Smarty says -
“Quite frankly, special ed kids need to have the old-fashioned special ed classrooms. Not to isolate them, but to allow a specialist to help them grow as much as possible”
Ah, the old separate but equal line. Which of course is inherently unequal no matter how well meaning your intentions may be.
Well Smarty, let me tell you about the “old-fashioned special ed classroom” that you romanticize.
I was placed in one nearly 38 years ago. Children were placed there not because we were disruptive, they well knew how to deal with disruptive children. No, we were placed there because we were different, something about us wasn’t quite right and they were afraid that it might be catching. For the most part we were just extreme introverts, I suppose that more than a few might have been diagnosed as having a form of autism, but they didn’t do that sort of classification in those days.
During the two years I spent in that environment not a single day was spent on instruction in reading, math, science or any of the subjects that “normal” children were expected to attempt. The expectation for us was much lower, we engaged in making crafts and developing basic motor skills with the hope that someday we would be employable performing some menial task. When the weather was nice we would spend the entire day outside on the playground.
It came as some surprise to them when I was tested at the end of the second year, I would have been in the sixth grade and about 12 at that time, and I tested as able to read and comprehend on an eleventh grade level.
What they failed to understand is that I had no desire for social interaction and in their eyes that translated into being unable to function.
I lived those days that you seem fond to return to and I would not wish them on anyone’s child.
Ah, but today’s argument is the we are more enlightened, we have better tools and the errors of the past will not be repeated.
Times may change but people and institutions do not.
