Educational Diagnosticians

Anise Flowers, Ph. D, has moved on from Pearson learning and now works for Presence. Presence uses telecommunication technology to match evaluators with districts who need evaluations. She tells us about the benefits of the platform and the validity of using it.

Dr. Monica McHale-Small tells us about the position of the Learning Disabilities Association of America's position on identifying a learning disability and the work of the LDA to bring awareness to the issues surrounding learning disabilities.

The Texas Educational Diagnostician Agency celebrated its 50th Anniversary and became golden this year. Many didn't get to go because the conference was quickly sold out. I share my take aways from the conference for those of you who didn't get to attend.

Dr. Sarah Brasiel joins for Educational Diagnostician Week to tell us about the Institute for Educational Sciences.  The organization offers lots of information and services to teachers and evaluators. Because they encourage the science of education, their work provides hope that one day, we will use science to find ways to prevent learning disabilities.  In recognition of Educational Diagnostician Week, she wrote a blog about our Clubhouse and the researchers that have been interviewed through this project who have also been awarded grants for research from the IES. 

Marnee Loftin is has had the unique position of being the LSSP for the School for the Blind.  She tells us about the special considerations we should have when testing children who have significant visual impairments.  She also shares her view on co-morbid diagnosis for children who are visually impaired.

Dr. Mark Shinn could be considered one of the Founding Fathers of special education. He led the way in research to find ways to measure progress for children with disabilities.  His work on developing CBMs lead to the development of DIBELS and AIMSweb, both of which are widely used in schools today.  Together with other pioneer researchers, he and others helped influence the federal IDEA and its revision in 2004. He sees interventions as the tool to closing the gaps between the haves and the have nots, but he feels like strict adherence to giving IQ tests stands in the way of the adoption of intervention practices and therefor our ability to truly realize social justice through education. 

Dr. Schultz tells us about the President's Commission on Excellence in Special Education report from 2002.  The recommendations in this report drove the revision of IDEA in 2004.  At the time, SLD identifications were reported to have grown by 300%.  The recommendation was to include Response to Intervention.  The question here would be, with the lack of focus on good RTI practices, is our rise in referrals a sign that we are Repeating History? Dr. Schultz argues that CSEP is the answer in the context of the state of RTI at this time. 

Allison Hollis joins to tell us about all the special considerations when managing a transition assessment.

Nancy Mather tells us about the Test of Dyslexia and how to assess for dyslexia. 

The Law Dawg tells us about the Texas Legislature and we discuss what we can look forward to in this legislative session.