The Multiple Roles of Staff DevelopersBy Joellen Killion and Cindy Harrison
Journal of Staff Development, Summer 1997 (Vol. 18, No. 3)
Everybody has his own theatre in which he is manager, actor, prompter, playwright, sceneshifter, boxkeeper, doorkeeper, all in one, and audience in the bargain.-- Augustus William Hare
Serving in multiple roles is common for most staff developers. During the last several decades, the transformation in the roles of staff developers has paralleled the shift from inservice education focused primarily on individual teacher change to a more comprehensive, systemic focus on the entire organization and the individuals who comprise it (Henkelman, 1991; Killion & Harrison, 1991, 1992; Phillips & Shaw, 1989). Throughout the history of staff development, the journey of staff developers has had eight major stops, each one adding a new role.
Staff developers began their work primarily as trainers and coordinators of training in the 1970s. Throughout the 1970s, staff development focused largely on the delivery of workshops and training. Staff developers also assumed responsibilities for managing training departments, training others to be staff developers, coordinating on-site follow-up, and evaluating program effectiveness.
In the mid-1980s, the focus of staff developers’ work reflected the movement toward organization development, school improvement, and systemic change. With the spread of school improvement processes, staff developers added to their repertoire the roles of facilitation for the school improvement process and other projects.
Today, staff developers emphasize developing learning organizations and learning communities. This newest role involves all stakeholders in the educational process and capitalizes on the strengths of all for improving the entire school community.
Adding new roles for staff developers seems to parallel changes from a centralized decision-making system to a decentralized system. The shift from bureaucratic organizations to more organic organizations that fostered school-based decision making, school improvement planning, teacher leadership, and individual school communities has created the need for different forms of support from staff developers. As staff developers’ roles expand and change, their work broadens and incorporates more responsibility and accountability to respond to continuous changes in educational programs.
The need for each role continues to be strong within most school organizations. The roles described in this article are necessary for effective staff development. In some districts and schools, a variety of people assume responsibility for these roles.
At the district level, a curriculum coordinator, school improvement coordinator, or assistant superintendent may share the role with a staff developer. At the school, teacher leaders, the principal, or others may share roles which are not filled at the district level, or they may assume those roles most necessary to advance their school improvement plans.
Eight Roles
There are eight distinct roles of staff developers (see Figure 1). Each role differs in its key responsibilities; however, the roles often overlap in real life situations. For example, staff developers acting as trainers or training designers also commonly assume the role of coach.
The scenarios provide examples of specific contexts in which a staff developer performs each role. In each role, the staff developer depends on skills that are particular to that role. However, as roles overlap, so do skills. Staff developers face challenges that often are unique to each individual role.
Trainer/Designer
The director of materials management asked the staff developer to train his office staff on how to deal with difficult people. He said his staff was experiencing stress and frustration because they didn’t feel very successful in meeting client demands.
The staff developer met with the director and several department members to learn more before designing a training program. Before the training, the staff developer met again with the director and the staff to review the training plan and assess whether the design addressed the group’s needs. As part of this discussion, the staff developer helped the group develop a plan to evaluate the training.
The training was delivered in several sessions. Between each session, the staff developer met again with the planning team to make necessary revisions. He also visited the work site to provide coaching on skills and techniques as participants transferred the new learnings to their practice. During these visits, he learned how to further customize the training. The staff developer was also available by phone to help individuals with questions and problems.
The early training role of staff developers continues to be important. The staff developer helps others acquire new skills, knowledge, and attitudes through designing and delivering training. Staff developer’s current role in training is more comprehensive than in the past. Rather than delivering a predesigned program, today’s staff developer often custom designs training, plans on-site implementation assistance, focuses on measuring the training’s impact, and influences the necessary systemic changes.
The training role is highly visible and places the staff developer "on the stage." But, the staff developer who conducts successful training spends as much or more time behind the scenes preparing learning experiences. The trainer/designer assesses participants’ needs, designs learning experiences which meet identified needs, creates a plan that honors adult learning, focuses on implementing the learning, and adjusts the instruction and learning environment to ensure success.
Occasionally, the staff developer only designs the training while another person conducts the actual training. But, in most situations, staff developers assume the roles of both designer and trainer. A client may initiate the request for training, but it is not unusual for a staff developer to initiate the service in response to a district- or building-identified need for knowledge or skill development.
