Promoting access to the general curriculum has emerged as a central theme of the standards-based reform movement, challenging educators to identify effective strategies for supporting students with disabilities to access the numerous social and learning opportunities within general education. We examined peer support interventions as an…

Three young children with severe, multiple disabilities were taught to utilize a voice output communication aid (VOCA) to request access to preferred items and/or peers during play activities. Acquisition of VOCA use resulted from a naturalistic intervention strategy that consisted of creating communication opportunities, prompting the participant…

Promoting access to the general curriculum for students with disabilities has emerged as a central theme of recent legislative and policy initiatives. Ensuring that students with severe disabilities benefit fully from the myriad learning and social opportunities available through the general curriculum remains an important challenge, particularly…

It is now the responsibility of educators to provide for the education of severely handicapped students in what has been referred to as "the least restrictive educational environment." This paper discusses least restrictive educational environments in relation to segregation versus integration, interactions with nonhandicapped age peers,…

In this article, the author comments on the paramount article "Toward Realization of the Least Restrictive Educational Environments for Severely Handicapped Students" by Brown, Wilcox, Sontag, Vincent, Dodd, and Gruenewald. She states that the article contained amazingly persuasive and logical ideas that guided the dramatic changes in service…

We studied parents' perceptions of the effects of their nondisabled child's participation in a classroom in which a child with severe disabilities was enrolled full time. Survey responses from 389 parents indicated that they generally perceived their nondisabled child to have benefited from this experience. A minority of parents held negative…