The practice of serving students with emotional and behavioral challenges in the United States has been fraught with anxiety, fear, and stress. Fortunately, researchers in the field of emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) have identified a range of empirically supported interventions to improve outcomes for students with EBD. This study sought…

This study examined the psychological well-being of students enrolled in two gifted programs with different service delivery models. Participants were 292 fifth- and sixth-grade students (M[subscript age] = 11.70, SD[subscript age] = 0.65) enrolled in a gifted math pull-out program (n = 103), a self-contained gifted program (n = 90), or a program…

COVID-19 has presented new challenges for all teachers, especially teachers of students with special needs. Students have struggled with online learning environments with limited opportunities for social interaction and resources for these disruptive times. The study examined the effect of a professional development (PD) intervention, guided by…

Empirical research has identified many factors that contribute to feelings of burnout among special education teachers. Few studies, however, have examined the influence of varying responsibilities on burnout among special education teachers. The "Maslach Burnout Inventory Educator Survey" was distributed to a sample of special education…

This study employed a descriptive correlational design to investigate the collaborative role of teachers' profiles, assistive technology utilization, and their impact on teaching exceptional learners in public schools. A convenience sample of 63 teachers who had experience teaching exceptional learners in self-contained and inclusive classrooms in…

The landscape of public education has felt a severe impact from the COVID-19 global pandemic. As schools and educators move into this new normal, educators and students will have to come together to reverse the damage caused over the past 3 or 4 years. To complete this goal, educators must understand the perception of students regarding building…

Background/Context: The 1960s open space school removed partitions between classrooms in part to alleviate teacher isolation. The model was long ago deemed a failure. Years later, teachers in surviving open space facilities continue to navigate the reform. Despite wide dismissal of the model, components of teachers' work that open space schools…

Teachers' instructional language is often described as key in facilitating the learning of children with disabilities. This article explored two teachers' instructional language as used in interactions with children with mild and severe language difficulties in one-on-one instructional sessions. The results showed that teachers used more…

The ability to notice internal sensations such as tense muscles, a rumbling stomach, or heavy eyelids and translate these internal sensations into emotional meaning such as anger, hunger, and fatigue is an important skill called interoceptive awareness. Deficits in interoception have been discovered within many conditions including autism spectrum…

This phenomenological case study explored the pedagogical change experiences of five special education teachers who have transitioned from teaching in a self-contained class to an inclusive class. Educators participated in individual interviews regarding their experiences over the course of their teaching careers. These data were combined using a…

Based on street-level bureaucracy, this study investigates the paraprofessional role and assignments in self-contained classrooms for students with intellectual disabilities in Sweden. The research design contains a mixed method approach using a digital questionnaire for paraprofessionals (N = 60) and semi-structured interviews with four special…

There is a national shortage of special education teachers, so it is imperative to retain special educators in the field (Carver-Thomas & Darling-Hammond, 2017). The most commonly cited reason special education teachers shared for leaving is lack of support from their administration. The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore how…

Adopting an "act-in-context" approach is helpful to researchers investigating situational variability in children's active engagement in preschool classrooms. Aligned with this approach, we propose an empirical pathway and a conceptual model to support examinations of contextual factors hypothesized to impact active engagement as well as…

Limited research exists to target algebra instruction for students with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). In this study, researchers compared the use of concrete -- with scaffolds added by researchers -- and virtual algebra tiles -- with inherent scaffolds -- to support the acquisition, fluency, and generalization of linear…

Scholars have documented long-standing disparities in access to well-qualified, well-supported teachers, including disparities in access to special education teachers (SETs), based on student socioeconomic status. In response, policy initiatives have aimed to incentivize teaching in higher-poverty schools. Thus, we examined changes over time in…