For my paper, I am taking a general look at Special Education issues. There are two conflicting views that are addressed in my paper – the first being the idea that there are too many students that are put into special education, and the second being that integration into the system that allows parents more information will help make the special education system more effective. The first premise builds off the idea that students of color are disproportionately being put in special education – such as the sons of African immigrants, African American children, and Latino children – from the perspective that it is and isn't necessary. The second builds off the idea that teachers trying new strategies and an increase in parental involvement help to make special education more accessible and effective. Both premises come to form the conclusion that changing the parameters of how we think about and work within special education create maximum benefits for teachers, parents, and students.
Elements of culture and tradition that shape the perceptions and expectations of Somali refugee mothers about autism spectrum disorder
Shanna Miller-Gairy and Saul Mofya, DVM, MSc
Int J Child Aolesc Health 2015; 8(4): 425-438
This is a study that looks at 25 participatory mothers through observation and face-to-face interviews. The mothers feel a disconnect from the traditional western view of looking at learning disabilities, feeling that Autism is a result of stringent vaccination administration, the environment and processed food. The research they have down shows that these families are more likely to have children who receive a late diagnosis of Autism compared to English-speaking families – a fact that the researchers believe indicates that they are not receiving the adequate care that they need. The researchers used participatory observation during summer camp and face-to-face interviews with adult participants. They also required that the children (under 5 years old) have developmental evaluation / psychological evaluation and have seen a therapist within the past year.
They found that the mothers saw Autism as an "American or European disease" due to vaccinations, the environment, and food. The mothers looked at the behavior of their children, seeing it as "unruly behavior" that the children would grow out of, and also saw the child's behavior as contributing to the deterioration of their marriage. The professionals involved with the parents cited the "parent's inability to understand the specifics of a conversation and provide feedback" as well as the "failure to follow through with recommendations or referrals" The researchers come to the conclusion that changing the language of these diagnoses to the cultural understanding of Zimbabwe will help in the mothers getting help for their children. The article makes it sound as if their culture does not understand our diagnoses due to a lack of understanding, giving the culture less of a sense of cultural autonomy than minorities within the United States.
Overcoming Obstacles: African American Students with Disabilities Achieving Academic Success
The Journal of Negro Education
Volume 55 No 2, The 36th Annual Charles H. Thompson Lecture, Why Black Lives (and Minds) Matter Race, Freedom, Schools and The Quest for Educational Equity (Spring 2016) pp. 129-142 Branty T. Gatlin and Cynthia L. Wilson
The researchers express concerns over the overrepresentation of minority groups in special education, especially African Americans, and they look at how two African American student with disabilities have demonstrated academic success. What they discovered is that African Americans "are systematically marginalized and miseducated in an educational system that seeks to only highlight what they lack and disregard what cultural wealth they have to bear" (Lynn et al. 2010, pg. 291). When their education is both cultural responsive and involves parental / teacher involvement, they have fund that the students feel more encouraged about their work and are more likely to go to go to college. They also have found that "if a parent expects the students to learn, they will learn. If the parent doesn't show concern, then the child will not care about his or her education" (pg. 136) – which confirms their belief that adjusting the expectations of teachers and students will raise the outcome of those students in a similarity to the two students they have studied. While it seems as if they address the topic of stigma when it comes to special education, they really did not address the overdiagnosis of learning disabilities in any way that suggests you can turn around from it but rather that you must pull through with raising the involvement and expectations of teachers and students.
Special Education for Latino Students in the United States: A Metaphor for What Is Wrong
Richard A. Figueroa
Bilingual Review / La Revista Bilingue Vol. 24 No. 112 Helping Individuals with Disabilities and Their Families
Mexican and US Perspectives Clawary August 1999 pp. 147-159
The article cites Leonard Baca – a man who created the idea of bilingual special education in the 1970's (Figueroa 2). It does this because the researchers believe that a major problem in the diagnosis and treatment of learning disabilities, especially when these disabilities are ascribed to people of color, is that there is a language barrier to those families being involved in the process (in a similar fashion to the mothers from Zimbabwe in the first article) (Figueroa 6). It makes the claim of special education "being a tracking system" (Figueroa 7) that is meant to justify the idea that these students do not deserve the investment in resources which would be able to "give students a choice in what they learn" and increase "high expectations" (similar to second article) (Figueroa 9). This article ties together quite nicely with the first two articles because it sees the labeling of students of color disproportionately with learning disabilities as a way to make sure that they do not rise up in the class system as well as a justification for not funding programs for minorities and special education. The question is raised on whether simply labeling a child with a learning disability and then putting them on a pill is an adequate path when many are still stigmatized / not expected to succeed, and the institutions themselves do not allocate resources to give the students choices and "print rich" environments (Figueroa 9).
Down the Rabbit Hole: A Commentary About Poor Research on Parents and Special Education
Jan W. Valle
Learning Disability Quarterly, Vol. 34, No. 3 (August 2011) pp. 183-190 Sage Publications, Inc.
