Reply to Anyone else educated by FCPS and sees the decline?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I'm shocked by how little my kids are learning. Also by all the distruptions caused by kids who probably aren't being well served by a general ed classroom. One kid wears headphones all day because he gets stressed by the noise and starts throwing a fit when he is stressed. Why would you put him in a classroom of 30+ kids? He can't hear what the teacher is saying at all. [/quote]

I've taught since 1994, and the idea that the mainstream classroom is the "least restrictive environment" for every child with an IEP is one of the most deleterious changes I've seen over 30 years.  That child with headphones who is so constantly overstimulated might do amazingly well in a self-contained classroom with 5 peers rather than 27, 12 of whom also have IEP's and very complex needs.  An easily dysregulated child around THAT many other children all day is NOT the least restrictive environment at all.  But when I suggest that a self-contained classroom might actually be less restrictive for some kids...meaning, it would better allow them to access and engage with the curriculum, I am treated by admin and coaches and advocates like I am an evil pariah who hates children with special needs.

What I hate is seeing children suffer from inappropriate placements, and it feels like that's what I see all day now as a specials teacher.  Most of our classes have 25-30 kids and 1 or 2 classes at each grade level have the students with IEP's.  And unlike "mainstreaming" in the 90's when we might have had 1-3 students with IEP's in a class of 20-24 kids, now we have 12-16 kids with IEP's in a class of 28 kids.  That's not mainstreaming.  It's a special ed class with more kids shoved in, just enough so that no one is being served.

But I am the hater when I say it was SO much better when kids with very high needs were able to be in very small classes with direct support form at least 2 adults.  I do not deny that there were some schools where there were low expectations of special education students and where low expectations kept very capable students trapped in self-contained classes without full access to grade level curricula.  But I did not see that directly.  Teaching in Arlington, I saw exceptional special education teachers do amazing work.  I saw kids who were supported in very small classes and who were mainstreamed with LOTS of support, slowly, with scaffolds, over time.  And mainstream was truly mainstreaming, with only a few special education students at most in a regular ed class.

The pendulum has swung so far in the other direction that more students than not are being disserviced.  A class where half or more oc the students receive special education services is not truly "mainstreaming" anyone.  It's just theater.  Because the other parents aren't told how many other special education students are in that class.  They don't know that it's a way more restrictive environment for their kid, who will be overstimulated and get WAY less attention than in a self-contained classes.  It breaks my heart.  It makes me rage for those kids.  
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