T his study focused on the practices used by specialists and early childhood education personnel that contributed to the successful inclusion of 7 young children with significant disabilities who were served in typical community settings, such as preschools and childcare centers. Analysis identified 4 elements common to each of the research sites: attitudes, parent-provider relationships, therapeutic interventions, and adaptations. These were examined in depth to identify essential practices that contributed to the children's successful inclusion in the community childcare or preschool programs.
Conventional assessment methods have serious limitations for measuring program impact with special education populations, and do not contribute much to managing effective IEP service delivery This article focuses on the utility of Goal Attainment Scaling (GAS) as a methodology for meeting those dual needs of special educators. A feasibility study of GAS in a multicategorical preschool demonstration project pointed to the relevance of the method for improving IEP implementation effectiveness with severely impaired preschool students. However, there were serious limitations for using GAS as a measure of program impact. The advantages of GAS as an intervention to improve the overall functioning of the model program are discussed, along with considerations for improving its application to IEP management. ·Federal legislation under Public Law 94-142 has mandated the use of individualized education programs (IEPs) as a means for making the education system more responsive to the needs of the handicapped student. Regulatory provisions within the mandate are also designed to stimulate the use of evaluation procedures which are sensitive to the
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.