The Education for Handicapped Children's Act, re-authorized in 1986, mandates special education and related services for all children with handicaps, ages 3 to 21. Perhaps the most confusing aspect of the law involves the interpretation of providing health related services required by children with disabilities. The law has created, in theory, a partnership between parents and professionals in sharing their specialized knowledge and collaborating in implementing services. / The study, conducted in a preschool class for children who had a range of handicapping conditions, used a qualitative strategy. It began with an interest in (a) how school personnel use health and medical information in the performance of their specialized roles and (b) the processes staff use in developing a shared understanding of the information and a coordinated course of action for individual children. The inquiry, however, expanded to include the critical role parents play in brokering information between the medical system and the educational system. / Findings from this study indicate that the lives of children with handicaps are managed by three different social systems: family, medical, and education. Each of these social environments has its own purpose, structure, rules, and perceptions. Communication between the three systems frequently is very difficult because all three are simultaneously but independently involved in assessment, diagnoses, prognoses, developing plans, and establishing outcome measures. Three factors contribute to the ease of communication and coordination between the systems: (a) a definitive etiology of the child's handicap; (b) a definitive diagnostic label of the handicapping condition; and (c) the degree to which the handicap is visible. The study was conducted in a a preschool class for children who have a range of handicapping conditions. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 51-12, Section: A, page: 4087. / Major Professor: Pearl E. Tait. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1990.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_78351 |
| Contributors | Morse, Mary T., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 341 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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