Educating Parents Effectively to Prepare Them for Their Role in the Special Education Process

Abstract

Students with a labelled learning disability comprise approximately 5% of the population in American public schools. This research project seeks to identify appropriate ways to both prepare and inform parent/caregivers to enable them to advocate for their children through the Committee on Preschool Special Education/Committee on Special Education (CPSE/CSE) processes. It determines that the children are best served through a collaboration between the educators’ experience and the parents’ intimate knowledge of both student and home environment. Additional questions considered in this research project are: parent/guardian emotional response to their child’s suspected learning disability, identification of effective programs to assist parents as educated advocates of the special education process, parental involvement and engagement in this process, parental awareness of services available to them. Participants in the parent workshop included appropriate school personnel and a parent group comprised of the researcher’s class as well as additional families from an urban Head Start program. The study affirms the usefulness of both parent questionnaires and an informative workshop for parents to strengthen their collaboration with educators and special education consultants.