To be successful as designers of training, staff developers must know and be able to apply theories on adult learning, instructional design, diagnosis, evaluation, group process, and individual and organization change. In addition, the staff developer needs the skills of delivering content in an engaging and effective manner to optimize learning, build rapport with learners, monitor participants’ responses and adjust the design or delivery, and evaluate the training’s impact.
Designers of learning are challenged to ensure clarity and variety in their instructional design while incorporating the latest research and practice on teaching adults. Designers must constantly update their understanding of the specific content and explore effective ways of delivering the desired learning to participants.
This includes becoming competent in using instructional technology, various models of staff development (Sparks & Loucks-Horsley, 1990), and the National Staff Development Council’s Standards for Staff Development (NSDC, 1994, 1995a, 1995b).
As a trainer, the staff developer faces the challenge of simultaneously being an expert and being a learner. As an expert, the staff developer must provide thorough, in-depth information related to the content.
As a learner, the staff developer must be open to new knowledge gained from participants about the multiple ways to implement the new learning. Trainers are also challenged to be responsive to their participants’ learning needs and to constantly adjust and fine-tune their work for their audience.
Coach
As they developed a multi-year staff development program in developmentally appropriate practices, the staff developers in Thompson School District recruited teachers who were successful in implementing developmentally appropriate practices as coaches for other teachers who completed the training. These coaches and the staff developers met several times to clarify what appropriate usage of the new strategies might look like.
They developed checklists and guidelines that delineated the difference between novice and sophisticated users. The coaches prepared several interventions to match the stages of concern outlined in the Concerns-Based Adoption Model (Hall & Hord, 1984) so they would have some quick references to use as they worked with individual teachers. For example, teachers who struggled with management concerns might be given time to observe a teacher who was doing well in this area.
After the training was over, coaches visited each participant and helped each reflect on how they were implementing the new learning and practices from the training. Coaches gave specific attention to the teacher’s behaviors, students’ responses, classroom situation, and curriculum. Coaches helped teachers reflect on their decisions and consider possible alternatives. With help from their coaches, teachers felt more comfortable taking risks and using new strategies.
At some schools where several teachers received the training, the staff developer formed support groups to encourage participants to help each other with difficult implementation problems. Teachers shared ideas, encouraged one another, and commiserated about the complexities of changing well developed practices and habits.
The coach also met with the teachers in support groups, offered constructive feedback, helped them share resources and ideas among themselves, and established a peer observation schedule that allowed teachers to observe each other.
Coaching is essential to increase the transfer of learning. As a coach, a staff developer’s key responsibility is helping participants transfer structured or unstructured learning experiences into practice. Coaches support their clients as they adjust new learning to fit their work setting or personal style.
Staff developers go to the work site, observe clients at work, gather information about participants’ behaviors, and offer feedback and support. The feedback should strengthen new learning and increase its use. Staff developers also encourage clients to become self-analytic by asking questions to promote reflection and metacognition. Sometimes, coaches might work indirectly by arranging for peer coaching.
Successful coaches have expertise in questioning, listening, giving feedback, coaching, and problem solving along with a thorough understanding of the change processes and the Concerns-Based Adoption Model (Hall & Hord, 1984). In this role, the staff developer understands expectations of the staff development program and the range of acceptable practice, and designs interventions to assist both reluctant and eager users.
The greatest challenge for the coach is to encourage adaptions of the new learning. Often staff developers find themselves struggling with the expectation of replication rather than encouraging variations and adaptations as part of learning and internalizing new skills and applying them in daily practice.
Resource Provider
When the high school’s improvement team needed assistance identifying instructional strategies to meet the needs of at-risk students, they went first to the staff development office. After collecting resources from the professional development library, the staff developer posted a message on an electronic bulletin board seeking suggestions from teachers, university personnel, administrators, and other staff developers across the country.
The staff developer showed the team how to do an ERIC search to gather references for relevant articles or papers. The school had gained access to information in multiple databases from subject area associations, regional educational laboratories, university partnerships with public schools, and the U.S. Department of Education’s resources. Within 48 hours, the staff developer was able to link the school improvement team with six other high schools working on the same problem.
As resource provider, the staff developer is asked to provide information regarding speakers, research about best practices, consultants, or teaching resources. Staff developers might be asked to recommend the best video on multicultural education to show at a staff inservice, recommend a book for a study group, or help a principal create a slide presentation for his parent organization.
The staff developer’s goal as resource provider is to provide or link clients with resources that will help them reach their desired outcomes. The resource provider also can disseminate current trends and research through a newsletter, research update, or other means.
