Papers Authored by Steve Roberts

Title	Summary	Read
20 Lesson Strategies	This little book is designed to satisfy a requirement of SED 552, Reading Strategies for Middle and Secondary Schools, in matriculation for a master’s degree in secondary education through Grand Canyon University, June 2007. The working title of this project was “Lesson Strategy Book.” The assignment was to create a book that compiles a listing with detailed descriptions of five strategies each under the following headings that could be applied in a specific content area classroom (20 different strategies total). Each strategy, with accompanying materials, should contain a brief description of the strategy and how an instructor would use it in the content area, in this case, advanced algebra. This level of algebra is often termed “college algebra,” even though many high school students embrace it in advance of calculus during their high school careers, and many bright students in grades as low as seventh may benefit from the same lessons.
Aligning Curriculum	This author is dismayed that his state’s published standards take the time and ink to explain that mental math is “calculating in your head instead of calculating using paper and pencil or technology.” We will continue to have published standards, of course; this is as we should. We should continue to have certified, professional teachers in our classrooms. We need certified teachers. But a reform is long overdue. We must reach for the better among us to prepare the citizens of tomorrow. We need to welcome professionals into the classroom. Teacher certification should transpire only after a teacher demonstrates a facility and an affinity for the art and science of instruction. Then, and only then, will we have the opportunity to truly leave no child behind.
Audio-Visual	This paper first describes how we see and hear. Legal and educational definitions of visual and hearing impairments are offered, with brief explanations of various types of such impairments. According to an online medical dictionary found at TheFreedictionary.com, there are at least 11 distinct forms of deafness. A brief treatment of how educators address the impairments discussed herein follows, with an example of “calculus for the blind” from a college in New York. In calculus, of course, we study the limits of functions as well as of ourselves. The author places a personal need to listen more closely into the paper to accede to his growing appreciation of the hearing-impaired. Finally, an interview with the admissions director for the Kansas School for the Deaf in Olathe, Kansas, completes the paper and the Week 7 assignment for Professor Zach Beck at Grand Canyon University.
Backyard Needs	To get a handle on educating students with disabilities including mental retardation, autism, and a variety of other infirmities and limitations, it seems essential to first define the disabilities. Subsequently it is prudent to identify areas of curriculum that warrant our collective attention to serve our special students with those limitations on individual learning. This paper sketches the same, with definitions first, then cursory identification of those areas of instruction that are necessary for students with severe disabilities. The crux of this paper, however, describes the special education policies of Blue Valley School District in eastern Kansas. The focus is on public school district’s policies that are designed to improve the lives of our students with exceptional learning needs.
Commonalities	What are the essential elements of a fully developed lesson plan? Because a fully developed lesson plan can only be an individual’s prerogative, what this teacher might detail as a fully developed lesson plan may not fit the bill for another mentor or another instructor. For as soon as we allow that a lesson plan can be followed like a recipe, we have denigrated the professional teacher to lackey, to clerk. This is no small point. In America we have a conundrum in education. It is the battle between professional educator and civil servant, between mentor and clerk, between autonomous intellectual leader and employee of an oft-mismanaged taxpayer-funded school system stumbling to try to be all things to all people. The fundamental conflict between scholar and union member is, to be sure, is an oversimplification.
Consistent Diversity	The task at hand is to describe appropriate assessments to be used for ELL students, for those English language learners who may or may not have mastered basics of a different language. In the discussion of those evaluations that are deemed appropriate, this paper details how alternative assessments are implemented effectively for all American students, regardless whether their native spoken language is English. Following those discussions is an enumeration of some of the benefits of using alternative assessments for ELL students as well as for native English speakers.
Enabling Transition	Disabilities result from impairments to body or mind. A disability is literally the inability to perform an act or function because of an impairment; the ability to do something is compromised because of a physical or mental impairment. This paper discusses early intervention priorities and educational programs for the disabled and for the exceptional learner – often one and the same, but not always. Transitional programs to get disabled high school students into the adult world are detailed with an emphasis on the progressive VESID of New York State’s education department. Assessing early learners is fraught with vagaries, and the strengths and weaknesses of some assessments and early interventions are discussed. Finally, transitional programs are evaluated with an eye on what outcomes and expectations for transitioning disabled individuals should be, and suggestions are offered for what needs to transpire to improve those transitional programs.
Exceptional Generalities	Americans have evolved a general perspective on the education of students with special needs. Most have some appreciation of our laws that protect those who need protecting, while at the same time legal wrangling unnecessarily depletes our limited resources that could be more effectively put to help those who need it. Beginning with important terms to understand, this paper addresses those perspectives concomitantly with some social implications of attitude, legislation, and litigation on the lives of students with disabilities. In addition to an explanation of my first memorable personal encounter with a person with disabilities I describe how my personal reactions to those with disabilities have evolved and, hopefully, matured.
Fraction Traction	Let us assume that we have five weekdays, a standard school week, to provide a complete instructional unit and to test, or assess, the students’ mastery of the material. We shall begin with a review of decimals and fractions on Monday. On Tuesday we will engage units within fractions. On Wednesday we will work word problems with rates expressed as fractions. On Thursday we will review for Friday’s test. Friday is dedicated to an exam.
Ideological Linchpins	Linchpins are usually concrete objects or concepts, not people. Nevertheless, this paper considers a few of the key figures in the development of higher-order thinking. While many women have contributed to this way of seeing the purpose of education, or seeing life itself, to paraphrase John Dewey, this paper briefly details nine men whose lives contributed to our collective knowledge and wisdom based on outward, objective observation and inward, introspective insight – of higher-order thinking. The list detailed herein: Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Locke, Rousseau, Mill, Dewey, and Whitehead.

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