zoning) are constituted through intersecting oppressive ideologies (e.g., ableism, racism, classism) that co-naturalize notions of “normalcy” and deviance and yield harmful consequences for disabled children of Color. Geographies of exclusion dynamically contribute to and constitute teacher candidates’ feelings about themselves and their social worlds. White teacher candidates’ investment in dominant racial ideologies is well-documented, and recent scholarship has interrogated the role of white emotionality in these processes. However, the extent to which white teacher candidates emotionally ascribe to oppressive constructions of ability have been underexamined. Focus of Study: We sought to uncover how white teacher candidates (TCs) used emotional practices to position themselves in relation to ability within geographies of exclusion as they narrated their educational journeys. Such an examination is necessary to upend ongoing constructions of racial-ability hierarchies in and through teacher education. Using disability critical race theory and emotional geographies, our study was guided by the following question: How do white, nondisabled TCs engage in emotional practices in relation to geographies of exclusion? Research Design: This critical narrative study took place in two teacher education programs in the Pacific Northwest with 42 white, nondisabled teacher candidates. We drew on qualitative mapping as a method for participants to tell stories about themselves and their relationships to places and people over time. All participants generated narratives through written reflections after creating their maps, clarifying aspects of their maps and providing details not captured in their visual representations. Data sources included 42 written narratives and 36 qualitative maps. We analyzed emotional dimensions of TCs’ written narratives and qualitative maps through multiple rounds of both deductive and inductive coding. Conclusions/Recommendations: Our analysis revealed ways white TCs weaponized emotionality to uphold racial-ability hierarchies through emotional geographies of gratitude, ambivalence, and claims to care. By sentimentalizing multiply-marginalized children’s suffering, TCs preserved a façade of being committed to educational justice. We conclude with suggestions for educational researchers, emphasizing that research with white teachers cannot ignore emotional practices that perpetuate harm for multiply-marginalized children. Instead, researchers must surface these engagements head-on, using DisCrit as a driver in teacher education research toward intersectional justice.

The Inclusion of Children on the Autism Spectrum in the Design of Learning Technologies: A Small-Scale Exploration of Adults’ Perspectives

This research explores the inclusion of children on the autism spectrum in the design of educational technology from the perspectives of adult co-designers. A group of five non-verbal children with a diagnosis of autism participated in a series of four design workshops over the course of 6 weeks. Using a participatory design approach, a small team of three teachers and two technology developers worked alongside the children to design a language development and literacy app for use in a special education classroom. The outcome of this process was a stand-alone education app that comprised many of the contributions made by children during the workshops. The inclusion of children with autism in technology design ensures the end-product reflects their education needs and requirements. Using a qualitative approach, this small-scale study sought to examine the participation of children with autism through the various stages of the design process from the perspectives of their teachers and technology designers. Data were collected through individual interviews and a focus group with teachers and technology designers. Three major themes emerged from thematic analysis: (1) valuing contribution; (2) the challenge of listening; and (3) ownership in outcome. Emerging subthemes highlight challenges described by teachers and designers in facilitating and maintaining meaningful participation in design activities and their efforts to address these. Findings emphasise the value of participation while questioning participatory practices for specific phases of design. The study explores the challenges of equalising power between adults and children with autism in participatory design projects. It uncovers tension between the desire to ensure the authentic participation of children with autism where communication and engagement is significantly compromised by the complexity of their disability. The small number of participants and the modest scope of this design project limit the generalisability of the findings. However, it points to the value of recognising children’s contributions and the importance of striving to incorporate these in the final design artefact.

Pilot study of an intervention based on an intelligent tutoring system (ITS) for instructing mathematical skills of students with ASD and/or ID

Few technology-based interventions have addressed mathematical and numeracy skills of individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). However, children and adolescents with ASD may experience difficulties in mathematical learning, and even be behind their peers at school. Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) is an innovative way for enhancing teaching programs through learning optimization algorithms coping interindividual differences in the educational curriculum progress. They have been used with success with typically-developed students for levering on the linkage learning-motivation, but remains at a theoretical stage for students with ASD and/or intellectual disability (ID). We conducted a pilot study to assess an ITS-based intervention embedded into the KidLearn application for instructing mathematical skills (i.e., adding and subtracting numbers between 0 and 100). Twenty-four secondary school students with ASD and/or intellectual disability, enrolled from special education classrooms, have been recruited: 14 students received the KidLearn intervention, while the 10 others received control intervention. Pre-post assessments showed that calculation and motivational measures were significantly improved in KidLearn condition compared to the control condition. ITS intervention appeared relevant for calculation learning in the setting of special education.

