ED 230 and 230 2 Nature of Exceptional Children
Final Portfolio – Spring 2021
The purpose of this final assignment is to summarize and synthesize what you have learned in
this course about teaching students with exceptional needs. In addition, the portfolio should serve as a
reference for you in your future career. Organize your portfolio according to the sections listed below.
You may use LiveText, livebinders.com, google docs or other electronic portfolios.
1) For each section, write a reflection (approx. one page) regarding how you have interacted
with the information in the section through class activities, your personal interviews, your service
hours, and/or your clinical hours this semester. For Section 2 and 3 also discuss some aspect of
assistive technology that was discussed or you saw in your practical experiences that you felt was
useful.
2) Include the guided notes for each chapter.
3) Include at least one article or artifact in each section that you feel would be important for
you to reference for another class, your portfolios (education majors), or for your future classroom!
Section I – Overview of Special Education and Working with Families
▪ Reflection
▪ Chapters 1 – 6 (3 guided notes)
▪ An article or artifact representing a key concept(s) of these chapters
Section 2 – High Incidence Categories of Disability under IDEA
▪ Reflection
▪ Chapters 7 - 11
▪ An article or artifact representing a key concept(s) of these chapters
Section 3 – Low Incidence Categories of Disability under IDEA, Gifted/Talented
▪ Reflection
▪ Study Guides 12 – 17
▪ An article or artifact representing a key concept(s) of these chapters
Appendix
▪ Personal interviews (2)
▪ Service Hour verification or review of service agencies
▪ Strategy Presentation Rubric
▪ Special Education Clinical Reflection
ED 230 and 230 2 Nature of Exceptional Children
Final Portfolio – Spring 2021
Portfolio:
Section 1
▪
▪
▪
_____ (25)
Reflection (includes mention of assistive technology and at least one of these: class
activities, personal interviews, service hours, clinical hours)
Guided Notes
Article/Artifact
Section 2
_____ (25)
▪
Reflection (includes mention of assistive technology and at least one of these: class
activities, personal interviews, service hours, clinical hours)
▪ Guided Notes
▪ Article/Artifact
Section 3
▪
▪
▪
_____ (25)
Reflection (includes mention of assistive technology and at least one of these: class
activities, personal interviews, service hours, clinical hours)
Guided Notes
Article/Artifact
Appendix
_____ (20)
▪
▪
Personal Interviews (2)
Service Hour verification or review of agencies
▪ Strategy Presentation rubric
▪ Special Education Clinical Reflection
Correct spelling and grammar
Total
Comments:
_____ ( 5)
_______
100
Category of Disability
under IDEA
Traumatic Brain Injury
Definitions
Characteristics
Causes
-an acquired injury to
the brain caused by an
external physical force,
resulting in total or
partial functional
disability or
psychosocial
impairment, or both,
that adversely affects a
child’s educational
performance
Physical Changes
Falls (35%)
- Coordination
problems, physical
weakness, and fatigue
- most frequent among
young children from
birth to age 4 and
adults age 75 or older
- Traumatic brain injury
applies to open or
closed head injuries
resulting in
impairments in one or
more areas, such as
cognition; language;
memory; attention;
reasoning; abstract
thinking; judgment;
problem-solving;
sensory, perceptual,
and motor abilities;
psychosocial behavior;
physical functions;
information processing;
and speech
Cognitive and
Academic Changes
- intelligence quotients
(IQs) were within the
low average to average
range
- Students who had
sustained a severe brain
injury had increased
rates of intellectual
impairment, particularly
related to nonverbal
skills. The cognitive
impact of brain injury
often results in
problems associated
with memory, planning,
problem solving, and
abstract reasoning
Automobile accidents
(17%)
- leading cause of death
from TBI and occur
most frequently among
adults ages 20 to 24
years
-most common when
driving under the
influence of alcohol
Being struck by or
against something
(17%)
-typically occurs in
sports or recreation
when a person collides
with a moving or
stationary object
Research-based
Instructional Strategies
Assistive Technology
- can be used to address
needs in many areas,
including:
• Environmental access
• Mobility
• Positioning
• Communication
• Learning
To access environment
e.g., switches to turn
book pages
to address positioning
needs
e.g., standers to enable
students to be in the
same position as their
peers without
disabilities
to communicate
e.g., augmentative and
alternative
communication systems
Emotional and
Behavioral Changes
- Mild TBI has few longterm social
consequences;
however, students with
moderate and severe
TBI have an increased
risk for problems in
building close
friendships, solving
social problems, and
recognizing emotions
- Students who
experience severe TBI
at an earlier age have
significantly higher
levels of internalizing
and externalizing
behavior problems
- Depending on the
severity and age of
injury, students with TBI
have an increased risk
for challenges related
to inhibiting, stopping,
or redirecting their
ongoing actions
Assaults (10%)
- frequently involve
firearms
-Non-firearm assaults
include child abuse that
results in head injuries
in infants.
