These four issues discuss issues in the education of children with disabilities. The Spring 1992 issues focuses on developing transition systems. Articles include: "Vocational Rehabilitation, Rehabilitation Counseling, and Transition: Service Delivery and Professional Issues" (Edna M. Szymanski et al.); "Personnel Preparation To…

A public school in Brooklyn, New York, has developed a system in which handicapped children are integrated into the life of the school. Special education classes are paired with nonhandicapped classes. They share a variety of activities, including presenting assembly programs or plays, going on joint field trips, and sharing appropriate physical…

Literature published between 2000 and 2003 at the intersection between online learning and disability can be classified into didactic, descriptive, research, and opinion pieces. In this article, two research pieces surveying the literature are reviewed. The resounding theme throughout the literature is that improving accessibility of online…

This article explains principles of cooperative teaching using the analogy of a "team effort" to include special needs students within the general education classroom. Columns contrast "what it isn't" and "what it is" for the following aspects of cooperative teaching: (1) establishing the ground rules (e.g., it's not…

This article compares two educational approaches, intensive-explicit instruction and constructivist instruction, considering how both can affect instruction for students with disabilities. It concludes by urging the integration of these two approaches, possibly by using models focused on the transformation of explicit knowledge into tacit…

Teaching adolescents with disabilities about acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) requires selecting an effective curriculum, building coalitions with parents and others, sending clear messages abut how the human immunodeficiency virus is transmitted, and being able to talk openly about these sensitive issues. An organizational resource list…

Reviewed are the 17 studies most widely quoted in support of the value of total communication and as evidence of the ineffectiveness of the oral approach for use with deaf students. (Author)

Two California programs (one elementary and one secondary) which demonstrate specified promising practices in the area of bilingual special education are described. Programs exemplify such practices as parent involvement, interface between bilingual and special education, and attention to both primary and secondary language development, and…

This article views differentiation as the process of identifying, with each learner, the most effective strategies for achieving agreed targets. It presents 10 elements of differentiation in special education, such as differentiation is multidimensional; differentiation is diagnostic; differentiation challenges classroom relationships; and…

This paper presents an overview of distance education technologies and a discussion of the potential benefits and abuses for special education of interactive television distance education. Technologies described include microcomputer systems, satellite transmission, and telephone lines as media transmitters. (Author/DB)

The article looks at two competing psychological theories, the componential and the constructivist, and the implications of each for the use of computers in reading instruction. The concept of "contextualization" as a basis for integrating the two approaches into a model of computer use in the special education classroom is proposed. (Author/DB)

The mainstreaming concept has dramatically changed the lives of enumerable special needs children in positive ways but in some cases has become a travesty as it is extended beyond its logical limits. Developmental appropriateness is the pivotal priority in the education of children, especially those with severe/profound mental disabilities. (JDD)

This newsletter theme issue focuses on issues in including students with disabilities in regular education. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act calls for students to be placed in the least restrictive environment, which is presumed by some educators to be the regular classroom. The drawbacks of separate programs are not felt to be…

The review describes the advance organizer technique and reviews the empirical evidence on the effectiveness of advance organizers with both normal students and students classified as handicapped. Examples of advance organizers include the expository advance organizer, the comparative advance organizer, the graphic advance organizer, and…

This commentary on EC 605 995 argues that rendering services to students with disabilities in general education does not preclude future problems; general education is not equipped to deal with great student diversity; and training needs should be addressed through special education, community-based education, employment preparation, transition…