The purpose of this manuscript is to identify social narrative strategies that can be used to enhance the social skills of young children identified with autism spectrum disorder. We provide a description as well as scenarios describing how educators might consider using social narrative strategies. We conclude with resources to attain additional…

Providing both a theoretical framework and practical strategies, this resource will help teachers, counselors, and related service providers develop understanding and empathy to improve outcomes for culturally and linguistically diverse (CLD) students with disabilities. The text features narrative portraits of six immigrant families and their…

Pupils with Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND) have the greatest need for excellent teaching and are entitled to provision that supports achievement at, and enjoyment of, school. The attainment gap between pupils with SEND and their peers is twice as big as the gap between pupils eligible for free school meals and their peers.…

Dealing with the behavioral problems of students is one of many dimensions of most educators' and schools' requirements. While research has repeatedly shown that a large number of children with behavior problems have underlying, unrecognized language difficulties, few schools have implemented programs where children with problem behavior are…

When the author adopted her son, she was an early childhood educator with a Master's Degree who had taught young children for eight years and directed a child care and infant-toddler center for seven. She thought she knew something about children. Actually, she had a great deal to learn. It took years for her to learn about his needs. He slowly…

The onset of selective mutism (SM) is usually between the ages of three and five years, when the children first go to preschool. However, these children are most commonly referred for treatment between the ages of six and 11, when they are entering the elementary school system. Early detection and early intervention is suggested for effective SM…

Why do some students go above and beyond what is asked of them while others do just enough to get by? This "Focus On" debunks common underachievement myths (such as "some students aren't capable of learning" or "underachievers are lazy") and looks at ways to create a motivating classroom by providing teachers with effective strategies for engaging…

Early care and education providers often are the first to notice children's developmental differences because their extensive knowledge about and experience with typical development is a baseline frame for recognizing differences. Educators of young children are aware that the earlier children with developmental delays, such as those caused by…

To assist states and local districts with planning for RTI, the National Center on Response to Intervention (NCRTI) has developed this information brief, "Essential Components of RTI--A Closer Look at Response to Intervention." This brief provides a definition of RTI, reviews essential RTI components, and responds to frequently asked…

"Intellectual disability" is a term used when a person has certain limitations in mental functioning and in skills such as communicating, taking care of him or herself, and social skills. These limitations will cause a child to learn and develop more slowly than a typical child. Following a brief story about a child with an intellectual…

Three times a year, all students at one elementary school are universally screened using Curriculum-Based Measurements (CBM). This process allows school-based reading intervention and data teams to determine how students are responding to core reading instruction and which students would benefit from additional instructional support. This type of…

To assist Wisconsin education leaders with planning for Response to Intervention (RtI), the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI), in partnership with Wisconsin education stakeholders, has developed this informational brief. This brief is intended to provide guidance for implementation of RtI and should not be read as administrative…

Some young children show signs that they may not be learning in an expected manner, even during the prekindergarten (PreK) years. These children may exhibit learning challenges in areas such as developing language, counting objects, hearing differences in letter sounds, paying attention during story time, or learning how to write. Teachers,…

In this article, the authors share five practical teaching activities for introducing disability into the secondary English curriculum that also address NCTE/IRA objectives for the English language arts. They have used these lessons to help students better analyze the language/rhetoric of disability, understand how disability is represented in…

As teachers, administrators, and members of intervention teams use student performance data to inform instructional decisions and monitor implementation of tiered instruction in a Response to Intervention (RTI) model, assuring fidelity of implementation or treatment integrity continues to be a challenge. This article describes how one school…