This practicum report presents a plan to reduce referrals for psychological evaluations in the schools in Dade County, Florida. Three goals of the plan are identified: (1) to reduce the backlog of referrals in three elementary schools; (2) to improve the placement rate of those students who are referred; and (3) to help teachers identify children…

The formation of a consortium of three elementary schools was proposed and initiated to offer inservice teacher education experiences to 45 staff members. The consortium schools shared resources to increase the scope and quality of staff development activities. A staff development program was designed to meet both group (institutional) and…

The purpose of this practicum was to develop an on-site training program for latchkey family day care home providers. Practicum objectives were to (1) develop a pilot project involving three family day care homes in Pinellas County, Florida; (2) assist caregivers in meeting the annual training requirements; (3) design and implement, on-site, a…

A 20-minute-long videotape program, intended for regular classroom teachers involved in mainstreaming, was developed and implemented to meet in-service needs of elementary school teachers in Cherry Hill, a township in Camden County, New Jersey. Included in the videotape program were an explanation of Public Law 94-142; an overview of the decision…

This practicum developed a program to improve the mainstreaming of secondary level students with learning disabilities through provision of: (1) inservice training workshops on the topic of collaborative consultation for regular and exceptional (special) educators, and (2) study skills seminars for the students. In addition to the inservice…

Information is provided on a practicum that addressed the lack of access to computer-aided instruction by elementary level students with learning disabilities, due to lack of diverse software, limited funding, and insufficient teacher training. The strategies to improve the amount of access time included: increasing the number of computer programs…

This paper describes the development and implementation of a sequential musical program, designed to be taught by non-musical classroom teachers in kindergarten through grade six. Chapter I provides a general background of the political influences which brought about the low status of music at Melaleuca Elementary School and other elementary…

In order to create a computer-literate elementary school, this practicum aimed (1) to provide information about computer-assisted instruction (CAI) to all kindergarten through grade 5 teachers while developing a prototypical classroom in grade 2; (2) to increase community awareness of CAI; and (3) to encourage quality networking among educators…

This paper describes a practicum designed to increase the stress management skills of 10 special educators working in a juvenile detention center. Teachers at the juvenile detention center were taking an inordinate amount of sick leave and engaging in behaviors that were counter-productive to their delivery of educational services to detained…

This report describes a practicum designed to improve physical education services for six elementary students (ages 5-9) with disabilities. The project used several strategies to improve physical education services, including: (1) inclusion of the children with disabilities in regular physical education classes; (2) inservice training for the…

This practicum sought to provide elementary school teachers with the skills and knowledge needed to teach students residing in foster care. The three specific goals of the practicum were: (1) to have all 30 of the teacher participants use teaching strategies appropriate to the education of foster care children; (2) to have at least 25 of the 30…

A program implemented in a school district in central New Jersey was designed to: (1) create at least four magnet school options for elementary school children; (2) reduce the suspension rate at the elementary level; (3) reduce the student referral rate for special education; (4) decrease the number of students requiring basic skills services; and…

The practicum report describes a program which established an Early Childhood Special Education Resource Center to serve the parents and teachers of deaf and hearing-impaired preschool children attending an integrated laboratory school associated with the University of Puerto Rico. Program goals included promoting parent-teacher interaction to…

This practicum involved the design and implementation of inservice training sessions for educators, to reduce the incidence of limited English proficient (LEP) pupils being inappropriately referred for possible special education placement. The inservice sessions covered the difference between a linguistic diversity and a handicap, prereferral…

This practicum report describes the development and implementation of a middle school program in King and Queen County in Virginia's Middle Peninsula designed to improve the achievement of sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-grade students whose achievement scores were consistently lower than national and state averages. A literature review and…