Program for Special-Needs Pupils Is Jeopardized

Program for Special-Needs Pupils Is Jeopardized


This article deals with a mother's fear for her son's education. Ms. Meade-Magruder has a three year old son named Joshua who has special needs. Joshua has currently attended Barbara Vick Early Childhood Center, a preschool in Chicago that serves a high number of children with special needs. "After a year there, Joshua, whose condition has been provisionally diagnosed as mild autism, has become a totally different person, Ms. Meade-Magruder said. Once he barely communicated, but now he talks freely." Due to budget cuts, Joshua's mother doesn't know whether or not Joshua's current school will continue to stay open. If the school closes, Joshua's mother fears placing Joshua in Chicago Public Schools. She worries that he will not get the care and support that he needs. As a teacher, I understand Joshua's mother's concerns. Being a general education teacher, it is very hard to teach an entire class of students who don't have special needs and make accomodations and modifications for one student who does. Also, when you have a large number of students, it is hard to focus on helping one child with special needs. As teachers, we do not push any child to the side and we do not treat them any differently than the rest of our class. The difficult aspect of teaching a child with special needs is finding extra time to meet the child's needs. If the child isn't being pulled from the classroom, there isn't much time for the teacher to pull the child aside to assist the child with special instruction and assistance.