Infusing Culturally Responsive Instruction to Improve Mathematics Performance of Latino Students with Specific Learning Disabilities

Culturally responsive instruction has the advantage of helping diverse students make academic gains. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of culturally infused mathematics lessons on the academic achievement of five middle school Latino students with specific learning disabilities in a resource classroom. We used an ABACACA multiple treatment reversal design, in which two forms of culturally responsive instruction (B) and its modification (C) were compared with the traditional instruction (A). The results of the study indicated that the modified culturally responsive mathematics instruction (C) was associated with increases in positive gains in participants' daily mathematics quizzes. Limitations and implications are discussed in relation to culturally responsive instruction for middle school Latino students with specific learning disabilities.     

STILL WORKING AFTER AGE 70: OLDER PROFESSORS IN ACADEME

The purpose of this interview study was to examine the perceptions and experiences of tenured university professors who continue to work in their career jobs after age 70. The study utilized the case study method to let professors describe in their own voices the personal, professional, and institutional factors in their decision to keep working beyond the conventional retirement age and their plans for the future. The population under investigation was all tenured professors aged 70-74 at a major public research university, the institutions most likely to be impacted by the end of mandatory retirement (Hammond & Morgan, 1991). Content analysis of the interview tapes revealed the following themes: most professors continued to work because they enjoyed it, or felt that it was important to continue their work, perceived the overall atmosphere in their department and the university as positive, felt little institutional pressure to retire, and had no plans to retire. Economic factors played a relatively small role in continuing to work.