How Have Students With Severe Disabilities Been Impacted by No Child Left Behind?

Question by jenniebells: How have students with severe disabilities been impacted by No Child Left Behind?

Best answer:

Answer by LDTeacher
I have been a special educator for 30 ears EVERYTHING has impacted these kids!!
The tests that they are required to take have been changed, and the graduation requirements are very different. Hopefully, the tests reflect he needs and and basics that these kids need as adults. but the problem is that the LD or mildly MR kids are the ones who don’t get enough changes in their educational program.
They are expected to do everything that a “normal” kid is supposed to do w/o appropriate adaptions….the whole thing is un fair…there will always be kids who have special needs and just how can we help them??

Answer by SPED Teacher
In Illinois we have the Illinois Alternate Assessment to follow students progress for No Child Left Behind. I teach moderately to profoundly mentally impaired students. The assessment allows us to use manipulatives such as blocks, counting bears, pictures, etc to adapt the test to their level. For some students, this is fantastic, but the problem is it does not differentiate between students’ disabilities. My student who is functioning at a 9 month old level takes the same assessment as my student who is functioning on a preschool academic level or on a 1st grade level. Obviously, this does not show the severely impaired student’s abilities. It only shows that he can not do grade level work even with modifications which we knew anyway. He will never be able to do this work, no matter how badly our legislators want him to. He simply does not have the ability to do this. It is so frustrating to me to see him making progress with what he can do but to have all of the “official” testing show that he can not do anything. In the past, there was the Illinois Assessment Portfolio, which was a portfolio demonstrating how he could meet certain goals and objectives to the best of his ability. It was so much paper work, and a lot of time and effort was put into this, but at least we were able to show what they could do. In my experience, the legislators would prefer to pretend that the severely mentally impaired students do not exist. Sorry this is so long, I finished this assessment with my students last week and I’m so frustrated!

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