2010 Conference Highlights and Materials

Range of topics included:

• Response to Intervention in WI and the new SLD criteria

• Evidence-based practices in the inclusive classroom

• Instructional strategies for students with disabilities in:

• Math

• Reading

• Science

• Cross-cultural comparisons of disability

• Team teaching

• Working with paraprofessionals

• Increasing social interaction of students with significant disabilities

• Self-determination

• Transition

• Assistive technology

• Sign Language

• Early childhood education

• Training in the supervision of student teachers to become a qualified cooperating teacher

• And much more!

2010 Keynote Speaker: Temple Grandin

The keynote speaker for the 2010 conference was Dr. Temple Grandin. Temple Grandin, the most well-known American with autism, urged teachers, parents and students to avoid getting “hung up on labels.”

Grandin advocated for building on students’ strengths no matter the disability label.

Grandin said her own brain works in an associative — not linear — manner; she thinks in pictures, not words.

“It’s like Google for pictures,” she added.

Grandin said that if a child with autism is fixated on a certain topic, such as horses or NASCAR racing, teachers should build reading and math lessons around that topic to keep the child interested. She also said early intervention and teaching children with autism how to take turns are key to success.

“You can’t take the geek out of a geek,” she said. “But you can teach them to be polite geeks.”

• Photo gallery
  

• Presentation materials

• Exhibitor list

• Online graduate course description