BACKGROUND Individuals with disabilities experience higher rates of abuse than the nondisabled. Few evidence-based prevention interventions have been published despite a need for such work. This study evaluated IMPACT Ability, a safety and self-advocacy training for individuals with cognitive and/or physical disabilities. METHODS A quasi-experimental design was used to assess change in safe...

Student performance in mathematics has been linked to the mathematical knowledge of the teacher. Based on this finding, a 5-day professional development module was created to improve teachers’ mathematical knowledge and their understanding of number sense. We found no difference prior to the professional development in mathematical content knowledge for teaching mathematics (CKTM) between speci...

The aim of this study was to explore the potential of ZORA robot-based interventions in rehabilitation and special education for children with severe physical disabilities. A two-centre explorative pilot study was carried out over a 2.5-month period involving children with severe physical disabilities with a developmental age ranging from 2 to 8 years. Children participated in six sessions with...

The purpose of this study was to further evaluate the outcomes of a model program that was designed to train current teachers of children with autism. Nine certified special education teachers participating in an intensive 5-day summer training program were taught a relatively large number of specific skills in two areas (preference assessment and direct teaching). The teachers met the mastery ...

This study examined the extent to which treatment integrity of 4 special education teachers was affected by goal setting, performance feedback regarding student or teacher performance, and a meeting cancellation contingency. Teachers were trained to implement function-based treatment packages to address student problem behavior. In one condition, teachers set a goal for student behavior and rec...

Single case designs are a set of research methods for evaluating treatment effects by assigning different treatments to the same individual and measuring outcomes over time and are used across fields such as behavior analysis, clinical psychology, special education, and medicine. Emerging standards for single case designs have focused attention on the need for effect sizes for summarizing and m...

This paper discusses the evidence that the specific developmental profile frequently described as being associated with Down syndrome--a profile of communication weaknesses relative to social and daily living skills - can be changed. It is not an inevitable outcome of having Down syndrome. Drawing on data collected to explore the outcomes of fully inclusive education for school-age children wit...

Purpose: Educators rely on sufficient knowledge and skill to provide effective phonemic awareness instruction, an important component of early literacy instruction, particularly for children who experience difficulty learning to read. The purpose of this study was to evaluate and compare the phonemic awareness skill of several groups of educators, including speech-language pathologists (SLPs; n...

The development of addition and subtraction accuracy was assessed in first graders with cerebral palsy (CP) in both mainstream (16) and special education (41) and a control group of first graders in mainstream education (16). The control group out-performed the CP groups in addition and subtraction accuracy and this difference could not be fully explained by differences in intelligence. Both CP...

The outcome of a due process hearing between parents and a school district concerning a child's special education program rarely draws the attention of anyone beyond the parties to that dispute. The resulting decision of the hearing officer similarly impacts only the parties to the dispute, without extending to other parents and school districts seeking an adjudication to resolve their disagree...