Enseñanza de funciones comunicativas orientadas a la interacción social en un caso de síndrome de Rett

Background and aimsChoice making and requesting have traditionally been the focus of Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) intervention in Rett syndrome (RS). However, scant literature exists about some other communication functions teaching. The aim of this study is to teach the social interaction function of communication using AAC symbols. Materials and methodsA multiple baseline study was carried out to investigate to what extent a girl with Rett syndrome aged 11 would learn to communicate for social interaction making compliments, asking for favours, and protesting assertively selecting AAC symbols using an eye-gaze system. The intervention consisted of the creation of opportunities for learning these communication functions and the application of prompts. Baseline, intervention, and maintenance were all implemented within a special education classroom in a public school, with different people and different materials, from the very onset, to promote generalization. ResultsAfter intervention, the participant displayed the ability to make compliments («How pretty you are!»; «How nice you are!» and «I like your costume jewellery!»), to ask for favours («Let me see Dora the explorer»; «May I borrow your toy?»; «I would like to rest»), and to protest assertively («I don’t fancy it»; «Later the better» and «I’d rather do it later») without any prompting, learning generalization outside the learning contexts and sustained learning over time. ConclusionsIt is concluded that this communication intervention had the potential to improve social communication and assist in the development of social relationships between the participant and her peers, teachers, and therapists.

과제 순서 선택과 시각적 활동 스케줄이 지적장애 수반 ADHD 장애학생의 과제 수행 행동에 미치는 영향

This study examined effects of providing choices in sequencing tasks and using a visual activity schedule in a six-graders with ADHD and intellectual disabilities. The study was conducted in a special education classroom of a general elementary school. Prior to an intervention, the participant completed a training for pre-requisite skills which were required in using a visual activity schedule. During intervention phase, he was provided with choices in sequencing tasks and the sequence was displayed in an activity schedule. After the participant completed making the visual activity schedule, he was required to follow the schedule. Data were collected during Korean literacy classes and math classes and a multiple baseline across settings design. was used. The results of the study showed that intervals when the participant showed task performance behavior were increased and the change of the behavior maintained in two weeks. The change was generalized in his general education classes.

Using Disability Studies in Education (DSE) for Effective Literacy Instruction

The Disability Studies in Education (DSE) framework can support teachers as they develop inclusive lessons integrating diverse instructional texts. It promotes the concept that all learners can read, comprehend, and discuss complex texts and it can expand opportunities for students with disabilities to participate in the same learning contexts as their nondisabled peers. The purpose of this manuscript is to provide teachers with background on the theory of DSE and offer practical strategies for integrating the principles of DSE into literacy instruction. The authors use a vignette to describe one way to experience integrating DSE in a high school English Language Arts special education classroom.

A Study of the Challenges in Teaching English as a Foreign Language to the Students with Visual Impairment

The aim of the present study was to investigate the challenges that English as a foreign language teachers face in teaching the English language to students with visual impairment. The data was collected through questionnaires from English language special education teachers who were teaching English at the secondary level. The research took place in Lahore, Pakistan, in special education classrooms. The target population of the study is English language teachers who are teaching visually impaired students in Lahore, Punjab. While the sample of the study was comprised of secondary level teachers of visually impaired students in Lahore. The findings of the study revealed that teachers were facing a number of problems in teaching visually impaired students, such as behavioral issues, less attention span, lack of motivation, lack of teaching materials, less family-supportive environment to do homework tasks etc.

Using Alexa to Differentiate Instruction in the Special Education Classroom

Access to technologies and understanding the potential uses of technology to differentiate instruction have been a concern for the teachers and students in a local school district located in the southeastern United States. Despite the emergence of digital voice assistants (DVAs) as tools for instructions, teachers lack knowledge and strategies for using DVAs to differentiate instruction in their classrooms. The purpose of this basic qualitative study was to identify teacher knowledge and strategies employed among special education (SPED) teachers using DVAs to differentiate instruction in their classrooms. The concepts of Carol Tomlinson’s differentiation theory and Mishra and Koehler’s TPACK framework served as the foundation of this study. The research questions examined middle school SPED teachers’ perceptions of challenges using DVAs to differentiate instruction, resources, and strategies available to these teachers and their perceived knowledge of using DVAs to differentiate instruction. In this basic qualitative study, data were collected from 6 SPED teachers using semistructured interviews. The findings suggest that teachers had little to no perceived challenges when using DVAs to differentiate instructions. However, the overutilization of DVAs might rob students of their ability to think independently. This study offers several prospects for future research related to the topic and findings. Further research is needed at the elementary and high school levels that may include core content teachers.