Unknown/Other
Causes (21%)
Systems of Least
Prompts
- also called least-tomost prompting, which
uses the time delay, but
also uses “a hierarchy
of prompts that moves
progressively from
having a minimal
influence to having a
maximal influence
- An alternative to SLP is
the most-to-least
prompts strategy, which
follows the same
logic as SLP, but in the
opposite direction—
that is, from maximumto minimum-intensity
prompt. This is used
particularly with the
student who has
multiple disabilities to
ensure that the student
is always reinforced for
the correct behavior.
Token Economy System
(strategy presentation)
-a strategy to make kids
follow rules
-similar to rewards
system in which kids
can earn tokens as
rewards
Category of Disability
under IDEA
Speech and Language
Disorders
Definitions and
Characteristics
a communication disorder
such as stuttering,
impaired articulation, a
language impairment, or a
voice impairment that
adversely affects a child's
educational performance.
Causes
Biological Cause
-caused by an identifiable
problem in the neuromuscular
mechanism of the person
Environmental Cause
Speech Disorder
Language Disorder
difficulty producing sounds
as well as disorders of
voice quality (for example,
a hoarse voice) or fluency
of speech, often referred
to as stuttering
difficulty receiving,
understanding, or
formulating ideas and
information
Research-based Instructional
Strategies
Social Stories
Kylie and Joey’s disabilities, Rett
syndrome and autism spectrum
disorders, respectively, are both
examples of congenital disorders. In
Kylie’s case the cause of her disability
is known and is attributed to
genetics. However, in Joey’s case the
cause is not currently known.
- those with no identifiable
biological or neurological cause
Congenital Cause
- occurs at or before birth
Acquired Cause
- disorder that occurs well after
birth
Functional Cause
- may be congenital or acquired
Facilitative Language Strategies
• Focused contrast
• Modeling
• Event casts
• Open questions
• Expansions
• Recasts
• Redirects and prompted
initiations
Receptive Language
Disorder
difficulty receiving or
understanding information
Expressive Language
Disorder
difficulty formulating ideas
and information
Phonology
use of sounds to make
meaningful syllables and
words
Morphology
system that governs the
structure of words
Syntax
provides rules for putting
together a series of words
to form sentences
Semantics
meaning of what is
expressed
Pragmatics
use of communication in
contexts
Visual Supports
• Graphic organizers
• Visual schedules
• Visual timers
AAC Language Input Strategies
-should focus on teaching
communication rather than solely
teaching the student to operate AAC
systems
- SAL (system for augmenting
language) is one instructional
strategy for modeling how to use
AAC. It focuses on augmented input
of language.
overall organizer for
language
Articulation
speaker’s production of
individual or sequenced
sounds.
Apraxia
motor speech disorder that
affects the way in which a
student plans to produce
speech
Voice Disorders
quality of the voice is
affected by problems of
breath support or vocalfold functioning as well as
resonance
repeated abuse of the
vocal folds may cause vocal
nodules
Fluency Disorders
characterized by
interruptions in the flow of
speaking, such as atypical
rate or rhythm, as well as
repetitions of sounds,
syllables, words, and
phrases.