The researchers aim to research the "reluctant hero narrative" of women who are mothers of student with special needs to see how they react and handle their students being diagnosed in a way that relates their experience to Alice falling down the rabbit hole in Alice in Wonderland. They discovered through their prior research that other researchers see mothers as "too subjective to contribute meaningfully and "in need of expert guidance" (Valle 184) – suggesting that the narrative of mothers is most frequently ignored in the view of "expert" opinion. The researchers have found that mothers engage more frequently with school personnel than either set of parents or than fathers alone, and that school personnel find the parents' proper role to be that of a "passive recipient" (186) of information rather than being able to actively contribute information that would benefit the teachers and education officials. The researchers conclude that parents should be seen as integral to the conversation about spcial education and should not be left out of the loop due to the perception of their "subjectivity" and "lack of understanding." It suggests, in relation to families of color, that most families of children with learning disabilities feel that they are left out of the conversation, and are not given the sufficient resources they need to have raised expectations as well as contribute to their children's' needs /talents to the best of their ability
Teacher-Student Interactions in Middle School Mainstreamed Classess: Differences with Special and Regular Education Students
Michael P. Brady, Paul R. Swank, Ronald D. Taylor and H. Jerome Freiberg
The Journal of Educational Research Vol. 89 No. 6 (Jul-Aug, Taylor and Francis, Ltd)
The researchers look at Bryan's (1978) study that learning disabled children are twice as likely to be ignored and Hogue + Bruelle's study (1984) that mainstreamed students did not significantly receive more time than non-handicapped students. Effective teachers of handicapped students were more likely to "use high rates of contingent feedback, guided students towards academic responses, asked questions, minimized discipline, and decreased criticism and the time students spent of task" (Larrivee 1906). They found that the teacher's expectations of the students fell as "a result of poor pupil performance" (Shores 1972) – suggesting that those in special education whom have a harder time than others may be decreasing the amount of expectation and instructional feedback that could be given to students otherwise. This suggests that teacher expectations are an important part of the instructional quality for student with disabilities, and that mainstreaming students does not necessarily decrease the amount of stigma that follows students. The article is questionable about what can be done to make the teachers better and suggests "active training, format, systematic feedback, timing, and improvements" (338) without being very clear about what those improvements mean.
The Concept of Cultural Pluralism: Issues in Special Education
Mary S. Poplin and Pamela Wright
Learning Disability Quarterly, Vol. 6 No. 4, Cultural Pluralism (Autumn 1983) pp. 367-371
Americanization is a concept that is stating in this article that holds "that people outside the dominant cultural group (Anglo-American broadened to include Scandanavian, German, and English) should relinquish their language, their customs, and any tiers to their land of origin in exchange for English." The researchers disagree with the idea that all cultures must melt and succumb to the dominant culture, but rather that Cultural Pluralism should be a concept that applies to education – one that guides educational standards and content design. This article, though it takes place in special education, suggest that students must "encourage diverse explanations of text material and become less dependent on projected answers" (5). We can take from this article that the researchers find it to be completely possible for students with disabilities to develop critical thinking skills about a multiplicity of texts. This raises the question, as it does in other articles about multiculturalism and parental involvement in special education, whether enough is being done.
All in all, it seems as if there is not as much being done in special education as there could be. Minority students are disproportionately being put into special education programs without much consideration for the way their culture looks at learning disabilities nor how their language and culture is left out of consideration. Teachers do not try as hard due to the low expectations of these students – suggesting that there is never going to be a significant amount of allocation of resources if the students are never expected to achieve beyond what they think the students will achieve. This literature presented suggests that students can benefit from print-reach materials and multicultural perspectives, yet there is still not being enough done to make this is a reality. In conclusion, once special education accounts for cultural diversity, you will see a lot of expansion of perspectives for students with disability.
Works Cited
"Overcoming Obstacles: African American Students with Disabilities Achieving Academic Success"The Journal of Negro Education, Volume 55 No 2, The 36th Annual Charles H. Thompson Lecture, Why Black Lives (and Minds) Matter Race, Freedom, Schools and The Quest for Educational Equity (Spring 2016) pp. 129-142 Branty T. Gatlin and Cynthia L. Wilson
Miller-Gairy, Shanna; Mofya, Saul, DVM, MSC. Elements of culture and tradition that shape the perceptions and expectations of Somali refugee mothers about autism spectrum disorder
Int J Child Aolesc Health 2015; 8(4): 425-438
Figueroa, Richard A. "Special Education for Latino Students in the United States: A Metaphor for What Is Wrong" Bilingual Review / La Revista Bilingue Vol. 24 No. 112 Helping Individuals with Disabilities and Their Families, Mexican and US Perspectives Clawary August 1999 pp. 147-159
Valle, Jan W. "Down the Rabbit Hole: A Commentary About Poor Research on Parents and Special Education" Learning Disability Quarterly, Vol. 34, No. 3, pp. 183-190 Sage Publications, Inc.
Brady, Michael P.; Swank, Paul R.; Taylor, Ronald D; Frieberg. "Teacher-Student Interactions in Middle School Mainstreamed Classess: Differences with Special and Regular Education Students." The Journal of Educational Research Vol. 89 No. 6 (Jul-Aug, Taylor and Francis, Ltd)
Poplin, Mary S.;Pamela Wright. (1983). "The Concept of Cultural Pluralism: Issues in SpecialEducation." Learning Disability Quarterly, Vol. 6 No. 4, Cultural Pluralism,pp. 367