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Call number: LD2668 .T4 1978 H66 / Master of Science

The purpose of this study was to identify the attitudes of unified school district administrators regarding a merger of special and regular education as proposed by some educators who support the Regular Education Initiative (REI). The REI is a position statement generating from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, that calls for a new partnership between regular and special educators in addressing the needs of all children with learning problems, including those with handicapping conditions. The study elicited responses from 229 administrators in Arizona during the 1988-89 school year. A survey instrument was used to obtain information from the administrators regarding their opinions on items within six categories of consideration (student, instructional, funding, teacher, administrative, and current program) that have implications for a merger. Administrators were also asked to indicate their overall support for a merger and to rate its feasibility and desirability based on each of the six categories of consideration. Statistical analyses revealed significant differences among the three administrator groups regarding the responsibility, role, and directorship of special education in the education of students with learning problems; the willingness of regular education teachers to work with students with handicaps; the benefit of a merger for nonhandicapped low-achieving students; and their rationale for changes in the current special education system. Additional significant differences were found regarding administrators' perceptions of the feasibility of a merger when the analysis was based on district size. Administrators were equally divided in their support for a merger. Most administrators indicated that regular classroom teachers were ill-prepared to educate students with handicaps and would not favor a merger. Administrators expressed strong support for waivers of federal state rules and regulations to implement merged systems experimentally and indicated that no major changes should be considered until results from evaluation studies were available. Results of this study hold implications for policy makers, researchers, teacher trainers, and school administrators.

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The purpose of this study was to describe the extent and quality of prior knowledge, transactional nature, and social context of literacy knowledge demonstrated by young mildly handicapped learners. The study was based on current theories of literacy which view literacy growth as part of the total language system development, and ethnographic methods were used to gather and analyze qualitative data. Language and literacy events were observed in three special education classrooms including 43 students ranging in age from 4 years 1 month to 9 years 11 months. Major findings of the study included: (a) The children in this study demonstrated prior literacy knowledge much like that of non-handicapped peers, (b) Demonstrations of oral and written language system transactions decreased after students received formal instruction in reading and writing. And (c) children's ability to interpret print depended greatly on the presence or absence of context with the print.

M.Ed. (Inclusive Education) / This study explored the nature of support for Reception Year teachers of learners with severe intellectual impairment at Lerato Special School (pseudonym) which is in the southern suburbs of Johannesburg in South Africa. As a past Reception Year teacher at this school, I experienced numerous challenges in teaching these learners, which prompted me to research more in this area. I experienced challenges such as overprotection of the learners by their parents, language barriers, lack of parental support, high learner-teacher ratio and health problems. From the focus group interview conducted, these were the same challenges experienced by the Reception Year teachers of Lerato Special School. As a result, I embarked on this study to find out from these teachers the extent of support that they are receiving and still require for them to be able to execute their duties to the expected standard in terms of teaching these young and inexperienced learners to their maximum potential development. The Education White Paper 6 (DoE, 2001) outlines four levels of support for both teachers and learners. At the national level, policy is formulated, and it is implemented at the provincial level (Landsberg, 2011). The district level provides co-ordinated professional services in supporting teachers, drawing on expertise in specialised schools through the district based support teams (DBST). Lastly, at the institution level the school based support teams (SBST) support teachers and learners directly. Teacher support teams are a way of supporting individual teachers who request support over a teaching concern relating to special educational needs (Cresse, Norwich & Daniels, 2000). The focus of district and institutional level support should be on differentiated teaching strategies, overcoming barriers, curricular adaptation, flexible teaching methods, individualised learning support material and assessment concessions. Since teachers are the primary agents for achieving such specialised education for intellectually impaired learners, the teachers should be fully supported in their endeavours. Yet, it is my experience in this special school that teachers are not being fully supported, particularly, teachers who are teaching severely intellectually impaired children between five and ten years old ...

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Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2006. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.