Society still carries the lingering remains of the autocratic cultural mores of reward and punishment. Staff in a group home setting for children must be aware of the complexity caused by the mingling of autocratic and democratic mores. This phenomenon causes discrepancy in parenting methods. It was surmised that training the staff (N=4) at one…

A project was designed to reduce the turnover of direct care staff in a community-based residential facility that provides a home and educational or adult day training services for 54 severely or profoundly mentally and physically handicapped children and adults. The project sought to reduce total staff turnover by 40%, reduce employee…

This practicum report describes the development and implementation of a program to increase parent participation in the planning and conducting of activities sponsored by the district-level special education parent advisory committee. Monthly meetings and social events were held to encourage the 250 special education families to be more involved…

A Piagetian, language-experience approach to the early teaching of reading to normal young and older developmentally delayed preoperational children was developed. The approach was discussed in a specially-developed manual which was field tested by 42 teachers among 390 children in 16 school systems in several states and in Canada. Subjects were…

This practicum addresses the problem of limited interaction between physical therapists and families of developmentally delayed/physically impaired preschool-age children. A program was developed in which the physical therapist was videotaped handling and exercising a child, while explaining the purpose of the movements and instructing the parent…

This practicum paper describes the design and implementation of a mentoring program to improve the academic achievement of black male urban high school students. The program utilizes black adult mentors from both the community and the school's faculty. Mentors function as role models, advisers, and resource persons. The program design includes the…

A study was done to develop and evaluate a program designed to improve the academic and personal achievement of Hispanic American high school students. The study posited that the causes of Hispanic American students' belief that they could not achieve were: (1) dysfunctional learned behaviors; and (2) acculturation difficulties. Using findings on…