MARCH 29, 2009

SCHOOLS BEHAVING BADLY

Schools Behaving Badly… is definitely every parents night mare. From bus drivers situations to preschool to actual teachers behaving badly in public schools is happening more frequently than we would like. The question is how do we as educators, parents and society make changes to make our schools behaving in a better manor? In the book Teachers Behaving Badly by Kate Myers and professor at the University of Keele takes notice of two professors having an affair. Not only are teachers having affairs with other teachers but today it’s occurring with the teacher and student. How do we protect our students and children? School Districts need to take the extra time in the interview process to hire quality teachers not a quantity of teachers. Another suggestion would have frequent observation sessions for each teacher to monitor what is being taught, relationships being built with their students and to take notes on anything that may not seem right. Student surveys through out the year would also be another effective tool that could be used. The links below provide websites with more information, stories and situations we hope to avoid in the future.

Teachers Behaving Badly by Kate Myers
http://books.google.com/books?id=-coXJOzXnxcC&dq=schools+behaving+badly&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=XBibSWjlDO&sig=OYbAY8F_GH_TSHcnqncr_oNoMhI&hl=en&ei=N-rPSdDgIIOssQOMlKygAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=5&ct=result#PPA1,M1

MyNC Users Catch Bus Drivers Behaving Badly, Call For Action
By Jenny Henry
http://wake.mync.com/site/Wake/news/story/29504/mync-users-catch-bus-drivers-behaving-badly-call-for-action/

Protecting Bad Teachers
http://teachersunionexposed.com/protecting.cfm

Bad Bad Teacher
http://badbadteacher.com/leah-pourdavood/

"High Stakes Testing"

March 22, 2009

“HIGH STAKES TESTING”

This week’s blog is to help parents and educators understand the term “high stakes testing” and what it means for individuals with disabilities. High stakes testing refers to tests that hold significance for a student to be promoted to the next grade level or to graduate from high school. It is a test each student is required to take to be able to move forward in most states. These types of exams often place a great deal of pressure on students as a whole and most definitely for students with learning disabilities. High stake testing for student with learning disabilities make it very hard for the student and for the educator. More than often a student with a learning disability is going to need more attention in a certain subject matter and is more than likely not going to be on the same pace or level as a student without a disability. Not all the information in each subject is going to be addressed as if it was a regular student due to the time allowed each school year. How does a State decide whether or not a child with disabilities should be given the test. IDEA highly stresses that each child should be given the same education as the next, should it be different in this case? Is it truly right to make a child with disabilities take a test that holds so much power? The links below are to several articles that address high stakes testing for students with disabilities. Enjoy!



1. Implications of High-Stakes Testing for Students With Learning Disabilities
By Candace Cortiella
http://www.greatschools.net/cgi-bin/showarticle/2846

2. Low Performance on High-Stakes Test Drives Special Education Referrals: A Texas Survey
By Cheryl Fielding
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa4013/is_200401/ai_n9389283

3. High Stakes Testing
http://www.wrightslaw.com/info/highstak.index.htm

4. Helping Your Students Understand Their Classmates with Special Needs
http://www.naset.org/2224.0.html

Parent Advocacy

March 13, 2009
Parent Advocacy
My goal for this week is to really explain the options parents have for their child with disabilities. There are so many tools, articles, books and general information that will help guide parents in finding proper help and services available to them at an affordable expense. As a parent it is so important and essential to be active and take action toward finding what’s available for your child so they can become as successful as possible. Its also parents know what their child rights are and the guidelines so if they don’t agree with how something is being handled then they can question and find a solution to a problem. Several of the websites below provide parents with steps to take toward finding proper services and special educational programs to go through. The websites also give you an idea of what questions need to be asked during your process of finding the right program for your child. When approaching something for the first time, its important to have a guide on what questions to ask so you can compare between the programs being provided.
Other websites offer parents to place to meet other parents and join workshops and conferences that will aid in their guidance for their child. I think this is very beneficial because it exposes parents to other parents that have similar circumstances. Parents will have the opportunity to compare notes, learn and build friendship with parents that also have children with disabilities.
Websites:
Wrightslaw Special Education Advocacy
http://www.wrightslaw.com/info/advo.index.htm

