Homebound instruction involves the delivery of educational services within a student's home. Examples include academic instruction, speech and language therapy, and physical therapy. Initially seen as a service option for very young or frail children with disabilities, homebound instruction is currently being accessed by a variety of student…

Successful transitioning and reintegrating students from alternative programs requires staff to (a) operate from an effective model that includes all stakeholders as participants, (b) follow guidelines that structure the process prior to, during, and at the follow-up stages, and (c) designate staff with responsibility for coordination and…

This article highlights current thinking and practice regarding the use of student portfolios to document performance of authentic teaching tasks in undergraduate special education teacher education programs. It describes ways to use portfolios for student and program assessment and includes suggestions for overcoming the subjectivity associated…

This paper discusses strategies for school personnel when preparing students with learning disabilities (LD) for a successful transition from high school to college. Some of the 10 strategies discussed are: teaching students about compensatory strategies; teaching students to self-advocate; teaching students about the law; helping students select…

This article explains the combination of instructional practices called personalized contextual instruction (PCI) and illustrates its implementation by a general education teacher, a special education teacher, and a paraprofessional working together in a multiage primary inclusive classroom. The PCI approach incorporates individual learning…

Twelve practical strategies that can be used by classroom teachers to prevent behavioral escalation are discussed, including reinforce calm, know the triggers, pay attention to anything unusual, do not escalate, intervene early, know the function of problem behavior, use extinction wisely, teach prosocial behavior, and teach academic survival…

This article explains how teachers can strengthen the self-efficacy of students who are struggling academically and increase their motivation for schoolwork. Instructional principles include linking new work to recent successes, teaching needed learning strategies, reinforcing effort and persistence, stressing peer modeling, and helping students…

This article describes the following steps for developing and implementing system-wide behavior support: establishing a foundation for collaboration; building faculty involvement; establishing a data-based decision-making system, brainstorming and selecting strategies within an action planning process; implementing a school-wide program through an…

This article provides a guide for planning field trips for educational engagement of all children in early childhood education settings. Based on interviews, environmental assessments, and evaluations of activities, it includes field trip considerations and a field trip planning guide that includes the teacher, the parents, and the field site…

This article discusses the crucial role assistive technology can play in ensuring that preschool children with disabilities become literate members of communities along with their typically developing peers. It provides practical recommendations to enable parents and professionals to enhance their literacy-related activities using assistive…

Drawing from a current study, this article identifies critical issues and challenges for alternative educators and administrators. It contains a list of questions that can be used to identify and address key issues in alternative settings in order to promote successful school experiences for students with and without disabilities. (Contains…

This article addresses the educational needs of fourth-graders who are having reading difficulties, first by briefly discussing the five research-based components of early reading (phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and text comprehension), and then by recasting these components in terms of instruction of older, struggling students.…

Suggestions for tutoring students with reading problems include repeated reading with a model, oral reading with monitoring and feedback, error monitoring, and reading practice of difficult words. Evaluation methods include evaluating oral reading accuracy and oral reading fluency, and flashcard assessment. Suggestions are also offered for…

Suggestions for tutoring students with reading comprehension problems include careful selection of books with readable text segments, use of comprehension strategies such as paraphrasing brief sections, and reading to find specific information. Several reading comprehension strategies for students are summarized. (Contains 7 references.) (DB)

This article explains how teachers can construct curriculum-based assessments (CBA), using state academic standards, to measure the reading skills and progress of elementary students with mild disabilities. Two mini-cases illustrate the creation of CBA test items based on individual educational goals and the Indiana Academic Standards. (Contains…