Instructional practices for students with disabilities in urban title 1 schools

Across the nation, many students with disabilities do not have basic reading skills. According to the National Assessment on Educational Performance, 64% of tested fourth grade students with disabilities do not have basic reading skills; for economically disadvantaged students the rate is even higher at 78%. This qualitative study used in-depth interviews and classroom observations to examine two urban Title 1 schools whose third and fourth grade students with disabilities have demonstrated success on the English Language Arts portion of the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS). Sixteen teachers of second, third, and fourth grade inclusion and special education classes were asked what instructional strategies they believed contributed to the success of their students with disabilities on the standard MCAS. Also, at each school, current and former principals were asked what they thought contributed to these students' success on the test. Results are presented using a theoretical framework based on the instructional recommendations of the National Reading Panel (2002) and Joseph Torgesen (1998). The major findings were that teachers who did teach phonics to their students with disabilities used explicit and systematic phonics programs. To teach vocabulary, they used explicit and implicit instructional strategies, and their strategies for reading fluency ranged from frequent practice to reading plays. To promote reading comprehension they used highly analytical and reflective questions and graphic organizers. One school principal believed that her school's success was due to an extraordinary special education resource teacher and to focusing on the core curriculum. At the other school, the current principal believed that students with disabilities get focused and targeted instruction and the former principal believes that the students are skilled readers because they get their fundamental reading skills from a multisensory sound segmentation training program and a reading program that focuses on reading comprehension through Lindamood Bell's Visualizing and Verbalizing technique. This study adds to the limited literature about the instructional strategies teachers use for their students with disabilities who have succeeded on a mandated statewide assessment.