The establishment of Common Core State Standards (CCSS) for students nationwide represents a particularly robust challenge for teachers of students with special needs. On the one hand, advocates for students with disabilities have made it clear that they want these students to be held to the same high level of achievement as typically developing students. On the other...Read More
Yesterday there was a segment on MSNBC (part of NOW with Alex Wagner) that focused on neurodiversity as the next civil rights movement. The focus was on one school in New York, The IDEAL School of Manhattan,which supports full inclusion of students with disabilities into the mainstream, and cultivates an attitude among all students of embracing...Read More
The use of Howard Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences (MI theory) has been increasing by leaps and bounds in countries across the globe. In many countries, it has become part of national policy. In India, for example, as part of its National Curriculum Framework for School Education teachers are required to have familiarity with the...Read More
The rapid pace of new educational technologies has made it so that students with special needs can accomplish many things that were difficult or even impossible for them only a few years ago. The following list contains some of the best apps I’ve seen for kids with neurodiversities in communication, reading, sociability, attention, and behavior. Dragon...Read More
A new study at Michigan State suggests that there is limited vocabulary instruction in kindergarten classes across the U.S., particularly for those students living at the poverty level. The is problematic because numerous studies have noted how building a good vocabulary right from start of schooling is directly related to later academic achievement and to success in a...Read More
Today’s edition of Education Week, education’s news site of record, contains a Commentary piece that I wrote on the importance of valuing the strengths of students with special needs. In the article I write about my experience as a special education teacher almost forty years ago. I share the disillusionment I felt when I realized...Read More
There’s a news feature in the New York Times today (“Drowned in a Stream of Prescriptions”) that focuses on the problem of addiction to ADHD medications. While the article deals mainly with college students and young adults who deceive mental health professionals into thinking they have ADHD so that they can receive these highly addictive...Read More
Yesterday in the New York Times an op ed piece appeared entitled ”Successful and Schizophrenic’‘ that affirmed the importance of neurodiversity and the value of strengths in people with mental health labels. Written by Elyn Saks, who has lived with schizophrenia all her life yet been highly successful in several fields (professor of law, psychoanalyst, MacArthur fellow), the piece...Read More
The American Institute for Learning and Human Development has just produced five short videos that take up the concept of neurodiversity (the idea that disabilities should be regarded instead as diversities), and apply it to the following diagnoses: learning disabilities, autism, ADHD, intellectual disabilities, and emotional and behavioral disorders. In each video, the executive director...Read More
Follow Me On: