Daily Archive for April 22nd, 2010

L-to-R: T. Scruggs (foreground), D. Fuchs, M. Gerber,
and N. Zigmond

At the behest of Rollanda O’Connor, Dan Hallahan gathered four informed people—Naomi Zigmond, Tom Scruggs, Mike Gerber, and Doug Fuchs—to address this question: “The LD Construct: Can it be Saved? Is it Worth Saving?” The discussion, which was held at the annual international convention of the Council for Exceptional Children, as a product of the Division for Learning Disabilities (DLD). Of course, I’m biased (I am compensated as the executive director for DLD), but I have to say that this was a top-notch event.

These advocates agreed that there really is something to LD. They argued clearly and effectively that educators need to reconsider the construct of LD; focus on individual students needs; the needs of those students can (in fact) be discriminated from others who have low achievement; that there’s lots of good to response to instruction (or intervention), but it’s neither likely to address all the learning problems students experience nor identify those who need additional services; and that those students may need instruction that is radically different from what they can get in general education settings.

There’s lots more to what they had to say, and I hope TeachingLD can capture and disseminate it. If so, I’ll relate it here.