Topics in Early Childhood Special Education

The purpose of this article is to explore the issues concerning the adaptation of school-based service delivery concepts for use in early childhood special education programs. The use of categorical labels for determining eligibility for preschool children is not required by law—and may be detrimental. The following concerns are discussed: (a) definitional issues in learning disabilities versus low achievement, (b) the dangers of labeling and low expectation sets, (c) repeated failure to demonstrate movement through a continuum of services (particularly to least restrictive environments), and (d) the efficacy of early intervention and school-based special services for those with mild or suspected developmental disabilities. Research is reviewed concerning definitional and assessment issues utilizing learning disabilities as a construct. Alternatives for describing the characteristics of young children who are significantly at risk or developmentally delayed are provided.

In recent years, there has been increasing concern about the identification of, and provision of appropriate services to, children with hearing impairment and learning disabilities (HILD). Although at present it is unclear just what percentage of children with HI also might have educationally significant learning problems, results from limited survey research within the sparse literature on students with multiple disabilities and HI (MDHI) provide evidence that such a group exists and that a significant portion of the school-age population with HI falls within the HILD subgroup. For children with hearing loss, the preschool period offers a prime opportunity for educationally significant problems in addition to impaired hearing, such as learning disabilities, to be identified and for an educational plan to be implemented. This article presents information on the characteristic etiologies, estimated prevalence, aspects of identification and educational programming, and an agenda for practice and research with this population.

Epidemiological techniques were used to reanalyze selected published studies that had screened preschool or kindergarten children. Subjects had been longitudinally tracked to determine results of the screens through the identification of educationally at-risk children. Using published results, a reanalysis of the studies was performed to include sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, relative risk ratio, and odds ratio. A comparison of these values was used to discuss and compare the predictive validity and risk indices of the studies. Further interpretation suggested a paradigm shift away from longitudinal studies for screening instrument testing. Methodological considerations emphasizing risk analysis and design modifications are discussed.

A sample of 221 children (102 females, 119 males) were tested in kindergarten with a battery of tests that included measures of phonological awareness, phonological coding in lexical access, and coding in working memory. Reading skill was measured in third grade with a group-administered achievement test (vocabulary and comprehension), and children were classified as severely disabled, poor, average, or superior readers. Of the 19 possible kindergarten predictors, only rapid naming of letters, general ability, and discrimination of beginning sounds within words significantly contributed to the prediction of reading outcome. With general ability removed from the analysis, rapid letter naming, beginning sound discrimination, and auditory conceptualization predicted reading outcome. These three measures were very accurate in predicting reading outcome for the extremely poor and superior readers. The false negative rate was low but the false positive rate was quite high. These results suggest that the diagnosis of children as at risk for reading difficulties or as reading disabled in kindergarten is a complex process that must involve the evaluation of a broad range of skills, including, but not limited to, phonological processing.

Recent studies concerning parental attitudes toward preschool mainstreaming indicate a favorable disposition toward this arrangement by parents of typical children and those of children with disabilities in mainstreamed settings. This study seeks to replicate and extend these findings. Discussed are the first-year results of a 5-year longitudinal study of parental attitudes toward mainstreaming in school-age programs. Surveyed were 230 parents. Results indicated that the parents, regardless of their child's preschool placement in a mainstreamed or segregated program, held very favorable opinions toward mainstreaming. However, the parents of typical children and the parents of children with disabilities in the mainstream settings indicated greater satisfaction with their child's involvement in a mixed grouping of children, and stronger opinion that this involvement influenced their child's development, than did their counterparts in the segregated settings. Correlations of these results with length of time in preschool and level of child functioning are also discussed.

This study investigated the effectiveness of a simultaneous prompting procedure in teaching expressive word recognition to preschool children. Four children, two typically developing, one with a physical disability, and one with mild developmental delays, served as subjects. The effectiveness of a simultaneous prompting procedure was evaluated through the use of a multiple probe design. Results indicate that the procedure was effective for three of the four students. These students acquired the behaviors in a near-errorless fashion, with a mean of 1.3% training errors. These students maintained the target behaviors at high rates up to 6 weeks after training and generalized the responses across stimulus materials, with an overall mean of 91% accuracy.