Category of Disability
under IDEA Chapters 15
& 16
Hearing Impairment
Definitions
(Chap. 17 Gifted and
Talented not under
IDEA)
Hearing loss is
determined by an
audiologist, who is a
special clinician trained
to identify and treat
problems in hearing or
balance. Pediatric
audiologists use a
number of different
tools to identify how
loud sounds must be
before a child can hear
them, and then they
map the results on a
chart called an
audiogram.
Characteristics
Causes
Research-based
Instructional Strategies
Conductive
- there is a problem
with how the outer ear
(what you see) or
middle ear (ear canal,
tiny bones, ear drum)
works
-can be temporary
-they hear voice like the
voice with a cold
Congenital
- present at birth
- can be caused by
prenatal ill-nesses such
as rubella, diabetes,
cytomegalovirus (CMV),
or other complications
during pregnancy
- 50 percent of
congenital hearing loss
is caused by genetics, or
hereditary factors
FM/DM System
Sensorineural
- there is a problem
with how the inner ear
(snail-like cochlea,
auditory nerve) works
- sounds are not only
softer but also unclear
and distorted
Mixed
both conductive and
sensorineural causes
are present.
Acquired
- after birth
- includes diseases such
as meningitis, measles,
mumps, or chickenpox,
among others
- has two components:
a wireless microphone
that is
either worn or held by
the teacher or by
anyone providing
instruction, and a
receiver that is
connected wirelessly to
the student’s hearing
aids or cochlear
implant(s)
Communication Access
Realtime Translation
(CART)
- an accommodation
that is typically
requested only for older
students with good
Deaf Culture
Vision Impairment
Low vision
- has a long and rich
history in the US, and
has a strong sense of
community and shared
language
-an impairment in vision
that, even with
correction, adversely
affects a child’s
educational
performance
- describes individuals
who read print,
English reading
proficiency
- The CART writer either
is present in the
classroom during
instruction or can be
listening remotely
through a microphone
that the teacher uses.
The writer captions all
spoken information,
which is then
transmitted in real time
to a handheld screen at
the student’s desk or on
a laptop
Lack of Incidental
Learning
-Incidental learning is
problematic for all
children with visual
impairments
Congenital
- occurs at birth or, in
the case of blindness,
before visual memories
have been established
- can affect the child’s
earliest access to
Expanded core
curriculum
- includes the following
areas: compensatory
and communication
skills, social and interaction skills, orientation
and mobility (O&M)
skills, independent
although they may
depend on optical aids,
such as magnifying
lenses, to see better. A
few read both braille
and print; all rely
primarily on vision for
learning. Individuals
with low vision may or
may not be legally
blind.
Functionally Blind
Totally Blind
- individuals who
typically use braille for
efficient reading and
writing. They may rely
on their ability to use
functional vision for
other tasks, such as
moving through the
environment or sorting
items by color
- describes those
individuals who do not
receive meaningful
Limitations in Ability to
Get Around
information and
experiences.
- Individuals who have
visual impairments are
limited in their
Adventitious
spontaneous ability to
move safely in and
- vision loss after having
through their
unimpaired vision
environment. This
restriction influences
children’s early motor
development and
exploration of the world
and thus affects their
knowledge base and
social development
Limitations in
Interactions with
Environment
- Knowledge about and
control over the
environment often are
areas of concern for
individuals with visual
impairments. In some
cases, their limited
living skills, recreation
and leisure skills, selfdetermination skills,
use of assistive
technology, sensory
efficiency skills, and
career/vocational skills.
Orientation and
Mobility Training
-Development of body
image
-Understanding physical
environment and space
-Orientation to different
environments
-Ability to travel in
school and community
environments
-Opportunities for
unrestricted,
independent movement
and play
input through the visual
sense
-generally read braille
vision reduces their
level of readily acquired
information about their
environment and their
ability to act on that
information. For
instance, they cannot
determine at a glance
the source of a loud
crash or a burning
smell, so they cannot
quickly determine an
appropriate reaction.
Adapted Materials
- A variety of adapted
materials are available
for use by students with
visual impairments,
including braille and
large-print maps,
measuring devices,
graph paper, writing
paper, calendars, flash
cards, and geometric
forms. A good source of
adapted materials is the
American Printing
House for the Blind.
