Parents of children with disabilities often worry about whether their children will fit into a mainstream educational setting. One of their primary concerns is what effect their child’s disability may have on his or her educational opportunities. Watch this video to see how the parents of a child with cerebral palsy have been involved in their child’s education.
1. What positive choices did Maddie’s parents make to help shape her education?
2. How does the father in the video suggest that special education teachers can best serve children with disabilities and their families?
>> Maddie is 6 years old and in first grade. She’s one of two surviving triplets and was born premature at 28 weeks. Maddie has cerebral palsy and attends a school with an inclusive environment. For her parents the school setting has provided something for their child they worried wouldn’t be possible — acceptance into mainstream society.
>> Well, when we first realized we were going to have a child that was going to be in a wheelchair, it produced nightmares of what that child would deal with. But it’s just been so, 100 times better than I ever could have imagined. Children are so open and accepting. And the earlier you put them together, the better they are, because they — if they’ve always been around it, then it’s not unusual for them. She has friends. She has typical friends and friends with special needs. So she does great in this environment.
>> The Templeton’s experience with their school system has been positive from the very beginning. It started when Maddie was 3 in the Eclipse Preschool program.
>> We met the teacher who taught that class, and very knowledgeable, many years of experience in this area. And we had a very good relationship, number 1, she was open, she was honest with us, she was upfront. At that point in time, as you see us here, parents with kids of special needs, they go through various stages of not only dealing with it, but just the day in and day out stresses as the kids grow, what your kid can or cannot do, those things. But trying to figure out all the new information’s thrown at you all of a sudden at 3 years old. That’s very young, but they did an excellent job of showing us and opening the door for us into a system that is very complicated for most parents with kids of special needs, having no understanding of the law, no understanding of what’s involved, and all of that is overwhelming.
>> From the beginning, education professionals have empowered Maddie’s parents by allowing them to participate in decisions affecting her education. This includes the major decision concerning her writing.
>> In consultation with folks at the school and really kind of a realization of what her abilities were, we chose just to bypass them trying to teach her how to write. Realistically she could, with a lot of training and a lot of work — so much so that probably other things would be left out — she could probably write the alphabet. We chose to go just keep her, technology the way of the future anyway. I mean, we’re already here.
>> Mm-hmm, and by starting early, we feel like we’ve had a really good opportunity to tap into and try to keep her on target academically. Through what that provided us for this system, she is doing grade level work. And she’s able to keep up. It’s offered her a great opportunity to participate and be a part of the classroom.
>> In addition to collaborating on IEP issues, how else are Maddie’s parents and teachers partners in fulfilling her educational needs?
>> We have a notepad system where we have a notepad that can come back and forth between us in the book bag. We always know we can call and set up a conference anytime we want to, call up and ask questions, e-mail. I e-mail questions from time to time. If I want to know — sometimes I’ll go between, is this software in yet? I’ve heard about this software, do you think it would be good for Maddie? We’ll sometimes just discuss it over e-mail.
>> What is Mr. Templeton’s advice to special ed teachers trying to best serve the needs of the families of their students, all of their students with different disabilities and from families with diverse cultural, social and economic backgrounds? How can teachers best relate to parents?
>> Learn this person as early as you can. Get to know them the best that you can, as quickly as you can and then as the year would progress, you’ll kind of see if they’re really kind of real stressed, and less stressed in dealing with things better than they actually were the first of the year. You kind of get into a well-greased groove of figuring out how the parents cope.
==== Transcribed by Automatic Sync Technologies ====