Reflections on week 4

Thank you to those who have posted comments and questions. There were two questions posed I appreciated and thought I would address here:

Question: “I'm with Juanita it is very hard as a special ed teacher to find my niche in a classroom that belongs to a general ed teacher and help the special needs students. Do you plan to include training for both? I'm not real sure I get the idea, is it to provide more inclusion or less?”

Response: Yes training is essential. There is a fantastic training provided by The ARC of Texas (an association for children with intellectual and developmental disabilities) called “Inclusion Works.” It is geared for regular and special education teachers, and I recommend anyone working in an inclusion classroom attend this conference. I also think it is essential for experienced teachers, both special and regular education, work as mentors to provide direction and ideas on how to work collaborative as well as provide instructional strategies to our staff.

Question: “I think your research plan is interesting? I may have missed it but are you addressing whether inclusion should be on a voluntary basses. I think that would be an interesting question, because I am finding that so many general education teachers do not like to share their rooms. Some teachers have to be reminded that the special education teachers are teachers. As a special education inclusion teacher I am having a hard time finding my place in the classroom. That is way I am so interested in your plan.”

Response: Due to No Child Left Behind and our current laws regarding IEP’s and student placement, students must be served regardless of classroom availability or teacher approval, which is why a good inclusion/co-teach model must be “bought-in” by our staff. It becomes incumbent upon administrators to “sell” the benefits of the program to the teachers by showing them how it is beneficial to them as well as the students to work collaboratively in this effort.


I appreciate the comments and hope you continue to follow and post comments. They do help in the reflective process in considering points I didn't prioritize or give merit to.

I also like the suggestive methods presented in this week's readings of how to conduct my group inquiry. Initially I considered using the Nominal Group Technique; however after considering time and the nature of my inquiry, I believe utilizing the Delphi method would be more effective to attain the results desired.