Assistive Technology
(Braille Reader)
- several types of
devices make access to
the curriculum much
easier for people with
visual impairment
-optical character
reader, which will
convert the print to an
electronic form that he
can either emboss in
braille or read aloud
using the computer’s
voice synthesizer
Gifted and Talented
- identified at the
preschool, elementary,
or secondary level as
possessing
demonstrated or
potential abilities that
give evidence of high
performance capability
in areas such as
intellectual, creative,
specific academic,
or leadership ability, or
in the performing and
visual arts, and who by
reason thereof, require
services or activities not
ordinarily provided by
the school
Creativity
- Fluent, flexible,
imaginative, and
original thinkers
-Intrinsically motivated
and curious
-Adventurous, risk
takers, and persistent
problem solvers
-Able to generate
multiple ideas and
solutions to problems
-Intellectually playful
and willing to
manipulate ideas
-Able to improvise and
comfortable with
uncertainty.
Whether giftedness
originates from nature
and/or nurture has long
been debated. In terms
of nature, neuroimaging
techniques have
enabled scientists to
document differences
in the structure of the
brains and the
neurological functioning
of students who are
gifted
Acceleration
- Students start
kindergarten or college
early, skipping one or
more grades in order to
experience higher levels
of instruction, and/or
attend a higher-gradelevel program for part
of the school day.
Enrichment
- all-school enrichment
programs provide
proven ways to educate
students who are gifted
Leadership
- Key characteristics
associated with
leadership include the
ability to engender
others’ trust, to assess
situations quickly, and
to take direction for the
benefit of a group
Visual and Performing
Arts
- Students with talents
and gifts in visual and
performing arts often
pursue these avenues
with determination,
seeking opportunities
to create and perform
whenever they can.
-Determining
“giftedness” in these
areas can be subjective;
those determinations
involve the use of
in the general
education classroom, to
the benefit of all
students
- Address the top 20
percent of students in a
school through special
interest groups,
specialized instruction
in small groups, and
mentoring on individual
projects
Compacting the
Curriculum
- differentiation method
teachers can use to
make sure all students
are challenged
especially for students
who are gifted who
already mastered the
given materials
Differentiated
Instruction (See Week
4)
portfolios, performance
evaluations, and
product assessment
activities
Social and Emotional
- children who are
gifted experience lower
levels of anxiety and
depression than their
typical peers, although
this can change as
children enter
adolescence,
particularly for girls
- Many students who
are gifted tend to
develop a sense of
perfectionism that can
lead to negative selfjudgments.
Differentiated
instruction modifies
traditional instruction.
In differentiated
instruction, a teacher
uses more than one
instructional
methodology, such as
increasing students’
access to instructional
materials in a variety of
formats, expand-ing
test-taking and data
collection options, and
varying the complexity
and nature of content
presented during the
course of a unit of study
Guided Notes Exceptional Lives Name: Firas Sawaf
Chapters 3 & 4
1)pp.66-76
Partnering with Families
Define:
Family – group of two or more people related by birth, marriage, or adoption who reside
together.
Demographics of families – statistical comparison of population. Differ for youth with and
without disabilities. This can affect the capacity of families to provide school-related support.
Family domains – 1) emotional well-being 2) parenting 3) family interaction 4)
physical/material well-being and 5) disability-related support
Parent role in the 6 IDEA principles – be partners with professionals in making decisions about
the education of their children.
Principles of Family-Professional Partnerships – 1) communication 2) professional competence
3) commitment 4) advocacy 5) respect and 6) equality
How will this research inform your future relationships with families and parents?
This research helps me realize that as a future professional working with students with
disabilities, I should include the families and parents of students with disabilities in planning
their appropriate education. This tells me that I should communicate with them, make myself
knowledgeable in my role for me to be competent, commit myself in my goals, support the
parents in their advocacy towards appropriate education for students with disability, respect
them, and treat them and their children the same as how I treat other parents and their
children without disability.
