Special Education: Looking Backward To Move Forward: Article Analysis

The article chosen for this analysis is titled “Culturally Different Students in Special Education: Looking Backward to Move Forward” by Donna Y. Ford (2012). It was located by using the Google Scholar online database. The article is published in the Exceptional Children journal. This article was reviewed by experts in the field before it was published. In this article the author sought to identify the need for multicultural courses and degrees that prepare teachers and special educators to be culturally competent would decrease misunderstandings, unnecessary referrals and inappropriate special education identification. The purpose of this article is to promote awareness to attitudes and behaviors in the public school system that contributes

This article was easy to read and well organized. The information was culturally broken down to show how multicultural learning styles differ. This article answered many questions that sometimes go unanswered due to of lack of cultural competence. The article presents findings from other research which confirms that the practices are unchanged in the public school system when it comes to the imbalance of students in special education programs. The articles used annual reports from the U. S. Department of Education, Conditions of Education and the U.S. Census Bureau and U.S. Department of Education Office for Civil Rights along with other expert professionals to determine the extent in which special education was being culturally overrepresented in the public school system. The article included some discussions from educators which some denied that there was any cultural differences. I think the resources researchers used were adequate. The only thing I may have included was interview education professionals from the different school levels such as elementary school, middle school and high school. The interpretation of the data analysis was a combination of tables and graphs which provided