The Assessment of Pupils with Profound and Multiple Learning Difficulties

Jim McNicholas, educational consultant, provides an overview of a detailed research enquiry into the practices of teacher assessment of pupils with profound and multiple learning difficulties (PMLD) set against a background of curriculum theory and curriculum change. The overview approach (with its 'instant practical application') to a major study has not previously been reported in BJSE and the Editor would be grateful for your comments on its relevance to other studies.     

The Gender Mix Among Staff in Schools for Pupils with Severe and Profound and Multiple Learning Difficulties and its Impact

Phil Goss has extensive experience as a practitioner and manager in schools for pupils with severe and profound and multiple learning difficulties. In this article, he reports on his enquiries into the gender mix among staff in these schools. He finds that there are significantly more women than men working as teachers and in support roles in these specialist contexts. Phil Goss goes on to discuss the outcomes of his research into headteachers' perceptions of the impact of this gender imbalance. In concluding, he makes a series of proposals for future policy on recruitment and staff development, for teachers and teaching assistants. Phil Goss argues that we need to find ways to bring more men into this work.     

Evaluating the Effectiveness of Intensive Interactive Teaching with Pupils with Profound and Complex Learning Difficulties

Judith Watson, lecturer and Anne Fisher, teacher, present encouraging results from two research studies which evaluated the effectiveness of Intensive Interactive teaching with pupils who had profound and complex learning difficulties. The method is compared with the effects of other classroom experiences over the course of one school year.     

What Happens After the Age of 14? Mapping Transitions for Pupils with Profound and Complex Learning Difficulties

This article reports on part one of a three-part national survey of provision for pupils aged 14 and older, in England and Wales, who have profound and complex learning difficulties. The survey is part of the Enhancing the Quality of Life (EqoL), a three-year research project jointly awarded to Skill: the National Bureau for Students with Disabilities, and the University of Cambridge School of Education. The aim of the project is to construct a framework for learning which will support improvements in the quality of life for these young people. It is funded by the National Lottery Charities Board.     

Music Education for Pupils with Severe or Profound and Multiple Difficulties — Current Provision and Future Need

There is a general agreement about the important role that music can play in the education and daily lives of children with severe or profound and multiple learning difficulties. But what are the distinctions and relationships between music education, music therapy and music as a vehicle for other forms of learning, occupation, development or engagement? To what extent are professionals in schools aware of these issues and prepared to explore them from an informed perspective? In this article, Dr Adam Ockelford, Deputy Director of Education and Employment for the Royal National Institute of the Blind (RNIB), Sally Zimmermann, Music Education and Employment Advisor (RNIB); and Professor Graham Welch, Chair of Music Education and Head of the School of Arts and Humanities, Institute of Education, University of London, present and expand on the key findings from their recent research project, 'PROMISE', which examined the Provision of Music in Special Education and specifically in schools for pupils with severe or profound and multiple difficulties. The authors conclude their paper with an acknowledgement that a great deal of significant work takes place in these contexts at present but that further research, leading to the provision of new resources for curriculum and staff development, is crucial to the realisation of music's full potential in the lives of pupils with severe and profound and multiple learning difficulties.     

Sex Education for Pupils with Severe Learning Difficulties

This article is based on the dissertation for the degree of B.Ed. (Honours) awarded by Birmingham University in July 1986 to the author when she was a student at Westhill College, Birmingham. Karen Giles is now teaching at Rosemary School, Islington, in the Inner London Education Authority.     

Experience and Achievement: Initiatives in Curriculum Development for Pupils with Severe and Profound and Multiple Learning Difficuties

Richard Byers, education consultant and part-time lecturer at the University of Cambridge School of Education, challenges recent thinking on the teaching of subjects to pupils with learning difficulties. He emphasises that school-centred and innovative practices in curriculum development should be fully recognised and the role of experience and achievement thoroughly explored.     

Fostering Reflection in Pupils with Learning Difficulties

This paper reports on the classroom experiences of 11‐year‐old pupils attending four Scottish special schools. The focus was on reflection by pupils, that is the extension of their thinking ‘beyond the given’, in reasoning, problem solving and metacognition, and on ways in which teachers facilitate the process of reflection in pupils who have moderate degrees of difficulty in learning.     

Preparing for Contact Between Mainstream Pupils and their Counterparts Who Have Severe and Profound and Multiple Learning Disabilities

Despite the increasing societal inclusion of young people with a disability in Ireland, there is very little evidence of any substantive improvement with regard to inclusion for young people with severe and profound and multiple learning disabilities (usually referred to, in educational settings in the UK, as pupils or students with severe and profound and multiple learning difficulties). As a result, these young people often remain isolated within their local communities and have minimal contact, if any, with their mainstream counterparts. One innovative schools link programme in Ireland offers structured curricular activities that include mainstream pupils and their peers who have severe and profound and multiple learning disabilities. A video programme was used in the pre-contact phase of the programme and this paper explores the effectiveness of the video programme in preparing the mainstream pupils to meet their counterparts who have severe and profound and multiple learning disabilities. Michael Shevlin, who teaches in the Education Department of Trinity College Dublin and has research interests in inclusion, argues that it was evident that the mainstream pupils reacted positively to the video programme and found it useful in overcoming their anxieties at the prospect of contact. He discusses the implications of these findings in relation to the further development of structured contact sessions in integrated classrooms and to the wider issue of societal inclusion for young people with severe and profound and multiple learning disabilities.     