2) pp. 81-86, 109-117
IEP meetings
These are very important sections of the text. Please review and take notes that will help you
retain this information. Additional information related to terms from week 1 are built on here.
In week 3 we will be simulating an IEP meeting with the purpose of putting this information into
action.
IEP – Individualized Education Program
Discuss what your role would be in an IEP meeting in the future. General education teacher?
Special education teacher? Speech/language therapist? Occupational/physical therapist?
Right now, I can see myself more of being a general education teacher with a few students
having disabilities. With this, I would be meeting with their parents to talk about IEP of their
children.
3) pp.99-108
Nondiscriminatory Evaluation
Define:
Screening – assessing for a condition or situation in the absence of symptoms
Pre-referral process – aims to address difficulty in academic content areas. This can involve one
or more of the following:
• Delivery of more intense instructions
• Instruction for a longer duration
• Different types of instructions provided to the student to address his/her performance
before referring him/her for evaluation for eligibility for special education services
Criterion-reference assessments – Measure student performance compared to an existing or
predetermined standard
Curriculum-based assessments – Directly assessing the student’s skills in the content of the
curriculum.
Progress monitoring –Involves assessing students in areas in which universal screening
determined that students were at risk for academic difficulties.
Formative assessment – Involves frequent assessment of student progress with wider rays of
strategies across time to check for student understanding and learning.
Summative assessment – Used to assess educational outcomes like results in state tests in core
content areas.
Discuss why all of these measures of evaluation are essential for IDEA to be effective.
All the measures mentioned above are essential for IDEA to be effective because they involve
processes that screen students to see if IDEA can be applied to them. They also determine what
other parts of the program the students need. The evaluation also assesses the student’s
performance to measure their progress and assess their overall development from the
program.
4) pp.94-97
Discuss ‘Challenging Academic Content Standards’ and ‘College and Career Readiness
Standards’.
Academic content standards are the same among the US states. These standards describe what
our society thinks all students should know which is also part of IDEA’s policy goals. The state
set challenging academic content standards for each of grades 3 to 8 and at least once in grades
9 through 12. This helps students prepare for postsecondary education as these standards align
with postsecondary entrance requirements. College and career readiness standards are
somewhat similar as they aim to prepare students to be equipped with the knowledge they
need to be ready for college and career as soon as they graduate high school.
Guided Notes Exceptional Lives Name: Firas Sawaf
Chapters 1&2
1) pp.38
Define:
Culture – “customary beliefs, social forms, and material traits of a racial, religious, or social
group; also, the characteristic features shared by people in a place and time”
Macroculture – a dominant societal culture that majority of the people in a place and time
share. It can be democracy and capitalism in the United States.
Microculture – specific beliefs, forms, and traits that some people share with others but not
with all. This can be related to language, gender, religion, age, class, race,
disability/exceptionality, income or geography that is not the same for everyone.
Where do people with disabilities fit in these terms?
Since people with disabilities share traits that is common among them but not to all people in a
specific place and time, then they fit in microculture. However, they can also share the same
societal culture with majority of the people which also makes them fit in a bigger microculture.
2)pp. 38-42, 6-7
Summarize the history of disability court cases and legislation beginning with the 1950s and
ending with Endrew F. v Douglas County School District (2017)
In the 1950s, students with disabilities were discriminated in schools in two different ways: 1)
they were not admitted in schools and 2) if they were admitted, they were not given effective
or appropriate education. Parents of children with disability began to form advocacy
organizations to assert their children’s rights to proper education. These parents began to sue
state and school officials for exclusions and misclassification of students with disability. They
used the Brown v. Board of Education case to argue their cause that since schools should not
discriminate students based on race, they should also not discriminate based on disability.
In 2017, Endrew won high his right to an education. Since he was 2 years old, Endrew was
diagnosed to have autism and later on ADHD. This made him eligible for free public education
or FAPE. However, the public school did not provide the appropriate education for him. His
parents had to transfer him to a private school for him to progress – the progress that he did
not achieve in his years in public school. They lost in the federal trial court but they brought
their case to the Supreme Court and won.
Discuss the parallels with this movement against discrimination with the civil rights
movement. The women’s right movement.
