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  • Essay / Effective Best Practices for Special Education Students

    Special education teachers are always looking for the latest information on best teaching practices to help their students with learning disabilities succeed in school. Over the years, new laws and mandates have been put in place to ensure that these students receive the appropriate education that students without disabilities receive. In the past, students with learning disabilities have been excluded from general education classes or have been deemed incapable of learning. Through the use of best practice procedures designed for special education students, these students can succeed in the classroom. Direct instruction has become the most commonly used method for children with special educational needs. “Direct instruction is an approach to teaching. It is skill-based and the teaching practices it involves are teacher-led. It emphasizes the use of small-group, face-to-face teaching by teachers and assistants, using carefully articulated lessons in which cognitive skills are broken down into small units, sequenced deliberately and taught explicitly” (Carnine, Silbert, Kame’enui, & Tarver, 2004). In a special education classroom, a teacher will work with a small group of students, which makes this teaching method ideal. Direct instruction is often confused with a phonics based teaching program, this is not the case. There are a few direct teaching programs based on phonics, but you will also find direct teaching programs for writing and mathematics that are widely used. Although direct instruction models vary somewhat, these models are based on similar principles of effective teaching. “Key elements of direct instruction models include: a) reviews to check student understanding......middle of article......g direct instruction and contingency rereading with a high school student. The International Journal of Special Education, 20(1), Kucan, L. and Beck, IL (2003). Inviting students to talk about explanatory texts: a comparison of two discursive environments and their effects on understanding. Reading Research and Teaching, 42, 1-29.Meichebaum, D. and Asnarow, J. (1979). Cognitive behavior modification and metacognitive development: implications for the classroom. In P. Kendall and S. Hollon, Cognitive-behavioral interventions: Theoretical research and procedures (pp. 11-35). New York: Academic Press Koskinen, P. S. and Blum, I. H. (1986). Repeated reading in pairs: a classroom strategy for developing fluent reading. The Reading Teacher, 40, 70-75.Topping, K. (1989). Peer tutoring and pair reading: combining two powerful techniques. The reading teacher, 42, 488-494.