Donald L. MacMillan

Full Inclusion: An Empirical Perspective.

It is argued that educational treatments of children with disabilities should be empirically validated. From this perspective the current press for full inclusion is examined against empirical evidence bearing on the major assertions of advocates for full inclusion. Students with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) are among the most difficult to include, and the unique problems presented by such children often are ignored by advocates for full inclusion. Arguments for full inclusion, particularly as they apply to children with emotional and behavioral disorders suffer from: (a) the failure to specify what constitutes full inclusion, (b) the weakness of relying on anecdotal reports and single case studies to validate the utility of full inclusion of all children with disabilities, and (c) the fact that the evidence that does exist fails to include children with emotional and behavioral disorders. Finally, evidence is summarized that contradicts the position that “more restrictive” placements are never beneficial and that regular class placement is always beneficial to all children with disabilities.

Treatment Integrity: An Essential—But Often Forgotten—Component of School-Based Interventions

In this article, the authors introduce the construct of treatment integrity and illustrate the importance of treatment integrity as it relates to school-based intervention. Specifically, the authors address the following questions: What is treatment integrity? Why is it important to assess treatment integrity? How can treatment integrity be assessed? and What factors influence treatment integrity? Finally, the authors offer school personnel examples of ways to realistically assess treatment integrity at the classroom level.

Social and Academic Profiles of Externalizing and Internalizing Groups: Risk Factors for Emotional and Behavioral Disorders.

Three groups of third-grade students classified as either Externalizers (n = 30), Internalizes (n = 55) or Controls (n = 96) were contrasted on 19 measures in social and academic domains using multivariate analyses. Based on these analyses, a series of descriptive discriminant function analyses were undertaken to determine the best predictors of Externalizing and Internalizing group membership. Of 19 variables, those that best predicted Externalizing status compared to Controls were critical events, social skills, academic competence, peer acceptance, negative narrative comments, math, and reading, in that order. Variables that best predicted Internalizing status compared to Controls were social skills, academic competence, math, critical events, reading, peer acceptance, and negative narrative comments. Variables that best separated students on Externalizing and Internalizing status were critical events, disciplinary referrals, social impact, academic self-concept, school absences, peer acceptance, and academic competence. Cross-validated classification analyses correctly classified 97% of the Externalizing group and 89% of the Internalizing group compared to Controls. A classification analysis contrasting Externalizers and Internalizes resulted in correct classification rates of 63% and 84%, respectively. Contrary to much research in special education, both Externalizing and Internalizing groups appeared to have adequate academic self-concepts and social self-concepts. These findings were interpreted in light of recent work on positive illusory biases and the hypothesized relationship between unrealistically positive self-evaluations and psychological adjustment.

The Problem of Motivation in the Education of the Mentally Retarded

One possible reason for the failure to demonstrate the efficacy of self contained classes for the EMR lies in the failure of such classes to balance the emphasis on motivational and cognitive variables. Several motivational variables have been isolated experimentally and the research findings have been interpreted to suggest that children who have experienced excessive amounts of failure dramatically differ from children with little history of failure on these variables. Three specific motivational variables are discussed and the related research evidence presented. The variables are (a) expectancy for failure, (b) outer-directedness, and (c) positive and negative reaction tendencies. Implications are drawn and suggestions made regarding ways of dealing with these behaviors.

Head Start Children Finishing First Grade: Preliminary Data on School Identification of Children at Risk for Special Education.

Although Head Start has a mandate to serve children with disabilities as at least 10% of its population, few systematic data are available on identification of children in various disability categories in the years immediately following their preschool experience. In the study reported here, two cohorts of 4,161 children across 30 sites were followed through first grade as part of a larger study on transition assistance. At-risk status was assessed at the beginning of kindergarten by developing research diagnostic criteria (RDC) for four major special education categories using clinical cut-off points on language, achievement, and social skills measures and indicators of speech or mental health problems on parent interviews. The school identification of study participants in each RDC was determined by a search of school archival records in the spring of first grade. Only 26% of the children meeting RDC in the four major categories were identified by the schools, and little concordance was observed among categories. Findings are discussed in relation to disability categories, with particular reference to assumptions about underidentification of children with emotional or behavioral disorders.

Students with or at Risk for Problem Behavior: Betwixt and between Teacher and Parent Expectations.

This study examined differences between teacher and parent ratings of social skills in a sample of adolescent students (n = 33) previously identified in the elementary grades as at risk for academic or behavioral concerns, or both. Findings suggest a core of 4 classroom behavioral expectations for social competence consistent across elementary and secondary school teachers. Furthermore, parents and teachers of adolescents with behavior problems reported different behavioral expectations. Teachers value behaviors almost entirely in the cooperation domain, rating skills that display assertion and self-control as less important for success in the classroom. Conversely, parents of children with behavior problems at school value behaviors at home in the self-control, responsibility, and assertion domains rather than cooperation skills. Although this may be situation specific, the fact that teachers and parents differentially judged adolescents with behavior problems from their peers suggests several potential targets for early prevention or intervention in collaboration with parents. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.

Behavior Modification: Limitations and Liabilities.

The discussion concerns limitations inherent in the behavior modification paradigm and common misuses of the strategy by naive practitioners. The behavioristic explanation of learning often oversimplifies the human situation. Some pure behaviorists view motivation as extrinsic to learning and commonly separate the reward from the behavior. The separation may be justifiable in early stages of a shaping program, but desired behavior must come under the control of natural reinforcers as soon as possible. Various programs have been adapted to incorporate some of the evidence presented herein. Others have been less flexible, in which cases one can only speculate about the benefits derived by those whose behavior was modified.

The Origins of Behavior Modification with Exceptional Children.

The behavior modification movement has a noteworthy history in the education of exceptional children. Although the formal beginnings of the movement can be pinpointed in the first quarter of this century, its origins and techniques can be traced to much earlier periods. The efforts of several behavior modification practitioners in and peripheral to the field of special education are described in an attempt to put present day behavior modification programs in historical perspective.

Effects of motivational and presentation conditions on digit recall of children of differing socioeconomic, racial, and intelligence groups.

Arthur Jensen (1968a, b) has summarized considerable evidence in support of a theoretical position which distinguishes between intelligence and basic learning abilities. Jensen describes basic learning ability as a different, more fundamental, psychological process than intelligence. Tests of basic learning ability are considered to depend relatively little on transfer from previous learning or upon verbal mediation processes; they are, therefore, presumed to be less sensitive to social or experiental conditions than are standard intelligence tests. Specifically, Jensen suggests that lower socioeconomic status (SES) children who test within an IQ range of 60-80 are better than middle SES children of comparable intelligence on certain tests of learning ability, such as memory for digits. He suggests further that low SES children of normal intelligence do not differ from middle SES children of normal intelligence in performance of such tasks. Despite impressive evidence describing performance of middle and low SES groups on serial and paired associate learning, several major considerations deserve attention before definitive generalizations

Sex differences and repeated choice in retarded and non-retarded subjects.

Normal and educable mentally retarded Ss of several ages were tested for repetition choice preference to determine whether ability level or sex were determinants of repetition of previously completed or interrupted tasks. For normal and EMR boys, as CA and MA increased so did the tendency to repeat interrupted tasks. A curvilinear relationship between repetition choice and CA was found for normal and EMR girls. A sex difference became apparent between ages 11 and 17, with males choosing to repeat interrupted tasks in increasing proportions and females reverting to an increased preference for previously completed tasks. For the total sample, males repeated significantly more interrupted tasks than did females.