Bilingual Special Education Interface

This book is about children who are learners at risk. They are bilingual or are from bilingual homes and sometimes have legitimate special education needs. We see a tremendous need for a meaningful interface between bilingual education and special education. During the last 40 years, special education classes were over-promoted and misused for these students in many parts of the United States. Declaring a student "mentally retarded," "learning disabled," or otherwise in need of special education and placing the child in a special class or resource room became an accepted method of educating ethnically, linguistically, and socio-economically different children. In some cases these children had authentic disabilities, but in other cases their linguistic or cultural background was the primary factor in their low test scores and subsequent special education placement. Because of the strong emphasis on inclusion and whole-school programs, the decades of the 1990s and 2000s have presented new challenges in properly identifying and serving these students. Because of the tremendous increase in the numbers of Asian, Hispanic, and Native American students, school districts have been unable to ignore the need for adjusting instructional programs and service delivery models to better serve these groups and other linguistically and culturally different individuals. One result has been the improvement and expansion of bilingual education to provide for the educational needs of the students with limited proficiency in English. But the bilingual student with special learning needs, including authentic disabilities, continues to be improperly identified and inappropriately served in many school districts. It is on this group of learners that we focus our attention in this text. By interfacing the common knowledge base, programs, and methodologies of bilingual education and special education, we believe that these learners can achieve success and maximize their potential. John Dewey's famous dictum that "what the best and wisest father wants for his child, the state should want for all its children" continues to have special significance today." By "all," we mean Anglo, Asian, Hispanic, Native American, African American, the poor, the rich, and all other linguistic, ethnic, cultural, and socioeconomic groups in the United States. Objective of This Book We have written this book as a resource for both regular and special education teacher trainers, staff developers, consultants, and others engaged in the preparation of ancillary school personnel, such as school counselors, psychologists, and speech and language specialists. It is designed to familiarize educators with the major needs of the exceptional child with limited skills in English. We provide information on inclusion, model programs, curriculum, and strategies for better educating this unique population of students. Organization and Flexibility We organized this text to emphasize the interface between bilingual and special education. We carefully sequenced the chapters to familiarize you with key issues from both areas and to demonstrate the creative convergence that can result when these two educational approaches are meaningfully integrated in an inclusive and collaborative environment. The major issues within the emerging field of bilingual special education have all been included in the text. We have tried to strike a balance between the theoretical and the practical dimensions of the material. We wrote this book to promote maximum flexibility as well as breadth of coverage. Although it is designed as a text for courses in special education, bilingual education, and bilingual special education, certain chapters can also be used as supplementary material for many other education courses. By using the reference list and appendixes, you can achieve greater depth and breadth of treatment. Features of the Fourth Edition In resBaca, Leonard is the author of 'Bilingual Special Education Interface', published 2003 under ISBN 9780131138438 and ISBN 013113843X.