Critic's Corner Discuss a review. Provide constructive feedback. Talk to the industry.

---

[ Follow Ups ] [ Post Followup ] Thread: [ Display  All  Email ] [ Critic's Corner ]

---

[ Alert Moderator ]

---

RE: Art Dudley - Listening, Nov. 2014

Posted by RGA (R) on November 17, 2014 at 00:02:16

In Reply to: RE: Art Dudley - Listening, Nov. 2014 posted by lord addleford on November 16, 2014 at 18:37:42:

Ding Ding Ding "Problems arise when local budget slashes staffing so regular ed teachers are left without support in their classroom and have received little to no professional development."

Yes I am all for inclusion if it is actually funded properly. And I come from the school of Mr. Spock - the good of the many outweigh the good of the one or the few. In a class of 30 where one student is hitting the other student with a chair and screaming and banging his head into the window and he's bigger than teacher in size and weight and there is no Special Ed worker because the boy is a "High-Functioning" and already dislocated the shoulder of the regular full time special ed worker - then Houston - we have a problem! And we have not even started on the other 5 kids with special needs or the three who should have been diagnosed but were not because there are not enough psychologists or the parents don't want the stigma.

This is a reason the BC teachers were on strike for 3 solid months with no pay because the government would rather spend $500 million on a stadium roof for 8 CFL football games than put it into public education and special ed.

I'm all for the political correctness of integration but I also realize that when Canada had a separate school system for special needs - integration was trotted out MORE because they could save a whole pile of cash. Dump the kids into the regular classroom (increasing the size of the classrooms) fire 3/4 of all the expert special needs teaching staff and have largely untrained or under-trained classroom teachers take on the load. That time directly comes off every other kid in the class. It is unreasonable that one kid should take up 50% of the class time.

A teacher who uses sarcasm to get a laugh from students has to walk on eggshells because the Autistic boy takes everything literally and will flip out. Sure the teacher will accommodate and school admin will say it's good for regular students to get used to special needs people as they go into the working world and in life. But political correctness aside - the regular students are not exactly going to be hanging out with the HF autistic boy at parties nor will they likely be working together in the future business realm. The contact largely stops at the end of the school day and most certainly by the end of the school year.

The issue would be a non issue if it were properly funded. When 1 Special Ed worker is responsible to cover 4 classes and numerous students and largely NOT the behavioral students then it's a serious problem. So when I walk into a high school English class and 8 students out of 27 pass and English is their first language I scratch my head. Oh but waaaait. I then go teach at the elementary school they came from and see why. One of my first assignments was subbing a grade 4 classroom. Grade 4 is almost always held up as a teacher favorite grade - I also did my final 6 week practicum in a grade 4 classroom which had students cry because I was leaving.

So I was very excited. Of course I taught in a reasonably middle class area. Wow was I in for a lesson. Walk in and they hand me the special needs folder - watch out for these 4 I am told. Those 4 were actually dream boats - it was the 4 not in the book who needed a book that was the issue. "Good Morning I'm Mr....." - SCREEEEAM the little girl starts spinning around in her chair. Umm yeah not in the book. I walk over and another kid runs into the cloakroom "Where is Mr. such and such (their class teacher). And it pretty much went downhill for the rest of the day. I have never been so tired at 3:00pm in my life.

Is it me? The next time I passed by to watch 3 other subs pull their hair out. The regular class teacher? Oh wait - there were two teachers by midway through the school year. One in the morning and one in the afternoon. Send the kid to the special ed room when they were having problems? Oh wait - they're not special needs according to the paper work so nope regular class teacher's problem.

Don't get me wrong - I have a pretty big heart - I want every kid to do well - I want the thugs to change their ways and find something in school they can grab a hold of whether it is sports or at least one academic subject. It's why I went into the field. But it's like going to university and getting trained to be world class swimmer and then when you actually get to the event after all the training they tie two 8 ton boat anchors to your legs and say "swim."

The bottom line is that integration was decided upon by governments looking to save money. If it were funded, if there were resources then ideally yes. Short of those they should be separated for the good of the many. A teacher can't cover the day's math lesson if Billy has a fit and cracks Sally over the head with a chair every single day. It's not fair to the 29 other students or the Teacher who has to tell Sally's parents that it is wrong for them to say that Billy isn't allowed in the room because after all there is a law and laws are always right. And most of the politicians who say integration is grand - send their kids to private schools where there are no special needs integrated into the classroom. And I WONDER why that is? Yup the private school with 14 or fewer students with 1-2 teachers - no thugs, no academically weak students, no behavior needs. Funny how integration is great for Public Schools (ie poor people) but umm not so great when it's the rich kids. Political correctness? Politicians should be forced to put their kids in the Public School system - then tell me it is funded properly. Something tells me that if our premier had her kid in Public School that $500 million roof would be a big gaping hole and a strike never would have happened.

Edits: 11/17/14

This post is made possible by the generous support of people like you and our sponsors:

VH Audio

---

[ Top of Page ] [ Contact Us ] [ Support/Wish List ] [ Copyright © 2025, Audio Asylum, all rights reserved ]

---

[ General ] [ Speakers ] [ Tubes ] [ Vinyl ] [ Digital ] [ Hi-Rez ] [ Video Asylum ] [ Cables ] [ Tweaks/DIY ] [ Music ] [ Films ]

---