Competence in early numeracy skills highly correlate with success in mathematics in later years; however, many students, including students with moderate and severe disabilities, lack a sound foundation in early numeracy skills. For this population, the gaps in skills widen as students progress through academic years, making it more difficult for students to access the general curriculum, and consequently, students exit school without the skills needed for the 21st century. This article provides a conceptual model for teaching early numeracy skills to elementary students with moderate and severe developmental disabilities, as well as pilot research in both special and general education settings. Limitations and suggestions for future research are included. DESCRIPTORS: mathematics, severe disabilities, moderate disability, severe disability, access to the general curriculum, inclusion In recent years there has been a growing awareness of the importance of mathematics for students to graduate The conceptualization and analysis for this project took place while Bree Jimenez served as the Coordinator of Project MASTERY at University of North Carolina at Charlotte and

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of coaching on special education teachers' implementation of function-based interventions with students with severe disabilities through the use of a delayed multiple baseline across participants design. This study also sought to examine if teachers could generalize the ability to implement function-based interventions to different situations with their students.Additionally, this study examined the effect of the function-based intervention on the students' problem and replacement behaviors. After an initial training on completion ofFBAs and implementation of function-based interventions, coaching was provided by the researcher to each teacher. Results indicated that there was a functional relationship between implementation of the coaching procedure and an increase in teacher fidelity scores. Teachers demonstrated the ability to generalize the strategies to another situation with the target student. While some improvement in student behavior was noted upon teachers implementation of the function-based intervention without coaching (e.g., teacher baseline), this improvement was not consistent for all students and across the replacement behaviors. A functional relationship was found between accurate implementation of the function-based interventions (e.g., the coaching phase) and an increase in the students' primary replacement behaviors.

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Fidelity of implementation of School-Wide Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (SWPBIS) procedures within schools is critical to the success of the program. Coaching has been suggested as one approach to helping ensure accuracy of implementation of SWPBIS plans. This study used a multiple baseline across participants design to examine the effects of coaching on elementary schools teachers' implementation of Tier 1 SWPBIS with their general education students. After providing the coach with an initial training on the SWPBIS and coaching procedures, four elementary schoolteachers were provided with side-by-side coaching during whole-class group instruction. Results indicated that there was a functional relationship between coaching and improved SWPBIS fidelity scores. Implications for practice included the need to consider selecting an appropriate person to act as the coach, scheduling difficulties, and the inability to standardize the number of opportunities for teachers to demonstrate some of the skills based on variability in student performance. However, utilizing school personnel to act as SWPBIS coaches may be a viable option to build sustainability and integrity of SWPBIS procedures within schools.

Some students with intellectual disabilities require explicit instruction of language skills, including preposition use; however, little is known about effective ways to teach preposition use to this population. This study examined direct instruction (DI) to teach students to use and respond to prepositions. Results indicated that DI was an effective way to teach prepositions. Limitations and directions for future research are discussed.