Group Differences Forum Reflection

I enjoyed the group differences forum. I feel as if it allowed me to consider possible differences in my classroom that I have not encountered before. I think that there was great classroom discussion that allowed me to see different points of views on controversial issues. I really enjoyed discussing the issues of poverty and race. I have lived near an urban, poor environment for all my life, but I have always been in the suburb point of view. This suburban point of view has really made me create stereotypes and opinions about city schools and the surrounding communities. It was nice to experience people who have a different point of view, and I feel as if it has helped start a change in my own opinions. These children do not ask to be provided a lack-luster education in a poor, corrupt school district. It has really inspired me to possibly work in one of these schools and make a difference for these children.
However, I feel as if my groups portion of the group forum was seen as sort of non-important. We worked on providing thought provoking questions that would cause the class to consider how they felt about the education of students who have disabilities. We were only provided with less than ten minutes to discuss our topic. I feel as if the lack of focus on students with disabilities is evident in the teacher education program. While students do participate in a special education class, is it enough knowledge to go out into the classroom and provide individualized instruction that maximizes the education of students who have disabilities? I highly doubt so. I feel it is important for general education teachers to reflect upon their strengths, weaknesses, and opinions about working with students who have disabilities. I wish that my group would have had more time to offer valuable reflection opportunities. The amount of students who have disabilities present in the general education classroom are rapidly increasing. It is highly likely that issues aligned with ableism will be encountered. Like you had mentioned before, the forum came across as busy work.
Also, I think it's very interesting that each chapter we covered had a section on the content's application to students who have disabilities, but they were never mentioned in class. I think that this ableism topic was the only time, besides Kalee and I's teacher projects, that special education was ever mentioned. It would have been nice to have more time to discuss it.

Ableism

For the group differences forum, my group read an article entitled Confronting Ableism. Throughout the article, the author was urging that people need to accept people who have disabilities as they are instead of trying to change them. The author uses examples and testimonies from individuals who have disabilities to argue that society spends too much time trying to make these individuals ignore their disabilities. For example, the author urges that instead of attempting to teach a child who has visual impairments to read, braille should be instructed. Instead of forcing people who have disabilities to adapt to how people without disabilities live, we should instead focus on how to best educate the children in reference to their disabilities.  The argument for me was a little shaky. The author urges that children with disabilities should have individualized educations that focus on their needs and build upon their abilities; however, in the same argument he is urging that these students need to learn in the least restrictive environment, which he deems a general education classroom. It seems to me that if the education system focuses on providing what these students need to succeed that placement in learning environments outside of the general education classroom will be necessary. However despite this misunderstanding of motives, I do agree that people who have disabilities should not be educated solely based on making them the same as people who do not have disabilities. It is important to take a student's disability into consideration when providing them with their educations. What comes to mind when I am thinking about this issue is assistive technology. People with disabilities are provided with these accommodations so they can access the curriculum. Their individual needs are being considered; however, they are participating in the same instructional activities as their peers. This article did surprise me because I had never heard of this issue before in any of my special education courses. To me, it just seems like common sense that a child's disability is considered when educating them. However, after reading this article it seems like my assumption was incorrect. Reading this article has made me realize that in my future career I may have to urge teachers and parents to accept the disability instead of ignoring it. Children who have disability deserve a better chance at an education, and expecting them to learn the same way as children who do not have disabilities is cheating them out of a proper education and future life.