Using Alexa to Differentiate Instruction in the Special Education Classroom

Using Alexa to Differentiate Instruction in the Special Education Classroom

Culturally Responsive Pedagogy in Special Education Classrooms: An Exploration of Elementary and Secondary Special Education Teachers’ Instructional Practices

Culturally Responsive Pedagogy in Special Education Classrooms: An Exploration of Elementary and Secondary Special Education Teachers’ Instructional Practices

Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Classroom Practices: A Home Remedy for the Classroom

As a teacher in the biggest public school system in the United States, I found myself struggling to incorporate culturally responsive and sustaining education (CR-SE) into my special education classroom practice. I was curious about how other special education teachers in the same city who had similar students were tailoring their lessons to include CR-SE. Were they also struggling to create effective lessons that students could engage in? Or was I the only one feeling alone and unsupported when it came to creating a CR-SE environment? I created a study whose participants were all graduates of the New York City Teaching Fellows certification program. I focused on finding answers to three main questions: How are other teachers applying CR-SE in their special education classrooms? Has it been effective? What evidence do they have to support their results? I found three common trends showing that teachers continue to need support when it comes to implementing culturally relevant pedagogy in the classroom: time, expectations, and accountability. Feeling this was not enough to help me, I continued to search for more answers. I eventually concluded that, in order for students to achieve their full academic potential, teachers first need to learn and practice how to construct and maintain empathy and inquiry in their classroom. These two ingredients together serve as the perfect "home remedy" to create a strong foundation for a CR-SE classroom for any beginner, intermediate, or veteran teacher.

The Perception of Special Education Teachers towards the Involvement of Audiologist in Special Education Classroom

Audiologist plays vital roles work in supporting the individual with deaf and hearing impairment. In the school setting, an audiologist is one of the members involved in planning interventions for children. This research was conducted to study the perception of the special education teachers on the involvement of audiologists in special education schools. In this research, quantitative data which is a questionnaire is used as the research instrument. The data obtained were analyzed using Microsoft Excel XLstat. A total of 165 teachers are included in this research through snow-balling sampling. Results have shown that 149 (90.8%) of the teachers agreed that the role of audiologists is vital to improving the special education quality in Malaysia. In general, the teachers have a high viewpoint of the common function of the audiologists but a very worrying understanding of their specific role. It is proven when special education teachers are unsure about whether audiologists only work in hospitals (56 teachers (33.9%)), involved in balance problems (65 teachers (39.4%)) and vestibular problems (88 teachers (53.3%)). The research has shown that having an audiologist helps to reduce the impact of hearing loss for the deaf students when 152 (83.8%) special education teachers agreed that the involvement of audiologists in the education system benefits many teachers and students thus prepares a better and more conducive environment for them.

A Positive Version of the Good Behavior Game in a Self-Contained Classroom for EBD: Effects on Individual Student Behavior

A within-participant withdrawal design was used to examine the effects of a positive version of the Good Behavior Game (GBG) for three students in an elementary special education classroom for students with emotional or behavioral disorders (EBD). Results indicated immediate improvements in disruptive behavior and academic engagement for all three students when the GBG was implemented which was generally replicated in the second intervention phase for academic engagement. Tau- U effect sizes ranged from .76 to .95 indicating large and very large effects for both behaviors for two students and academic engagement for the third student, but Tau- U for the third student’s disruptive behavior was .32 (considered not effective). Two students exhibited slight decreasing trends in academic engagement behavior and increasing trends in disruptive behavior near the end of intervention phases. A preliminary within-session analysis also suggested students’ behavior was generally better in intervention phases both during and not during the GBG when compared with their baseline levels of behavior. Social validity information suggested generally positive teacher and student perceptions about the GBG initially, with less positive student perceptions 10 weeks following the conclusion of the study. The teacher reported implementing the GBG 5 times over the 10 weeks following the conclusion of the study.