Jordanian parents’ beliefs about the causes of disability and the progress of their children with disabilities: insights on mainstream schools and segregated centres

This study aims to identify the beliefs of Jordanian parents of children with disabilities (CWD), including intellectual disabilities, specific learning disorders and Autism Spectrum Disorder: both in terms of the causes of these disabilities, and the ability of their children to make progress. A qualitative interpretive methodology was employed. Interviews were used to collect data from 63 parents of CWD. Two major themes emerged concerning beliefs about the causes of disability and children’s progress. Results showed generally that disabilities were attributed to supernatural and biomedical causes; also, most parents had positive expectations about their children’s progress, especially in education skills, and had hopes for their children’s futures. Conclusions and implications are presented in the light of the study findings.     

美国加州选择性表现评价对我国障碍学生学业评价的启示——以CAPA中的英语评价标准为例

NCLB法案颁布之后,美国各州相继推出了针对障碍学生的选择性评价。其中,加利福尼亚州发展较为完善,走在各州前列。美国加州选择性表现评价的基本内容(以英语评价标准为例)、评价标准的构成及特点,对我国特殊教育学校课程评价改革具有借鉴意义。     

基于关键词共现分析的阅读障碍研究热点

借助Bicomb文本挖掘软件和SPSS17.0软件对我国近年来阅读障碍的研究热点进行分析,对高频关键词进行统计分析,经过矩阵转化,构造高频关键词聚类图和高频关键词多维尺度分析图,挖掘出阅读障碍的五大研究领域,分别是阅读障碍的认知和脑机制研究、脑功能和事件相关电位研究、眼动和病例对照研究、发展性阅读障碍的认知研究、阅读理解障碍的教育对策。     

归因视角下的大学外语学困生学习障碍分析及策略研究

基于归因视角,主要从俄语教学和英语教学两个方面去审视目前的大学外语教学现状,对于外语学困生的现象进行了总结,对其特点和成因进行了详细地分析,有针对性地提出了相应的解决问题的方式方法,对于目前改善学困生的外语学习困境,促进外语教学方式的改革有一定的实际意义。     

Disability,Stigma and Otherness: Perspectives of Parents and Teachers

This qualitative study explored the perspectives of parents and teachers in the US with regard to the meaning and implications of disability in the context of schoolling, and of raising a child with a disability. The findings revealed broad conceptual differences in the perspectives of these two groups. Teachers’ beliefs were generally consistent with medical model perspectives on disability as biologically defined. Parents’ interpretations, more aligned with a sociocultural paradigm, were situated in the cultural meanings ascribed to disability and linked with issues of stigma, marginalisation and access. The findings also revealed the existence of master narratives on families of children with disabilities, entrenched in assumptions of pathological functioning and negative outcomes among these families. Implications for professional–family partnerships in the education of students with disabilities are discussed.     

Effects of a Mindfulness-Based Intervention on the Perception of Basic Psychological Need Satisfaction among Special Education Students

Mindfulness-Based Interventions (MBIs) have been increasingly implemented in schools to foster better emotional regulation skills for students with special education needs such as learning disabilities (LDs). This pilot study aimed to evaluate the impact of a MBI on the need satisfaction of elementary students with severe LDs. A prospective quasi-experimental design involving one group and two time points was employed. A sample of 14 elementary school students from a severe LDs special education class participated in this project. Repeated-measures ANOVAs were conducted and revealed a significant reduction in need satisfaction, with a large effect size (η² = .35). Contrary to our hypothesis, the MBI appeared to be negatively related to need satisfaction among participants. These results indicate that MBIs could be linked with better self-evaluation skills in students with severe LDs, which, in turn, may change (or increase the accuracy of) the perception that children have of their own need satisfaction.     

Reasonable Adjustments in Assessment: Putting Law and Policy into Practice in Australia

The Australian Disability Standards for Education 2005 (Cth) require education providers to make reasonable adjustments in educational assessment so that students with disability can participate on the same basis as other students and be able to demonstrate what they know and can do. Reasonableness is governed by a determination of the balance of interests, benefits and detriment to the parties involved. The Standards require providers to consult with students and associates on adjustments, although guidance on how consultation should occur and how the views of students and associates are to be taken into account is vague. In this article, we identify three principles to be considered in order to put appropriate and effective reasonable adjustments in assessment into practice. While Australian law and assessment contexts are used to examine intentions, expectations and practices in educational assessment for students with disability, we argue that these three principles must be considered in any national education system to ensure equitable assessment practices and achieve equitable educational inclusion for students with disability.     

试论新残疾人观及其对残疾人工作的启示

以“平等·参与·共享”为核心的新残疾人观,运用现代社会的文明、进步、科学的观念来认识残疾人和残疾人问题,对我国残疾人事业的持续健康发展有着积极的促进作用。本文简要回顾了我国残疾人观的沿革和新残疾人观的形成,分析了新残疾人观的深刻内涵和重要意义,并试图从中寻求对今后的残疾人工作的一些启示。     

The relative effects of university success courses and individualized interventions for students with learning disabilities

Little is known about the relative effects of post‐secondary learning services for students with learning disabilities. We compared outcomes for students with learning disabilities who selected to: (1) take an academic learning success course (course‐intervention), (2) have regular individual interventions (high‐intervention) or (3) use services only as needed (low‐intervention). Pre‐ and post‐test comparisons revealed improvements in academic self‐efficacy and academic resourcefulness for students in the course‐ and high‐intervention groups. The course‐intervention group also showed decreases in their failure attributions to bad luck and increases in their general repertoire of learned resourcefulness skills in comparison to the high‐intervention group and had significantly higher year‐end GPAs in comparison to the low‐intervention group. Here we find positive outcomes for students with learning disabilities taking a course that teaches post‐secondary learning and academic skills.     

Current state of inclusion of children with special needs in child care programmes in one Canadian province

We suggest that most inquiry in special education is misconceived. We examine the consequences of an allegiance to the erstwhile knowledge of special education in professional assumptions about learning difficulty and the research and practice of special education. We assert that obeisance to that knowledge has proven unfruitful for the children and young people it is intended to serve. Suggesting that the preferred inquiry methods of special education have led only into culs-de-sac, we argue that inclusive education should reinstate the importance of teachers' own experience, insights, and values—restore the significance of reflective practice. It is these that should provide the lead for new developments in inclusion. We suggest that arguments for inclusion have to emerge less out of the kind of supposed knowledge so respected by 20th-century educators—less out of notions of success and failure (of children or of schools)—and more out of ideas about social justice and human rights.