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Dear colleagues, If you attended and participated, thank you. If you have ideas to share, we'd love to hear of them. If you did not attend, and would like more information about Procedures Lite (a voluntary process for parents and schools to develop IEP services without the procedures and meetings usually involved) and SpedEx (the use of an outside agreed-upon consultant to assist parties to assure that a child's program will provide a free appropriate public education (FAPE) in the least [...]

Dear friends and colleagues,   Today is Special Education Day--a day for celebration and renewal!  It is also the 35th anniversary of the IDEA.  December 2, 1975.  A big day in our world.   As you know, we will host the 6th Annual Special Education Day here in the Boston area this afternoon.  We plan *to celebrate special education's successes over the last 35 years, and *to highlight current reforms underway here in Massachusetts (SpedEx, Procedures Lite, and update of a draft new IEP [...]

Indeed, if our country is going to move forward successfully, it's going to be more from the parents--than the schools. An excellent op-ed. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/24/opinion/24friedman.html?_r=1&src=me&ref=homepage.  As an immigrant, a former teacher, an always parent and citizen, a current attorney who works for public schools--I know that it's about time to get the parents (and next, the kids) at the responsibility table.  Education will not happen without that.  If they [...]

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/21/opinion/21friedman.html?_r=1&src=me&ref=homepage. Thank goodness--Thomas Friedman finally (though, only in the last paragraph) said what we all know. Teachers can't teach alone. Parents have to support education, turn off the TV and electronics, feed their kids, get them  to bed on time,  Etc.  What is still left to be said is, Kids have to study in order to learn. And, shock of shocks,  if the work is hard, they need to study harder.  Not get an [...]

http://educationnext.org/all-together-now-meets-differentiated-instruction/ My father told me--if something sounds too good to be true, it's probably not. Differentiated instruction (DI) is designed to make mainstreaming/inclusion work. As far as I know, including all sorts of learners in one classroom is an unproven theory created in the name of a civil right, not pedagogy.  It's basis is a dream. It's reality is unproven. Will another generation of students be the guinea pig for this [...]

The headline, "Special ed students could bankrupt districts.  http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/education&id=7786691  On KGO television in California. It's not the kids' doing. It's the system for special education that is broken. It promises more than it can deliver. It is burdened by bureaucracy and legal threats.  It does not have good evidence of success.  All that is true. All that lead us to establish Special Education Day on December 2--to attempt to fix the system. [...]

http://boston.com/community/blogs/rock_the_schoolhouse/2010/11/was_galileo_wrong.html.  Galileo was right.  So is Diane Ravitch. So was I when I taught students to memorize their number facts. It's obvious. It's clear. It's real. Without facts at their fingertips, students can't move forward to learn science, math, and live their lives.  And that's bad for all of us.

http://www.educationnews.org/commentaries/102694.html A wonderful article with lots of ideas by John Jensen,Ph.D.--about why teacher prep and teacher inservice don't always translate to better teaching and learning. He cites a Teacher of the Year's ADAMANT insistence that his students learn the material. The teacher insisted on hard work. Drill. Repeat. Hard work. Drill. Repeat.  How different from the current mode--that kids will learn if we just present material to them; they'll learn [...]

I enjoyed the movie a lot--and seeing some friends in it. I live and breathe education!  Alas, it's a controversial movie--making it all the more interesting.    Yes, we need to 'fix' our schools, especially in the cities. Yes, we need to focus on the fact that our top students are not on a par with the world's top students. But why no word about special education--the program that serves about 14% of all students nationwide and costs millions (often twice the amount we pay for regular [...]

Special education is middle aged (or is it young adult?).  A true milestone. It's time to celebrate how far we've come in this civil rights legislation. All students with disabilities now have access to  a free appropriate public education.   An awesome achievement. Yet, even as we honor the success, we also need to acknowledge that much of the system is broken.   It is far too bureaucratic and burdensome--for schools AND parents. We need to refocus our efforts to teaching and learning, [...]