Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-8bhkd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-08T04:56:42.859Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Sharing Accountability for Educating Children with Special Needs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 February 2016

Robert Strom*
Affiliation:
Arizona State University, U.S.A

Extract

Who is accountable for the education of children with special needs? We can begin to find out by considering these additional questions:

How can the school improve its approach to teaching handicapped children?

What kinds of help can parents be expected to provide?

How important is the influence of nonhandicapped peers and what role is best for them?

What kinds of curriculum should the public favor in order to achieve integration?

In what ways can the government offer effective leadership and support?

When we pose these more specific concerns, some useful changes take place in our point of view. There is a shift in emphasis from who is at fault to who can be helpful, from limitations to possibilities. The resulting perspective identifies other people with whom we must work more closely in order for children to succeed.

During recent years educators have made it a practice to specify the learnings for which they are willing to be held accountable. This policy is worthwhile but insufficient. I believe that we need a more inclusive definition of accountability, one that will acknowledge and clarify the different roles and obligations for those who teach elsewhere than the classroom or whose influence on child development is indirect. Surely the helping environment for educating children with special needs must include the collaborative efforts of school faculty, parents, students and the government. Let’s consider how each of these parties are implicated in the concept of shared accountability.

Type
Keynote Address
Copyright
Copyright © The Australian Association of Special Education 1980

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Allen, Vernon (Ed.). Children As Teachers: Theory and Research on Tutoring. New York: Academic Press, 1976.Google Scholar
Bronfenbrenner, Urie. A report on Longitudinal Evaluations of Preschool Programs. Washington D.C.: U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare, Office of Human Development, 1974.Google Scholar
Cahen, Leonard and Filby, Nicola. The Class Size/Achievement Issue: New Evidence and a Research Plan,’ Phi Delta Kappan, 60, 7, 1979, 492495.Google Scholar
Carnegie Council on Children. ‘All Our Children,’ Carnegie Quarterly, 25, 4, 1977, 112.Google Scholar
Chaze, William. ‘After 15 Years of Great Society Spending – –,’ U.S. News and World Report, 88, 25, June 30, 1980, 3638.Google Scholar
Coles, Robert. ‘Saving the Family,’ Newsweek, 91, 20, May 15, 1978, 6465.Google Scholar
Devoney, Catherine, Michael, Guralnick and Helen, Rubin. ‘Integrating Handicapped and nonhandicapped Preschool Children: Effects on Social Play,’ Childhood Education, 50, 6, 1974, 360364.Google Scholar
Glass, Gene and Smith, Mary. Meta-Analysis of Research on the Relationship of Class Size and Achievement. San Francisco: Far West Laboratory for Educational Research and Development, 1978.Google Scholar
Gliedman, John and Roth, William. The Unexpected Minority: Handicapped Children in America. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1980.Google Scholar
Gorman, Pierre. ‘Orientating Children in Regular Schools Toward Impairments,’ Unicorn, Bulletin of the Australian College of Education, 3, 3, 1977 5261.Google Scholar
Hodgkinson, Harold. ‘What’s Right with Education?,’ Phi Delta Kappan, 61, 3, 1979, 159162.Google Scholar
Irwin, Eleanor and Frank, Mary. ‘Facilitating the Play Process with LD Children,’ Academic Therapy 12, 4, 1977, 435443.Google Scholar
Kolstoe, Oliver. Teaching Educable Mentally Retarded Children. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1976, 142144.Google Scholar
Ladas, Harold. ‘The Limits of Accountability,’ Kappa Delta Pi Record, 16, 4, 1980, 118121.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lippitt, Peggy. Students Teach Students. Bloomington: Phi Delta Kappan Foundation, 1975.Google Scholar
Reynolds, Maynard and Rosen, Sylvia. ‘Special Education: Past, Present and Future,’ The Educational Forum, 40, 4, 1976, 551562.Google Scholar
Slade, Margot. ‘Bias in Labelling the Handicapped,’ Psychology Today, 12, 5, 1978, 3132.Google Scholar
Smith, Mary and Glass, Gene. Relationship of Class Size to Classroom Processes, Teacher satisfaction and Pupil Affect: A Meta-Analysis. San Francisco: Far West Laboratory for Educational Research and Development, 1978.Google Scholar
Strom, Robert and Torrance, Paul. Education for Affective Achievement. Chicago: Rand McNally, 1973, 161165.Google Scholar
Growing Together: Parent and Child Development. Monterey, California: Brooks/Cole Publishing Company, 1978a.Google Scholar
‘Play and Peer Teaching,’ The Elementary School Journal, 79, 2, 1978b, 7480.Google Scholar
Growing Through Play: Readings for Parents and Teachers. Monterey, California: Brooks/Cole Publishing Company, 1980.Google Scholar
Roger Rees, Helen Slaughter and Stanley Wurster ‘Role Expectations of Parents of Intellectually Handicapped Children,’ Exceptional Children, 47, 1, 1980.Google Scholar
Thurman, Richard. ‘Mainstreaming: A Concept General Educators Should Embrace,’ The Educational Forum, 44, 3, 1980, 285293.Google Scholar
TIME, ‘Help! Teachers Can’t Teach,’ June 16, 1980, 5463.Google Scholar
Torrance, E. Paul. ‘Giftedness in Solving Future Problems,’ Journal of Creative Behaviour, 12, 2, 1978, 7586.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
U.S. News and World Report. ‘The American Family – – Bent But Not Broken,’ 88, 23, June 16, 1980, 4854.Google Scholar
Voeltz, Luanna. ‘Children’s Attitudes Toward Handicapped Peers,’ American Journal of Mental Deficiency, ‘ 84, 5, 1980, 455464.Google Scholar