This movement for students with disability is parallel with other movements against civil rights
movements and women’s right movement. All these movements sought to end injustice among
people who share microculture. These movements aimed to end injustice. They all ended up in
better equality among people and changes in laws that became more favorable to different
groups in the society. The advocacy groups against discrimination of people with disability
resulted to congress brining the IDEA that protects people with disability. This is also the same
with civil rights movement that resulted to laws against discrimination as well as the women’s
right movement that resulted to allowing women to vote and enjoy the same benefits that men
have.
3)pp. 7-25
Individuals with Disabilities Education Act – also known as IDEA that provides FAPE and other
programs that aim to provide prevention, intervention, and education for children and youth
with disabilities from birth through 21.
Define:
Free Appropriate Public Education (FAPE) – this enables students with disabilities the right to
be given free appropriate public education from birth until they reach age 21. The provisions
given to students vary by age.
Special Education – Specially designed instruction for students with disabilities, at no cost to
student’s parents, that meets the unique needs of the student in school.
Related Services – Supplemental instructions or services that are necessary to assist the
student in benefiting from specialized education.
Supplementary Aids and Services – Aid, services, and other supports provided in regular
education classes other education-related settings to help students with disabilities learn with
nondisabled students.
Zero Reject – This prohibits schools from excluding any student with disability to have free
appropriate public education.
Nondiscriminatory Evaluation – This ensures educators are giving appropriate education to
students with disability. This evaluates whether students really have disability. If the student
has no disability based on the evaluation, the IDEA will no longer apply on that student. If the
evaluation shows that student has a disability, then the assessment would define whether the
student needs special education and related services.
Appropriate Education – Education given according on how educators, parents, and sometimes
student plan what services should be provided and where they will be provided. There are also
standards set by IDEA that educators must meet.
Substantive Definition of Appropriate – tells what students have right to receive. It relates to
the content of the student’s curriculum.
Least Restrictive Environment – This is an environment in which students with disability learn
alongside students who do not have disabilities.
Procedural Due Process – The process that makes schools and parents accountable to each
other for carrying out the student’s IDEA rights.
Parent and Student Participation – An accountability technique of IDEA that gives the right for
parents to be part of the IEP team, to receive notices from school about free appropriate public
education before they make changes, to use techniques to resolve disputes, review child’s
records, and control who has access to personal information of their child.
IDEA includes detailed requirements as to how children with disabilities can be disciplined.
Review page 14 and discuss why you think this amount of detail is necessary in the law.
The amount of detail about disciplining children with disabilities is necessary in the law to
ensure that children with disabilities are disciplined appropriately. It is clear that the equal
treatment means disciplining all students with or without disabilities equally, but there are
exceptions. Since students with disabilities may have different behavior that can be out of their
control, it is important that they are not being disciplined for these behaviors related to their
disabilities. Putting this in the law ensures that children with disabilities will not be maltreated
and will still receive appropriate discipline necessary for their own growth.
4)pp. 42-50
Cultural Bias and Student with Disabilities
Define:
Intersectionality – Introduced by Crenshaw (1989). Happens when two aspects intersect such
as the intersection of race and sex for Black women who get double discrimination for their
race and sex.
Disproportionality – Underrepresentation or overrepresentation of students with disabilities.
Restraint – Divided into two: 1) Mechanical 2) Physical. Mechanical restraint is any device or
equipment used to restrict the movement of student (ex: handcuffs, tapes, and ropes). Physical
restraint is a personal restriction to reduce the ability of the student to move his/her torso,
arms, legs, or head freely.
Seclusion – Student is involuntarily confined alone in a room or area and prevented from
leaving.
Reviewing the statistics in these pages, what summary statements can you make?
Based from the statistics, we can say that all people from all cultures benefited from IDEA as
long as they belong to the microculture of people with disability. Majority of them also belong
in the regular class or mixed with students who do not have disabilities, but this does not
happen all the time. These students with disabilities are more prone to experience bullying
since they are two times more likely to be bullied than they non-disabled classmates. Majority
of restraints also come from students with disabilities.
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