Ladson-Billings Article

The summation of this article is that the achievement gap is a superficial topic; instead, the issue is about the economic debt that has impeded the education of minority groups. The author insist that historical issues, moral dilemmas, and economic unfairness have accumulated throughout the years and has caused students of minority groups to have a less than a par shot at an equal education. The author seems to assume that if in the past an equal education would have been implemented, there would not be such a gap between white and colored students today. I do agree that students of minority groups have less opportunities available for success in their education. I, however, do not wholly agree with this concept of past endeavors causing the issue. I believe that the students of today are too far removed from historical educational deficits for it to be a major cause. For example, my family came over from Europe in the late 1800s with absolutely nothing. Members of my family were subjugated to becoming indentured servants in order to enter the country. My family continued to be uneducated and poor until my parents generation. However even with a lack of societal prestige and education, determination and vigor have caused an exponential growth in successful educations and lives of my immigrant family. That is a reason why I feel that historical inequalities are not a logical cause of the gap that exists in today's world. I am aware, however, of the fact that other students from minority groups are not as lucky as I was to live in a safe community with good schools. I do feel as if the economic discrepancies have a huge effect on the quality of education for minority groups. Growing up near a poor, urban area, I have seen the gross inequality of funds plaguing city schools. Students are not provided with adequate books, supplies, or effective teachers. However, I do not agree with the author stating that these economic discrepancies are possibly due to the amount of minorities that attend the schools.  I think that these economic differences are due to the wages and taxes of the neighboring communities. It is very unfortunate that students of minority groups do not have the opportunity to attend schools in affluent areas that receive a lot of high taxes. It is also unfair that better teachers and resources are not provided to these students.  However, I don't think funds are allocated based on race alone. The author concludes with the fact that the two issues that need to be changed to allow for the closing of the achievement gap are school desegregation and fund allocation. These are two difficult concepts that will only see a change if the whole societal structure were to change. In the Memphis City Schools, a lot of theses issues have been challenged. The Memphis City School absorbed the surrounding, rich Shelby County Schools. There goal was to increase tax flow into the city schools and also to end the engraved line between minorities in city schools and white students in county schools. This was a huge flop. The affluent cities of the county were enraged, and have now voted to leave the system to create their own school system. This breaking off will begin next year. Seeing this all play out, it seems to me that these concepts the author offers as solutions can not and will not be able to effect the country's education until drastic societal changes are made. Is this what she is referring to as historical debt? Probably so; however, does this really effect possible success of students of minority groups? I feel as if it does not. I think the solution is to provide these students with teachers who are intelligent, hard working, and care about seeing their students succeed. I also think that the community and family lives of students need to show improvements for them to succeed. If no one at home or in the community is rooting for them to get a good education, what is their motivation.   As for the economic issue of resource allocation, I think this is a city government issue. When Memphis City Schools received a lump sum from the Bill Gates foundation, they decided to put air conditioning in the city's school buses. This same year the start of school was delayed for several weeks due to insufficient funds. It's time to look at the people who control the allocation of the money for schools with a high number of minority students. The author enforces the idea that the issue of the achievement gap is a long standing issue that has no easy solution. I agree, but I think it's time to look at what can be done now instead of focusing on possible causes that have already passed.

Field Trippin' with Josh Justice

I really enjoyed listening to Josh speak about his experiences with children who have EBD. Even though I am a special education major, I feel as if I have not had a lot of experiences with children who have this type of disability. The thing that I found most interesting was that the children are weened from all of their medications when they enter the program. I have always though that physicians were way too quick in labeling a child with a disorder and putting them on numerous medicines for it. I think that starting from baseline and seeing how the child acts without medication is a great idea. It allows you to start fresh and get the child what they really need to have a successful life. I also really enjoyed the inventive ideas he had for stopping behaviors, such as when he took the girl's shoes away. It is something that is small and not harmful, but it can have a big impact. I hope that with my future students I can find little tricks such as this to help extinguish their behaviors. I also really liked how Josh determines the function of behaviors and stops the behavior from reaching the function. This is an important aspect of behavior that a lot of educators and parents do no focus on. If a child knows that a behavior will not get them what they want, they will eventually stop exhibiting the behavior. For example when the boy acted up and got sent home from school every day, that was an easy way for him to get out of doing his schoolwork. Why wouldn't he continue misbehaving? Overall, I really enjoyed the different perspective that Josh provided on working with these children and their parents. Sometimes as teachers, we forget that a personal connection can make all the difference.

Chapter 3 Generated Questions

1. How would you teach/ model/ encourage morality and pro-social development in a special education classroom setting. (Applying)

2. Do you agree with the underlying factors (p84) that Ormrod gives for why a student may exhibit aggressive behavior?  Do you think that factors for aggression may be different in students that have an EBD or other disabilities? (Evaluating)

Chapter 2 Generated Questions

1. How would you use components of Vygotsky's theory in your classroom?(Applying)

This is applying because you are required to use information that you have read and apply it to an outside situation.

2. Provide some real life examples of accommodation and assimilation that you have experienced.

I think that this is a creating problem because you are creating real life,concrete examples of an abstract theory.

Chapter 5 Generated Questions

1. How do you feel about ability grouping based on IQ scores? Do you think this would benefit/harm the education of children who have disabilities?

I feel that this is an understanding question due to the fact that you are explaining your opinion on the topic and inferring about the topic's affect on student performance.

2. Why is collaboration with parents critical, especially in a special education setting.

I think that this is a synthesizing question due to the fact that you are required to hypothesize about the affects of collaboration.