State Wide Parent Advocacy Network
http://www.spannj.org/

Special Education Rights

http://www.specialeducationrights.com/

Internet Special Education Resources
http://www.iser.com/CAadvocacy.html

Books :
Wrightslaw: From Emotions to Advocacy: The Special Education Survival Guide (Paperback)
by Peter W. D. Wright (Author), Pamela Darr Wright (Author)

No Child Left Behind Act

No Child Left Behind Act- NCLB
March 8, 2009
Today’s blog is to explain the No Child Left Behind Act that President George Bush proposed on January 23, 2001. The Act is set to established goals for every student and is trying to ensure that each student gets the proper education required and deserve to succeed in life. In all states the schools are expected to give each child a state test and the students are expected to pass this test. If a certain amount of students fail the test per that school the school will not receive federal funding from the government. In my opinion this can be good or bad. It’s great this act is concentrating on the student and making sure each student gets the required education to achieve their goals but then again it puts so much emphasis on the school passing this test as a whole. I think teachers are focused on teaching this material and getting their students to pass the exam just to meet the states requirements, but is the student really benefiting from so much time being spent on passing an exam? I’ve provided below some websites that explain the act more in depth so you can explore and form your own opinion based on the information you read, also if you want more information check out the books below as well.
Websites
National Education Association
http://www.nea.org/esea/
No Child Left Behind Act
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Child_Left_Behind_Act

NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND
http://www.dpi.state.nc.us/nclb/

Book :
Wrightslaw: No Child Left Behind by Peter W. D. Wright
Many Children Left Behind
By Deborah Meier, George Harrison Wood
http://books.google.com/books?id=d1kerx8kPawC&dq=No+child+left+behind&printsec=frontcover&source=bll&ots=MPigUbF820&sig=NU80kYelqFjD5x_TEeO65d3F-XA&hl=en&ei=INqzSYH7JZWksAOwrPF7&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=12&ct=result#PPP1,M1

IDEA 2004

March 1, 2009

IDEA 2004
My goal this week is to help parents and educators understand the IDEA 2004.
IDEA stands for Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. This act is a law ensuring children with disabilities with the right services for education through out the nation. The website Building the Legacy: IDEA 2004 help explains the different methods of intervention for infants, children and young adults. Visit http://idea.ed.gov/ for more information. This website is very informational as it explains the regulations pertaining to the IDEA 2004. It’s also a good reference for future questions because it is actively up to date.
The IDEA 2004 helps parents and educators understand why the IEP becomes important. The IEP is the Individualized Education Program. The wright’s law website is very helpful because it goes into depth on how to improve education with Children that have disabilities, high qualified teachers and the IEP. I highly suggest this website http://www.wrightslaw.com/idea/ and review the different links it has available.
I feel like it’s very important for parents and educators to understanding the IDEA 2004 if they are working with children with disabilities or have one of their own. I think it’s important to understand this so they have no boundaries that get in the way and each child can be given the best opportunity possible to succeed to the best of their ability. I’ve included a few other websites that I found very helpful as well.

· The Worlds leading website on Learning Disabilities
http://www.ldonline.org/features/idea2004
· IDEA 2004 Summary
http://www.fape.org/idea/2004/summary.htm
· National Center for Learning Disabilities
http://www.ncld.org/content/view/274/321/

Additional reading material:

What Every Teacher Should Know About Transition and IDEA 2004 - Carol A. Kochhar-Bryant & Stan F. Shaw & Margo Izzo

IDEA 2004 (ISBN: 1-892320-05-3) by Peter W. D. Wright,