This book introduces readers to key concepts and issues in the evolving field of special education. Arguably, over the past thirty years, no other area of education has been as radically transformed as the provision of services to children with disabilities. Since the mid 1970s, special education has steadily grown to reach fully 12% of the U.S. student population in grades K-12, and millions of children from birth to age five. Despite its promise of equal access, special education has become a controversial field in many respects. Critics point to its high cost, questionable pedagogical effectiveness, and differential outcomes across localities, family income levels, and ethnicities. The more typical approach in the literature highlights the legal and procedural mandates that dominate the discourse on educating the disabled student, but fails to explore the underlying assumptions and inconsistencies that make this area of education a controversial and still unsettled enterprise. This handbook departs from the traditional books in this field by focusing on the ways that special education policies and practices are enacted, rather than highlighting only their intended outcomes. Contributors to this text focus on defining commonly used terms and professional jargon in order to give interested readers access and insight into the field of special education and its associated practices. Some of the subjects included in this volume are the history of special education, disability and society, law and special education, pedagogy, policies and practices, and research in special education.

Korn and Bursztyn and their contributors examine the cultural transitions that children make as they move between the cultures of home and school. To better understand these transitions, they explore how educators understand their students' shifting experiences and examine how educators also negotiate transitions as they too move from home to school each day. The narratives or case studies reflect this shifting gaze: from child, to teacher, to parents, and take up the various relational configurations that these can form, amongst and between each other. They turn a critical eye toward instances of classroom practice and school life, connecting personal knowledge with school change. In some cases, the authors draw directly on autobiographical material, linking these to a reflective approach to teaching.

Avoiding the celebratory tone that often attends discussions of multiculturalism, the authors address how diverstiy engages us in continual renegotiation of the personal and social. The perspectives of educators and of teacher candidates are presented, and the construction of cultural identity and its impact on schools, explored. In illuminating the complicated nature of cultural transitions and the obligation of schools to create places in which children and families of diverse backgrounds can thrive, they highlight how multiculturalism can play a transformative role in the lives of children and schools. A must reading for educators and graduate students in education, school psychology, guidance and counseling.