IEP

I know that IEP stands for an individual education plan but I was interested on how one was obtained and what that meant exactly. As I researched an IEP I came upon a detailed manual that was put together. I found out that a student is referred to an evaluation team to see if they need an IEP. Within ten days a team made up of qualified personnel by the state review the referral. If the referral is denied the parent can try to change that or they are referred to a TST or 504 process. If the referral is accepted they decide they type of evaluations to perform and get parents consent. Then they request to evaluate within 15 days. Then after 45 days the evaluation is completed and a report is written. If the parent does not agree prior to this a 504 is suggested. Then after 15 days an IEP meeting is scheduled. They share the evaluation report with the IEP team and a notice is sent to the parents. Then a meeting is held to create IEP. Each IEP lasts 12 months and then is re-evaluated. An IEP is very helpful for students who need them in order to learn effectively. 

Art In The Classroom

Art is a way for many people to express themselves. This is a perfect outlet for a student who is not as strong academically. I think art is important in the learning process. I almost upsets me to think how some schools are trying to cut back on the arts. When I was in the younger grades I was always deeply involved in the arts and to see them be taken away is awful. Art allows students to grow as a person and as a learner. Today it is harder, as a teacher, to choose what is taught and how in class. I was speaking to a teacher in a second grade class and the principal has taken complete control of her school and will not allow anything out of his guidelines. He recently brought up the idea of eliminating history and science out of the curriculum until third grade. It is amazing how strict schools are getting. I think art is important for students because they do not realize they are learning. if it is incorporated in an accurate way, it can teach students more than learning from a book. 

Kliewer: Citizinship in School: Reconceptualizing Down Syndrome

1.) "Shayne, however, did not see Isaac, or any of her students, as defective. In her classroom, which contained 6 students clinically identified as disabled (3 with Down syndrome, including Isaac) and 10 students considered nondisabled..."
I think this quote is powerful. It shows how a teacher should treat students with and without disabilities. It is important to treat them equally. Each student is different even if they do not have a disability and this needs to be recognized. All students interact and learn differently, therefore the classroom needs to be flexible or the students will not be able to keep up. I love how the teacher in this classroom is so open minded about the students. I will aim to be like this when I become a teacher.

2.)“According to Shayne, the notion of Down syndrome often obscures our ability to recognize the child as a child.  She or he becomes a walking pathological syndrome, a mobile defect on the loose.”
This is another quote I found powerful, especially "our ability to recognize a child as a child." I think we need to learn to treat every student equally to give them a chance. If we automatically treat them different others will to and this will not help the way they feel. Also if we treat them differently they may not try to achieve goals because they are babied and almost told it is fine if they give up. No matter what differences people have, we are all human and need to be treated that way. Treating students with a disease or disability as a disease or disability can, in no way, make them comfortable.    

3.)"Community is not a location within circled wagons configured to keep out those charged with having the differences that matter. It is instead a web of dynamic, constantly shifting relationships that encompass the individual with Down Syndrome and all other human beings. To eliminate a single person through any form of banishment, no matter how benevolent the logic, reduces the web and makes the community a less democratic, and less rich place."
 This quote is important because it shows how important communities are. It points out how people with and without disabilities make up a community. By talking about banishing a person from the community for whatever reason makes the community, less of a community. This is saying that everyone needs to be treated fairly in to community for it to stick together. Communities are constantly changing because of the people in them. It is important to accept all changes going on in order to keep the community together. 

Social Class and the Hidden Curriculum of Work: Jean Anyon

1.) "In the two working-class schools, work is following the steps of a procedure. The procedure is usually mechanical, involving rote behavior and very little decision making or choice. The teacher rarely explain why the work is being assigned, how it might connect to other assignments, or what the idea is that lies behind the procedure or gives it coherence and perhaps meaning or significance."

I chose this quote because it shows how in the working-class school the students are not pushed to go beyond what is asked. They are not even given a chance. I think it is extremely important to know how assignments connect to each other or how it will help them further in their education or career. These schools prepare the students to become part of the working class. They do not give the students a chance to grow and aspire to obtain a more prestigious profession. I think this is a poor way to educate students, I think the complete opposite should be taught.  

2.) "In the affluent professional school, work is creative activity carried out independently. The students are continually asked to express and apply ideas and concepts. Work involves individual thought and expressiveness, expansion and illustration of ideas, and choice of appropriate method and material."

I chose this quote because I think it is important to ask students to expand on what they say. This school forces the students to be more creative which is important. I like that this school prepares the students better for what will come next. The students are never limited as to how far they can go which allows them to grow. This quote shows that students are prepared to do what is asked of them.  

3.) "In the executive elite school, work is developing one's analytical intellectual powers. Children are continually asked to reason through a problem, to produce intellectual products that are both logically sound and of top academic quality. A primary goal of thought is to conceptualize rules by which elements may fit together in systems and then to apply these rules in solving a problem. School work helps one to achieve, to excel, to prepare for life."    

This quote is similar to the affluent professional school. It states that students are continually asked to reason through a problem. i think this is extremely important because it gets them thinking. The most important part of this quote is the last sentence. I think it is very important to prepare students well for the next year and years to come. I know I was very well prepared in high school for college and being unprepared would be much more stressful.



I chose these three quotes to show the difference between each class school system. I do not think students should be treated or taught differently depending on their social class, or that of their parents. They should always be taught to do their best and set higher goals. It is important to prepare students for what will come next.