Pupils with Severe Learning Difficulties as Personal Target Setters

Richard Rose, Senior Lecturer at University College, Northampton, and Will Fletcher and Gaynor Goodwin, Watling View School, St Albans, argue that although many schools have attempted to enable pupils with special educational needs to play an active part in their own planning procedures and assessment, few have identified and analysed the skills required by both pupils and teachers. Theydescribe a one-year small-scale action-research project, in a school for children with severe learning difficulties, which resulted in the development of procedures for the assessment of 'pupil readiness' for full involvement in the target-setting process.     

Creating Opportunities for Contact between Mainstream Pupils and their Counterparts with Learning Difficulties

Michael Shevlin, Lecturer in Education, and Astrid Mona O'Moore, Senior Lecturer in Child and Educational Psychology and Co-ordinator of the Anti-Bullying Centre, both at Trinity College, Dublin, describe a programme linking mainstream pupils and their counterparts with severe and profound learning difficulties, consider the reactions of the pupils, and assess the social and educational benefits for all involved.     

Interactions between Pupils with Severe Learning Difficulties and their Mainstream Peers

Dr Jean Ware, Department of Educational Psychology and Special Educational Needs, Institute of Education, London University, Maeve Sharman, Sue O'Connor and Mall Anderson describe four studies on the interaction between pupils with SLD and their mainstream peers.     

Continuities and Developments in Research into the Education of Pupils with Learning Difficulties

This paper surveys a sample of current research into the education of pupils with learning difficulties. Examples of the three major established research traditions are discussed, namely the psycho-medical, organisational and sociological traditions. It is argued that much of this work seeks to extend the theoretical framework associated with one or another of these traditions, but fails to overcome the common limitation of reductionism. An emerging current of work is identified which adopts an anti-reductionist perspective. The characteristics of the new approach are illustrated, and a specific need for further search within this framework, focusing on the dynamics of the school development process, is identified.     

The Internet: a New Frontier for Pupils with Severe Learning Difficulties?

David Banes, Headteacher, and Richard Walter, IT co-ordinator, describe ways in which the Internet has been used by a group of pupils with complex needs at Meldreth Manor school. The rationale, some teaching techniques and methods of evaluating the experiment are discussed, and a range of issues requiring further investigation are identified.     

What do Pupils with Severe Learning Difficulties Understand about Counting?

The study of how children with severe learning difficulties acquire number skills is a much neglected topic – especially when compared to other areas such as language development or social interaction. Jill Porter, lecturer, Institute of Education, London University, asks if this is because the acquisition of language is perceived as more important than the acquisition of number or if it is because we don't think children with severe learning difficulties (SLD) are capable of developing numeracy skills.     

Views of Schooling Held by Children Attending Schools for Pupils with Moderate Learning Difficulties

There has been little research into the views of the consumers of the special education service‐‐the children themselves. Social legislation (e.g., the 1989 Children Act in the UK) has emphasised the importance of discovering the views of the child when planning provision. Similar proposals have been put forward in recent UK documents concerning educational provision (DFE, 1993). This paper reports data based on individual, semi‐structured interviews with 56 children (ages 9 to 11) attending schools for pupils with moderate learning difficulties (MLD/MlD). Interviews probed views about special and mainstream schools and pupils, and perceived reasons for transfer from mainstream to special school. Two areas (teachers as a liked aspect of special and mainstream schools, and problems handling playground relationships) point to key areas of concern for children with learning or intellectual difficulties. Overall, MLD school children were supportive of their special schools. This is discussed in relation to categorization theory.     

东乡族小学生汉语文学习困难调查研究

剖析了影响东乡族小学生汉语学习困难的各种困难，并在此基础上提出优化东乡族小学生汉语学习的教学策略和建设。     

联接与跨越 Bridging the Gap【连载·小学篇二】——王若桑同学在美国

本专栏以《联接与跨越》为题,以一位华裔美国中学生的亲身体验,提供常识性的对美国小学和中学学习环境与学习方式、校园生活、课余活动、升学准备、交友与聚会等中国学生和家长感兴趣的话题,提供短小精悍的中英双语介绍。本专栏分"小学篇"和"中学篇",分别在我刊《小学教师》与《中学教师》中以连载的方式刊出。下文为"小学篇"的第二篇文章。     

Dickens for All: Inclusive Approaches to Literature and Communication with People with Severe and Profound Learning Disabilities

Keith Park, a teacher of children with visual impairment and learning disabilities with the Greenwich Visual Impairment Service, describes a series of multisensory interactive drama games re-telling the story of A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, following a discussion of the potential uses of literature with people with severe and profound learning disabilities.