Change, School Reform And Curriculum - Essay Example

I realized that everyone can “[get] an 'A'” and “a week later [not] even remember what the course is about” (Chomsky, 2002). And when students who appear to be failing or struggling get bad grades, the question always is: Would they have failed no matter what (in which case, they were in the wrong class or expectations were unrealistic), or did they fail because the material failed to be interesting? Approaches to curriculum design and reform must always take into account students' real, lived experiences and their networks of actual interests and beliefs to be effective.

Education has to make itself relevant for students. This is especially true for curriculum reform for special education students in the field of language arts in middle school: Techniques have to be calibrated to their realistic ability levels and actual interests. A philosophy I adopt as a rubric or general organizing principle, culled from the Deweyan literature, is essentially, “You don't know if you try”. When any student arrives in any classroom, it is almost impossible to predict, even with all the knowledge about their educational background and relevant family and personal background (which is never available to teachers in toto anyways), how they might do and what they might like about the class.

Institutions can either choose to err on the side of optimism, knowing in advance they will waste some resources on students not ready for, not interested in or not capable of handling the material; or they can err on the side of pessimism, knowing in advance that they will waste opportunity and potential. The cost of the latter is too high to imagine. Limited curricula that underestimate the abilities of some students, then, should be rejected. One of the most major questions for educational advocates as regards middle school Special Education students is whether and how much they are included in regular class.

It is virtually impossible to tell if this policy should be adopted in general: “Current legislation supports the concept of including students with disabilities in the general education classroom but leaves many wondering, 'Is this approach working?' Determining the effectiveness of this practice is a task not easily accomplished. The term.is not found in any law and is used inconsistently..Inclusive programs differ greatly from district to district. [A]mount and nature of support provided to the regular classroom teacher differ dramatically from district to district” (Hines, 2001).

In general, the primary justification for this reform approach is one of justice. Disability students should be in classes with their able-bodied peers: It's a form of de jure segregation based on ability status if they're not. Legislators have embraced this reform influence whole-heartedly, which is a positive change from prior, less progressive views of students in general and Special Education students in particular. While this is a wonderful principle, and erring on the side of more inclusion and more optimism that they can participate meaningfully in the process given a chance is always good, the fact is that the analogy between racism and disability status is a poor one.

Students with learning, mental, physical or educational disabilities have innate, not just social, roadblocks to academic success. Treating them exactly like their able-bodied peers is just as inappropriate as treating black or Latina/o students identically to white students with no