Race, Class, and Gender By Peter MClaren

“School learning in white-controlled institution often is equated with abandoning the imperatives, values, and collective solidarity of black culture. Specifically, blacks and similar minorities (e.g., American Indians) believe that in order for a minority person to succeed in school academically, he or she must learn to think and act white. Furthermore, in order to think and act white enough to be rewarded by whites or white institutions like the schools, a minority person must give up his or her own minority group attitudes , way of thinking, and behaving, and, of course, must give up or lose his or her own minority identity.” (Page 227)

I chose this quote because I do not think it is fair that people of the minority feel like they have to abandon their values just to fit in. I do think it may make it easier if they realize how white people think and act but I do not think they need to do the same. To think  and act white should not mean one must give up their own beliefs. It is not right to ask one to lose their identity in order to fit in.

“At what price to we ask our students to conform to our version of ‘the good student’? For some, the price we exact is obviously too much to bear. That’s when dropping out becomes not so much an option as an urgent and necessary act of survival.” (page 230)

 I chose this quote because I think it is eye opening. It shows how we are pushing students away when the goal was to bring them closer to education. Students have become so overwhelmed their only option is to drop out. This quote talks about how dropping out is less of an  option and more of a need to survive. The quote also points out that students are 'pushed' out because they are expected to leave their culture behind. To be accepted they must change entirely losing all individuality. 

 "The girls in my class were primarily concerned with popularity and physical attractiveness- areas of interest that far superseded academic aspirations. Girls were constantly experimenting with makeup and improvising clothing styles." (page 231)

I chose this quote because it reminded me of the Christensen reading and the media presentation. I believe that girls try so hard to fit in and will do anything. This quote is pointing out how it is affecting students school work. They become more concerned with physical appearance than academics. If they put in as much effort to their school work as they do in their appearance they would all do so well. I think that society is to blame for this. Students try to hard to fit in because they want to be accepted and in the mix of it all lose motivation to do well in school. 

Doll Face

I chose this video because I think it is extremely powerful. I believe it represents how we have become like robots. We see a picture or a video of someone and want to become just like them. In this video when the television screen begins to move back, the robot tries to move closer but gets stuck. She is so insistent on being closer to continue to apply makeup to look exactly like the girl on the television screen that she breaks herself because she cannot move any further. The robot want to be a human being by applying makeup and inserting eyeballs. This relates to the Christensen reading because it resembles how we as humans are always trying to become another person we see, someone we thing we should be. In the end the robot is broken lying on the floor, this is how far some people will go just to be accepted. We want what everyone else has and nothing is ever good enough.

Unlearning the Myths That Bind Us: Linda Christensen

1.) "Our society's culture industry colonizes their minds and teaches them how to act, live, and dream. This indoctrination hits young children especially hard. The 'secret education,' as Chilean writer Ariel Dorfman dubs it, delivered by children's books and movies, instructs young people to accept the world as it is portrayed in these social blueprints. And often that would depicts the domination of one sex, one race, or one country over a weaker counterpart." (pg 127)

I chose this quote because it shows how movies distort peoples views of a perfect life. It is true that our society has been, as Dorfman put it, "secretly educated." We watch movies, read magazines and listen to songs that portray people as what we have come to think of as perfect. Not only that but we live in societies depending on our race or nationality or social status and rarely see outside of them. Similar to what Kozol stated in his article, Christensen says that we have limited opportunities to interact with people who are different than us. This is calling our small community diverse. These books and movies we are exposed to at a young age stick in our minds until we are taught different. These forms of education are powerful but go unnoticed.


2.) "Personally, handling the dissection of dreams has been a major cause of depression for me. Not so much dissecting- but how i react to what is found as a result of the operation. It can be overwhelming and discouraging to find out my whole self image has been formed mostly by others or underneath my worries about what I look like after years (17 of them) of being exposed to TV images of girls and their set roles given to them by TV and the media. It's painful to deal with. The idea of not being completely responsible for how I feel about things today is scary. So why dissect the dreams? Why not stay ignorant about them and happy?" (page 128)

This quote is from a student named Justine. She is talking about how she realized that what she has been taught previously, and what she based her dreams on was images set by movies and books. To her looking deeper into her dreams in class and realizing this she did not take it lightly, is caused her depression. She realized "what is found is a result of the operation" meaning that movie producers and book authors know hot to manipulate children at a young age causing their dreams and aspirations to be based upon what they create. She realized that after 17 years of dreaming, her dreams were based on others through television. I agree with how this could be painful because what the media depicts as perfect, it almost impossible to achieve, but once it has been a dream for years, it is hard to realize that. I often find myself wishing for what others have and it is still hard to realize it will never happen. Maybe I do realize it but I will never be able to accept it. She says that she is not completely responsible for the way she feels because how she feels is based upon others she sees in movies or reads about in books. 

3.) "Catkin wanted to publish her piece in a magazine for young women so they would begin to question the origin of the standards by which they judge themselves. Most students wrote articles for local and national newspapers or magazines. Some published in neighborhood papers, some in church newsletters. The writing of these articles was tighter and cleaner than for-the-teacher essays because it had the potential for a real audience beyond the classroom walls." (page 137)

Some of the students spoken about in this article have come to feel so passionate about this topic their reflections are much better than their other work. One student wanted her article to be in a magazine to raise awareness. I think this would be a good source for other young women to read because it is coming from someone around the same age that has done research. The students knew their papers could have a chance of being published in some greater place. This, i think, for any student would be a huge incentive to write a stronger piece. I think the topic they were reflecting on is something so real to them that even that would help their paper become stronger.