Disabilities- Presentation Comments

I was interested in the presentation concerning learning disabilities in the classroom and learning what aid is out there for these types of students. My eyes have really been opened this year, vicariously, through my roommate who teaches kindergarten for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg School System at a Title I school. Though there are many programs and sources of aid for children with disabilities, this is not the case for every school and namely Erin's school. As I mentioned in class, Erin has children that spend half of the time in the classroom and half of the time with their special education teachers. However, Erin has 20 children and no assistant in her classroom, and actually got a new student on Tuesday. Can you imagine 21 kindergarteners and no assistant, combined with ESL learners and disabled ones? In our public school system, I can't imagine that this is what policy makers had in mind. Not to mention the fact that this situation is probably not the best to foster learning with the students. Erin cannot give the children individualized instruction that would benefit these at-risk students. The actuality is that many of these children are suffering educationally for a variety of issues, and especially the learning disabled. It is hard to mainstream students in this type of situation. As discussed in the presentation, educators should do what is best for the children. In this case, we need a new solution.