I chose 'Meeting Special Needs in Science Curriculum' as my book because it's more useful for my intended teaching path than the books suggested on the list. Though I have not recieved the book yet I know that there are parts that, for the intention of our integrated curriculum course, are not relevant (i.e. policy writing, working with TAs, etc). The sections of the book that I am most interested are those that will explain how to modify science lessons or create lesson plans that special needs students (both physically and developmentally delayed) will be able to have fun with and learn from.
In all the years that I've been working in special needs classroms I can not think of a single in depth science lesson that was taught. I'm sure that when your students are working on gross/fine motor skills, speech, and even feeding themselves, that it's easy to overlook science. Every once in a while you'll have a lesson about animals or weather, but never any real answers (why do frogs croak? what makes a cloud?). I hope to one day incorporate science experiements and hands-on lessons; I believe that special needs students benefit even more from these approaches that general ed students do, and it's vital that we give them the opportunity to do so.
Photo by Jillian L. of Chappy P. (Making a volcano in Wales, UK) 2007
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