In today's inclusive classrooms, general and even many special education teachers often do not feel confident that they know or are using methods and strategies that researchers have shown to be effective in the general education setting for students who struggle with grade-level reading regardless of whether educators have identified them as…

Students with learning disabilities are being placed with their peers in inclusive classrooms for content area subjects in greater numbers than ever before. In many cases, these students are being held to the same standards as their general education peers. Many students with learning disabilities have deficits in a very essential skill area…

This article discusses different types of instructional grouping for teaching reading skills to students with learning disabilities, including whole-class instruction, small-group instruction, peer pairing and tutoring, and one-on-one instruction. After discussion of each groping format, implications for practice are highlighted, particularly…

Although approximately half of the six million students receiving specialized services for an identified disability are learning disabled, research shows that assistive technologies are far more commonly used with students who manifest physical or sensory disabilities than they are with those with learning disabilities. Assistive technology can…

Guidelines for involving students with learning disabilities in classroom literature circles include demonstrating literature discussion, introducing and forming the circles, modifying requirements for students with low reading abilities, building group skills, managing group discussion, and having students keep response journals. (DB)

The experience of students with learning disabilities during cooperative learning reading lessons with peers without disabilities was studies ovr the course of 2 years. In the first year of research observations were conducted in one elementary school. Twelve children with mild disabilities and 12 students who were average in performance were…

In the field of education, there is considerable controversy about the appropriateness of an inclusive setting as a more beneficial environment than a resource room for students with learning disabilities. The purpose of this research is to determine whether students with learning disabilities perform better in an inclusive setting or in a…

This article describes a new technique for improving the reading comprehension of elementary students. The Coop-Dis-Q technique combines cooperative learning, discussion, and questioning strategies to create a synergistic instructional effect. The specific steps of the technique and successful use of the technique in a fifth-grade classroom are…

Two students with language learning disabilities (LLD) and two younger typically developing peers were videotaped in their emergent reading groups for analysis of the distribution, types, and functions of teaching scaffolding sequences. Both the regular and special education teachers used primarily directive scaffolding sequences and provided…

A solid, emerging research base exists on how to provide meaningful access to the general education curriculum for students with learning disabilities. This article uses examples from research in comprehension and writing to highlight the underlying features of these empirically based approaches. The importance of multiple teaching strategies is…

This digest summarizes research on methods of student grouping in reading instruction other than whole-class instruction and ability grouping. Peer tutoring and reciprocal-role tutoring have been demonstrated to be effective for students with learning disabilities because they are allowed to be either tutors or tutees. Cross-age tutoring has been…

As part of a researcher-teacher professional development group, seven general education elementary teachers in inclusive settings containing students with learning disabilities were taught four reading and writing instructional methods, one for each nine-week grading block. Sustained implementation during the school year was maintained by four of…

This book explains the whole language philosophy of learning to read and how it can be applied in special education classrooms to assist students with learning disabilities. Chapters address: (1) an overview of the whole language approach; (2) examples of how special education teachers use whole language to teach children with learning…

This article describes the inclusion model implemented at two elementary schools in Minnesota and the educational experiences of a second grader and a sixth grader. One school's locally developed model focused on an alternative phonetic reading program for students at risk or with disabilities; the other school focused on team teaching. (DB)

This final report discusses the activities and outcomes of a project that explored the effectiveness of strategies for teaching reading comprehension to English language learners with learning disabilities who are failing to acquire the comprehension skills to learn from print. A series of studies was conducted over a 3-year period that…