- Middle and high school teachers are challenged to design and deliver instruction that responds to a variety of mandates deriving from both inside and outside their classroom. Many teachers feel the amount of information they are required to teach is overwhelming and difficult to accomplish successfully with the range of diversity of students in their classrooms.
- It is not extraordinary to observe secondary classrooms where students with labels such as gifted and talented, the average learner, students with learning disabilities or emotional disturbance, students at-risk for school failure, or students who are learning English as a second language are together.
- Several components of IDEA ’97 significantly impact general education teachers who may have been teaching students with mild disabilities only when they were ready to do the same work as the other students in the curriculum. Indeed, in previous years, students may not have received their education in the general education classroom as the least restrictive environment (LRE) unless they were prepared to do the same work in the same way as their typical peers.
- Some students may not be eligible under IDEA ’97 criteria for special education services, but may be eligible under the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 Section 504 for accommodations. Providing additional accommodations so that students with disabilities can access the general education curriculum seems, to some secondary educators, an unreasonable task given the complex instructional contexts and students they are already dealing with. However, it is a non-negotiable requirement that if a student is found eligible for special education services and requires accommodations in order to access the general education curriculum that the educators comply with that requirement.
- Many students with mild disabilities have both the intellect and potential to achieve comparable to their peers who do not have a disability label--when their teachers are knowledgeable about and skilled with a variety of ways of presenting and assessing content learning. However, some students with mild disabilities require accommodations for learning and showing what they know, or adaptations that somewhat modifies the amount or level of learning.
- Because the quantity and quality of such accommodations and adaptations are minimized when teachers select critical content to teach and are flexible and varied in presentation and performance areas, this module also describes universally-applicable planning and teaching methods.
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