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Content Enhancements and Adaptations

		Additional resources From the ERIC Clearinghouse on Disabilities and Gifted Education Learning Disabilities Overview Learning Strategies Graphic Organizer Minibib From the National Information Center for Children and Youth with Disabilities Interventions for Students with Learning Disabilities Research Syntheses Intervention Research for Students with Learning Disabilities: A Meta-Analysis of Treatment Outcomes Intervention Research for Adolescents with Learning Disabilities: A Meta-Analysis of Outcomes Related to High-Order Processing Promoting Success in the General Education Curriculum for High School Students with Disabilities: The Context as a Whole

The articles included in Teaching How-to’s are drawn from TEACHING Exceptional Children (TEC), a publication of The Council for Exceptional Children (CEC). TEC is published specifically for teachers and administrators of children with disabilities and children who are gifted and features practical articles that present methods and materials for classroom use as well as current issues in special education teaching and learning.

All articles are offered in PDF and require Acrobat Reader software to download and view.

© Council for Exceptional Children. All articles are reprinted with permission.

The Content Literacy Continuum: A School Reform Framework for Improving Adolescent Literacy for All Students
Authors: B. Keith Lenz, Barbara J. Ehren, and Donald D. Deshler
Researchers at the University of Kansas Center for Research on Learning and the University of Oregon joined to conduct a series of research studies under an umbrella project called the Institute for Academic Access. The studies have focused on how to increase the success of high school students with disabilities enrolled in rigorous academic courses. As this arena was studied, several factors emerged as important to consider in developing secondary literacy initiatives.
PDF (4p, 70k)

PROVE-ing What You Know. Teaching Exceptional Children, 34(4), 50-54.
Author: Scanlon, D.
The PROVE Strategy provides students with a procedure for naming a concept, providing evidence, and defending it. This learning strategy is designed so students can self-cue when to use it and can monitor their own performance.
PDF (7p, 85k)

Graphic Organizers to the Rescue! Helping Students Link--and Remember--Information.
Author: Gloria A. Dye
This article describes using graphic organizers as a way of assisting students with disabilities in the note-taking process and helping them link the new information to their existing schema of knowledge. It discusses the concept behind graphic organizers, graphic organizer activities, and steps for creating a graphic organizer.
PDF (6p, 153k)

Don't Water Down! Enhance Content Learning through the Unit Organizer Routine.
Authors: Daniel Boudah, Keith Lenz, Janis Bulgren, Jean Schumaker, Donald Deshler
This article argues that teachers need instructional techniques that do not simply water down content learning for students with disabilities, but are effective. It describes one research-based teaching technique, Content Enhancement and the Unit Organizer Routine. The article illustrates instructional procedures, offers practical tips, and cites additional resources.
PDF (9p, 139k)

Making Learning Easier: Connecting New Knowledge to Things Students Already Know
Authors: Donald Deshler, Jean Schumaker, Janis Bulgren, Keith Lenz, Jean-Ellen Jantzen, Gary Adams, Douglas Carnine, Bonnie Grossen, Betsy Davis and Janet Marquis
This article discusses the challenge that students with disabilities face in high-school settings in trying to succeed within the general education curriculum. The Concept Anchoring Routine is profiled as a way to help adolescents connect new information they are expected to learn to information that is already familiar to them.
PDF (4p, 212k)

What Curricular Designs and Strategies Accommodate Diverse Learners?
Authors: Mack Burke, Shanna Hagan, Bonnie Grossen
This article describes six features of instruction that efficiently accommodate and accelerate the learning of a diverse range of students in the general education classroom. These six features are:

1. organizing instruction around big ideas
2. using conspicuous strategies
3. priming students with background knowledge
4. using mediated scaffolding
5. judiciously planning and organizing reviews
6. using strategy integration.

PDF (5p, 76k)

Working with WebQuests: Making the Web Accessible to Students with Disabilities.
Author: Rebecca Kelly
This article describes how students with disabilities in regular classes are using the WebQuest lesson format to access the Internet. It explains essential WebQuest principles, creating a draft Web page, and WebQuest components. It offers an example of a WebQuest about salvaging the sunken ships, Titanic and Lusitania. A WebQuest planning form is included.
PDF (10p, 312k)