Special Education Today Newsletter 2(32)

Here’s this week’s news and info since 7 February 2023?

Welcome to something like the 74th issue of the newsletter for the Special Education Today. Readers who have been following SET for more than, say, 4 to 73 issues will recognize the overall structure of this newsletter. After an update about the status of the SET community, appreciation for readers’ interactions, and the current contents, you’ll find a bit of personal reflections.

Status update

SET has has grown. We are a community of > 500 members with dozens of people who help to share the content. The community is international, including people from Africa, Asia, Europe, North and South America, and some Pacific Islands. There are people (and parents and teachers of) kids with disabilities all over Earth, and I hope that SET can provide connections to helpful resources for them—maybe for any extraterretials who are listening in via balloons.

Thanks to everyone who spreads the word (“shares”). Please continue to do so! Forward. Tweet. Give gift subscriptions. Tell friends and others! Send connections to people worldwide!

Flashes of the electrons

Part of the reason the community has grown is that SET pals interacted with the magazine over the months.

• Thanks, especially, to Angelique W., Carie Anna C., Jimmy the K, Michael G., Patti P, and Vince W. for their comments on posts. Having people share their views—whether agreeing or disagreeing with what I post—is a good way to talk about issues and promote community. Bring ‘em!

• Thanks, also, to readers who dropped “likes” on posts. Angelique W., Clay K., Kate P.,Larry M., Laura, McK., Tina C., and Scott B. I’m happy to have the compliments!

• Thanks, too, to those TWit users who like and retweet posts tweets about SET. Build the community! Thanks to y’all who have followed @speciadedtoday, @spedpro, and @johnwillslloyd. (Also, thanks to any FB users who are sharing SET posts?)

Table of contents for the past week

If you are only reading this newsletter, you are getting what I think would be called “a lagging indicator.” This newsletter appears once a week. I post messages to the Web site multiple times during the week. Only some of them are published to the newletter.

Here is a list of the posts that appeared the previous week (after last week’s newsletter):

• Clear Teaching—What is Shep Barbash’s view of Zig Engelmann https://www.specialeducationtoday.com/p/clear-teaching

• Planning individualized instruction on the basis of child performance data—What if we used aggregated progress-monitoring data to select practices? https://www.specialeducationtoday.com/p/planning-individualized-instruction

• Olds: Instruction is important Interested in a 10-year old post? https://www.specialeducationtoday.com/p/olds-instruction-is-important

• Greg Ashman has some comments about disruptive classroom behavior that we should consider—What’s the story with “Australia’s classroom behaviour crisis?” https://www.specialeducationtoday.com/p/greg-ashman-has-some-comments-about

• ASAT this month! What can these wonderful autism peeps teach us? https://www.specialeducationtoday.com/p/asat-this-month

• The popular press on “informal suspensions”—Are students with disabilities being denied appropriate education? https://www.specialeducationtoday.com/p/the-popular-press-on-informal-suspensions

• Saturday selfies: I got a “Be Kind” shirt!—Isn’t it fun to read another success story? https://www.specialeducationtoday.com/p/friday-selfies-i-got-a-be-kind-shirt

• Singing in sign—Is it enough to get me to watch the Stupid Bowl? Nope

Keep up by watching the site https://www.specialeducationtoday

Commentary

Now, I don’t know much about architecure, about designing play spaces that are good for kids with disabilities. But this picture reminded me about the importance of my incompetence regarding this issue.

Little playground in a housing location; is it enough? Photo by John Wills Lloyd.

This playgroud at an under-construction complex near my home concerns me. It’s great that there is a playground in this complex. Is it accessible? Will kids with disabilites have access?

It’s not that the desgners of this play space deliberately “dissed” kids with diabilities. I hope that they didn’t. But did the designers consider kids with disabilites when they developed plans. If they did, that’s something that I would call ‘inclusion.”

Play spaces are “not my department,” as they say. But, I think those places are important for us to consider. Just as we humans should design literacy spaces that support kids with disabilities, we should also design play spaces that work for everyone.

Now, I don’t know enough to critique the space shown in the photo (it’s < 1 mile my house), but I think it’s important for us (we who are concerned about families of kids with disabilities) to help our communities to construct play spaces that are conceptualized with thought about kids with disabilities.

So, remember, folks that I’am promoting access and making sure that our plans for access work for out children and their families.

I end here with familiar recommendations: Wear your seatbelts (and encourage other passengers in your vehicle wear them, too). Wash your hands frequently. Prefer gathering in well-ventilated spaces. Get vaccinated and help others to do so. And, of course, teach your children well. ‘Till next time....

JohnL

SET Editor guy

Charlottesville

SET should not be confused with a product with the same name that is published by the Council for Exceptional Children. SET predated CEC’s publication by decades. Despite my appreciation for CEC, this product is not designed to promote that organization.