EDU 442

1

• EDU 442
• Teaming, Collaborating, and Communicating
• Building Relationships Between Professionals,
  Families of Young Children with Special Needs,
  and Community Agencies

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Chapter One

• Historical and Current Roles of Families and
  Parents

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Parents as the Source of Their Childs
Disabilities

• Eugenics Movement (1880-1930)
• Parents as source or cause
• Autism refrigerator moms to no known factors
  in the psychological environment of a child have
  been shown as cause
• Exceptions HIV, FAS, cystic fibrosis
• Avoid blaming parents..

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Parents as Organizational Members

• United Cerebral Palsy Assoc (UCPA) founded in
  1949
• Assoc for Children with Learning Disabilities
  founded in 1964
• ARC (formally called National Assoc for Retarded
  Children, Inc.)
• Many parent organizations tend to consist of
  white, middle-income families
• Non-categorical services in schools while most
  parent organizations are based on disability areas

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Parents as Service Developers

• During the 1950s and 1960s developed services for
  children at all ages
• Parents should be supported to be parents first

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Parents as Recipients of Professionals Decisions

• During the 1960s and 1970s a teacher knows best
  attitude existed
• Some educators still believe they know what is
  best for a student, particularly in evaluation,
  IEP, and placement
• Parents may feel intimidated and angry
• Cultural and diverse backgrounds
• Equal partner with trust

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Parents as Teachers

• Family environment can influence childrens
  intelligence (Hunt, 1972)
• Head Start
• Ecological linked family involvement to human
  development
• Parent literature in the 1970s refers to mother
  and not father
• Direct teaching methods could be a challenge
• Topics of interest homework, advocacy, future
  planning, information exchanges

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Parents as Political Advocates

• ARC, CEC
• P.L. 94-142 and five major amendments since then
  (IDEA)
• Additional case law
• In Illinois
• Marie O case http//laws.findlaw.com/7th/963609.ht
  ml
• Corey H case http//laws.lp.findlaw.com/7th/012707
  .html

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Free Appropriate Public Education (FAPE)

• Legislation providing services for young children
  with disabilities (1968 model demonstration
  grants)
• 1975 Public Law 94-142 Education for all
  Handicapped Children Act Provided 5-21 FAPE
• 1986 P.L. 99-457 passed as an amendment to
  94-142 (Reauthorized in 1997 as Individuals with
  Disabilities Education Act (IDEA)
• Assured 3-5 FAPE
• Program (Part H) for infants and toddlers 0-3
  (now Part C of IDEA)
• Includes children identified with developmental
  delays in one or more areas and those at-risk for
  developmental delays
• Family-focused intervention

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Families as Collaborators

• Paradigm shift from Parent Involvement to
  include all family members
• Collaboration the dynamic process of families
  and professionals equally sharing their resources
  in order to make decisions jointly.
• Families will be equal partners with the schools
• Students are also key collaborators
• Self-determination --choosing how to live ones
  life consistent with ones own values,
  preferences, strengths and needs

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Chapter Two

• Schools as Systems The Context for
  Family-Professional Collaboration

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Systems Theory

• Examination of the organization of complex
  phenomena
• Investigation of the principles common to complex
  entities
• Posits models which can be used to describe them

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Systems Approach

• Recognizes the complex nature of social ecology
• Emphasizes the interactions and connectedness of
  different components of a system
• Regards each component of a system as integral to
  the optimum functioning of that system
  self-regulating systems which we might call
  "cybernetic".

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Social Systems Impacting Human Development(Bronfe
nbrenner)

• In the ecology of the child, important systems
  include family and school
• Micro-system
• Meso-system
• Exo-system
• Macro-system

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Micro-System

• Child and Family Interpersonal interactions. The
  level within which a child experiences immediate
  interactions with other people. At the beginning,
  the micro-system is the home, involving
  interactions with only one or two people in the
  family ("dyadic" or "triadic" interaction). As
  the child ages, the micro-system is more complex,
  involving more people, such as in a child-care
  center or school. Bronfenbrenner noted that when
  increased numbers in a child's micro-system
  result in more enduring reciprocal relationships,
  then increasing the size of the system will
  enhance child development.

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Meso-Systems

• The interrelationships among settings such as
  home, child care center school. The stronger
  and more diverse the links among settings, the
  more powerful an influence the resulting systems
  will be on the child's development. In these
  interrelationships, the initiatives of the child,
  and the parents' involvement in linking the home
  and the school, play roles in determining the
  quality of the child's meso-system.

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Exo-Systems

• The quality of interrelationships among settings
  is influenced by forces in which the child does
  not participate, but which have a direct bearing
  on parents and other adults who interact with the
  child. These may include the parental workplace,
  school boards, social service agencies, and
  planning commissions.

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Macro-System

• Macro-systems represent society at-large. They
  are the interlocking social forces overarching
  the world of the child and those
  interrelationships indirectly influence the
  shaping of human development. They provide the
  broad ideological and organizational patterns
  within which the meso- and exo-systems operate.
  Macro-systems are not static, but might change
  through evolution and revolution. For example,
  war, economic recession, and technological
  changes may produce such changes.

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IDEA 1997

• Emphasizes family involvement/parent partnerships
  to a greater degree than it did before

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General Education Reform Movement

• Enhancing the Curriculum and Student Outcomes
• A Nation at Risk (1983)
• Standards-based education
• Restructuring School Governance
• Bottom up approach
• Concern that compliance is the goal.
• Reshaping Service Delivery

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Overlapping Spheres of Influence of Family,
School, and Community on Childrens Learning
(Epstein, 1994)

• Family
• School
• Community

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Model for Partnerships(Epstein, 1994)

• Parenting
• Communicating
• Volunteering
• Extending Learning in Home
• Decision Making
• Collaborating with Community

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Phases of Special Education Reform

• Reshaping FAPE
• Zero reject
• Nondiscriminatory evaluation
• LRE
• Due process
• Parent participation

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LRE Restructuring Placement Decision-Making

• Least Restrictive Environment (LRE)
• Continuum of Placements
• Mainstreaming
• Regular Education Initiative (REI)
• Inclusion
• As stated in IDEA, the student is to be educated
  with nondisabled peers to the maximum extent
  appropriate
• To ensure that this principle is applied in
  making placement decisions, IDEA begins with the
  premise that the general education classroom is
  where all children belong

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Continuum of Placements(From Least to Most
Restrictive Environment)

• I General education classroom with no supports
• II Gen ed class consultant
• III Gen ed class spec. ed resource room
• IV Spec ed class some general education
• V Special education classroom 100
• VI Separate school for students with special
  needs
• VII Residential School or Homebound/ Hospital
  instruction program

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Determining the Least Restrictive Environment

• Education placement is decided only after
  educators and parents agree on the IFSP/IEP
• Two important questions
• What is the appropriate placement for the
  student, given his or her annual goals (IEP)
• Which of the placement alternatives is consistent
  with the principle of LRE?

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Types of Power(Zipperlen OBrien, 1994)

• Power-over
• Power-with
• Power-from-within

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Activity

• 1. Working alone
• Describe your experiences with family involvement
  in education and their possible influences on
  academic outcomes.
• 2. Working with a partner or in groups, and using
  your texts as reference material
• A. Identify some key issues that were previously
  unknown to you, in regard to the historical,
  legal, philosophical basis for family
  participation in education and family-centered
  services
• B. Describe how your understanding, attitude
  and/or behavior might be altered by this
  information.