Mainstreaming Special-Ed Students: a Question of Time

By Jay Mathews
Thursday, March 15, 2007

Dear Extra Credit:

The special education debate is of interest to me because relatives and friends have had children in county schools, and I know that the present program has benefited them. I am a former educator -- principal (with special education classes), professor of education and teacher. I know teachers in Montgomery County public schools at the elementary and high school levels who mainstream students. The issue of teachers coping with one or more mainstreamed students is complicated as students grow older and subjects become more specialized.

In primary grades, teachers are accustomed to teaching individual students or small groups who need special help, and this continues with less emphasis as students advance. In high school, however, teachers who have a special-needs student are sometimes required to prepare an entire mini-curriculum for that individual. I realize that at all levels, teachers need to deal with the individual needs of their students. I also know that some teachers prefer to minimize that and teach to the entire class -- to fully present and explain the course material. The result for most teachers who have special students is to compromise, since there is only so much time.

I have overseen and done research in education and also in management analysis for a federal agency focusing on time management. I suggest the school system do an analysis of the effects on classroom instruction in high school (and also middle school) classes where teachers are required to (a) teach a complete curriculum to their regular classes while (b) teaching one or more handicapped and/or mainstreamed students.

It should not take a rocket scientist to devise a time-study that determines how much total extra time an individual teacher spends -- per day, per week, per year -- both in class and out of class, devoted to the special student. Once that is determined, additional resources for such teachers could be provided, probably from special program funding in some cases, to help students who are short-changed because the teacher must spend an excessive amount of time away from regular classroom instruction.

Obviously, a base line is needed, and it isn't as simple as I have suggested. In addition, teachers vary in abilities and approaches, and standardization might be difficult.

Nevertheless, if significant time is taken from regular instruction, it can and should be measurable and its reasonableness determined in an era of No Child Left Behind, testing to the limits of endurance, and teacher and school accountability.

The conflicting performance data from individual schools, school districts, state offices of education and the federal education establishment make it impossible to know what works and what doesn't, given the present state of American education. However, MCPS actually is one of the best school systems in the nation. It does provide a quality education to the majority of its students. My children received a good education, and they say it could have been better if they had been more diligent. But it could be better.

John H. Langer

Bethesda

This strikes me as a good idea. If the county has already done such a study, I would love to see the results.

Dear Extra Credit:

I'm quite passionate about the subject of student motivation. We have so many kids who claim not to care, but it is a coverup for lack of reading skills, lack of preparedness, lack of confidence, lack of time to study after work and other reasons.

To not care is to give oneself permission for failure. Many kids also won't work for a teacher they don't like. Some also don't care because the information has absolutely no relevance to them. It's hard for a hungry teenager to care about calculus when he or she is holding down two jobs to help his or her single-parent family. I could go on and on.

That's where Rocket Corps has helped. These are student interns at Richard Montgomery High School. At RMHS, we have fewer than 200 kids (less than 10 percent) who have less than a 2.0 GPA. Peer tutors, mentors, peer confidants and friends, and role models of every color, race and nationality are who help here. I've got more than 95 classes with student interns who help teach, and yes, help motivate.

My interns really help. It's a more personal, peer-friendly process that reaches beyond the adult-centered curriculum. It is a means to make passing more important -- a reason to, at the very least, pass. It places role models, often of students' own culture or ethnicity, with kids to encourage them to be successful.

Juliet Good

Coordinator, Rocket Corps program

Richard Montgomery High School

The interns also learn more about the subject while teaching it. This is a terrific program.