Ready To Use Tools & Materials for Remediating Specific Learning Disabilities (Complete Learning Disabilities Library, Vol. II) - Softcover

Harwell, Joan M.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 087628280X ISBN 13: 9780876282809

Publisher: Jossey-Bass, 1995

Synopsis

Volume I in the series, Ready-to-Use Information & Materials for Assessing Specific Learning Disabilities (0-87628-279-6 / 978-0-87628-279-3) is a complete reference guide to diagnosing specific learning problems, including a list of behaviors that signal possible learning disabilities. Volume II provides 230 reproducible activities to remediate problems in reading, language arts, and math in grades K-12.

About this title

About the Author

Joan M. Harwell has over 25 years of experience as a regular classroom teacher and a special education teacher for educationally handicapped children in the schools of San Bernadino, CA. She has run several remedial programs for slow learners and is the author of Complete Learning Disabilities Handbook (1987).

From the Back Cover

This practical resource is one of two volumes in the Complete Learning Disabilities Resource Library, a unique set of instructional resources that gives practical educators timely, ready-to-use information, techniques, and activities for helping students with learning difficulties at all grade levels.

Authored by a master teacher with over 30 years of classroom experience in the field of learning disabilities, the two-volume set provides a "library" of tested materials that can save you countless hours of research and preparation time in assessing student strengths and weaknesses, interpreting special education law, working successfully with parents, creating lessons and activities to remediate specific problems, and much more.

Volume I, READY-TO-USE INFORMATION & MATERIALS FOR ASSESSING SPECIFIC LEARNING DISABILTIES, is packed with useful guidelines and tips to help you identify and diagnose specific learning problems, including a list of behaviors that signal learning disability ... a review of students and parent rights and how the law affects what the teacher may and may not do ... a list of normal developmental milestones ... specific suggestions for helping students with various difficulties ... criteria for classroom observations ... guidelines for inclusion of special students in regular classrooms ... directions for classroom behavioral management ... a teacher's guide for helping children who find reading extremely difficult ... and 76 tips for classroom and academic management and teaching reading, writing, and math ... and much more.

Volume II, READY-TO-USE TOOLS & MATERIALS FOR REMEDIATING SPECIFIC LEARNING DISABILITIES, provides over 230 reproducible remedial activities covering the basic skills areas of reading, language arts, and math, including 11 activities such as "Likenesses and Difference" for children ages 3-7 ... 24 activities like "Using Pictures to Write Sentences" for teaching beginning reading and language arts between the functional levels of 1.0 to 1.5 ... 41 activities like "Compound Words" and "Contractions" for students functioning at level 2.0 ... 63 activities plus "The Five Elements of a Good Sentence/Parts of Speech" for students functioning at level 2.5 to 2.9 ... 90 activities like writing a business letter and answering phone calls for students at level 4.5 or higher.

Moreover, for easy use, each volume is printed in a big 8-1/4" x 11" spiral-bound format that folds flat for photocopying of the scores of assessment or remedial tools it contains as many times as you need them for use with individual students, small groups, or an entire class.

In short, the Complete Learning Disabilities Resource Library gives you an unparalleled store of tested, up-to-date information and materials ready for your immediate use to help each child achieve success in learning up to the limits of his or her ability!

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

ABOUT THIS RESOURCE LIBRARY

My purpose in writing the Complete Learning Disabilities Resource Library, Volumes I and II, is to share with you some of the things I have learned in my thirty years of working with learning disabled (LD) students, both in mainstreamed classes and in special classes, at the elementary and secondary levels.

When I began teaching special education classes for educably mentally retarded students in 1964, the educational field of learning disabilities was brand new. When I heard the term for the first time, I was immediately able to attach it to three students in my junior high class, who were able to pick up skills more quickly than other students in the class. Although we did not use the term mainstreaming" in those days, I was able to find teachers willing to have these three students in their regular classes for half the day, where they received extra help and encouragement so they could maintain passing grades. It was with great satisfaction that we-the teachers and the parents-saw those three students go on to complete a vocational nurses' program. As I watched their success, it aroused in me a fierce and abiding interest in the field of learning disabilities.

By 1971, I found myself working with learning disabled students in pull-out programs at the elementary level. In those days, we sincerely believed that if we provided LD youngsters with the right curriculum and concerned teaching, students would overcome or compensate for their disabilities. We would "fix" them. Sad to say, experience over the last 25 years has not borne this out. Students with learning disabilities grow into adults with learning disabilities. Once they leave school, these students find niches where they try to blend in with other adults with varying degrees of success. We now realize how important the parent's role is in determining whether these students will be successful.

Unfortunately, economic and social pressures within today's society have created a situation where parents are not exerting the influence they were able to exert in the 1960s. Parents say they simply do not have time to spend with their children. You will note Volume I continuously mentions the importance of involving parents of LD students in being the children's helpers and advocates. When students are originally identified as LD, do not be afraid or timid to tell parents how critical it is that they maintain weekly contacts with teachers, give encouragement to their children, and offer one-to-one help with their children's assignments at home.

Some parents report that they have never met with the Student Study or I.E.P. teams. Even though the law mandates parent involvement, obviously on occasion some schools are not involving them in any other way than having them sign papers. This is a very questionable practice. It is imperative that you enlist parents' (1) input in planning for their youngster's educational program and future, and (2) help with homework and the teaching of social skills.

The Complete Learning Disabilities Resource Library will show you how to involve parents in their LD children's education-and much more!

( Volume I, Ready-to- Use Information & Materials for Assessing Specific Learning Disabilities, provides you with a helpful background on the field of learning disabilities. It is intended to assist both the regular class teacher dealing with mainstreamed students and the special education teacher. If you are a beginning teacher, Volume I provides a wealth of information to help you as you begin your work in the field. The book is also of interest to school principals and to medical practitioners as a desk reference. While Volume I mentions some of the research that has occurred in the field, it does not do so in technical terms; the book is written at a level that is understandable to parents.

( Volume II, Ready-to-Use Tools & Materials for Remediating Specific Learning Disabilities, provides you with ready-to-use materials and activities you can use with students in the areas of reading, language arts, and mathematics. The majority of learning disabled students (even those leaving our high schools) have achievement scores that fall in the 1.0 to 5.0 range; for this reason, the difficulty of the materials in Volume II are confined to that range. (Keep in mind that the materials included in Volume II are not intended to replace those supplied by your district; rather, they are supplements. Colleagues have found them particularly helpful as homework.)

I look forward to watching the developments in our field, and am confident we will find more effective ways to help LD students. There are still far too many students who slip through school without acquiring those skills necessary to enable them to feel good about themselves. It is my hope that the information you find in the Complete Learning Disabilities Resource Library will make a positive difference in what you are able to do to help students. Joan M. Harwell

Edition details

• Publisher: Jossey-Bass
• Publication date: 1995
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 087628280X
• ISBN 13: 9780876282809
• Binding: Spiral-bound
• Illustrator: Duffey Shoup Colleen
• Edition number: 2
• Number of pages: 348