Staff developers need a variety of skills for this role. They must:
• Know how to research a variety of areas including school improvement, instructional strategies, leadership, program evaluation, and student assessment
• Know how to locate, access, and search on-line databases, libraries, journals, and catalogs.
• Network with colleagues to locate information or people to assist in particular areas.
• Critically analyze information and resources to verify their accuracy, assess their quality and relevance, and determine their appropriateness for the given audience.
As a resource provider, the staff developer faces several challenges. First, they must keep abreast of the rapidly changing field of education and share with others how to research their questions. By teaching others how to do the research, the staff developer not only meets the request, but also increases others’ capacity to gather the information for themselves in the future.
Second, the staff developer must be careful not to bias the information presented by selecting only that which agrees with his or her professional or personal philosophy or practice. Ensuring that clients have as much information as possible, including conflicting information on a topic, will build a clients’ ability to analyze information and critique its validity, reliability, and value. Staff developers might help clients develop and use questions to guide their review of information.
Third, staff developers must consider the audience for a particular resource. The resource provider must have more than one idea, book, video, or presenter for any given topic. An effective video that describes active learning strategies in a succinct fashion could be a disaster at a high school faculty meeting if none of the examples in the video relate to the high school level.
Program Manager
The state legislature recently passed a law requiring school districts to provide an induction program for new teachers. The staff developer called the director of personnel to discuss how the two departments might work together to provide this service. The staff developer held focus groups for new teachers, principals, and experienced teachers to gather specific data to help design the program. She researched district, state, and university induction programs. She also collected additional data with a districtwide needs assessment.
The staff developer examined ways to involve all the necessary stakeholders in developing and implementing the program. With the collective input from all the stakeholders, a committee of volunteers, facilitated by the staff developer, developed a clear vision for the program, wrote a proposal for the program, presented the proposal to the school board, and received the requested funding.
The staff developer, as program manager for induction, assumed responsibility for selecting, training and supporting mentors, and coordinating orientation and training sessions for new teachers. The staff developer also supervised the program’s support staff.
During the program’s second year, the staff developer worked with the teachers’ association to develop language for the teachers’ contract regarding induction. She also coordinated the training of new mentors and beginning teachers, matched mentors and new teachers, set up the induction teams, met with new employees to explain the program requirements, managed the program budget, conducted an annual program evaluation, and made the necessary revisions in the program based on an annual program evaluation.
As program manager, a staff developer may be responsible for an entire department or just a project. Program managers are accountable for program development and management. Staff developers may manage different types of programs. Examples might include an induction program for beginning teachers, a professional development program for administrators, a partnership project with a university, a diversity initiative, or a staff development department.
But the responsibilities and skills for each of these situations are much the same. In the program manager role, staff developers provide leadership and carry out necessary managerial functions such as managing budgets, coordinating services, delegation of responsibilities, or personnel management. Functions will vary depending on the project and its magnitude.
A program manager’s key responsibility is to ensure effective and efficient program operation. A program manager ensures that necessary supports for program success are in place. For example, if the program is a district-level staff development program for teachers, the necessary follow-up support, classroom resources, and ongoing opportunities to extend learning must be addressed.
Another responsibility is creating programs that respond to client needs. An additional responsibility for the program manager is to establish clear and measurable outcomes, assess the progress toward those outcomes, and make necessary modifications to reach the identified outcomes.
Staff developers acting as program managers need a comprehensive set of skills. One set of skills relates to the program and includes action planning, creating a vision, program evaluation, budget management, delineation of responsibilities and tasks, shared decision making, advocacy and influencing, and communication.
When the program involves employees, such as managing a staff development department, then the program manager depends on another set of skills. These skills include coaching and evaluating personnel, motivating people, and delegating responsibility.
This role challenges staff developers to place outcomes of the program and the needs of its clients above his or her own needs. The staff developer must recognize that the program serves others’ needs. There must be constant evaluation and revision so the program remains vibrant and responsive to the identified needs.
Program managers also must use appropriate decision-making processes when issues arise. The program manager often selects the stakeholders who will be involved in decision making, and determines when and by what means to involve them. The staff developer must make decisions which are in the best interest of the client.
This concept of "stewardship" as defined by Peter Block (1993) requires that the program manager and clients have a partnership built on the foundation of a shared vision, common beliefs, and absolute honesty which emphasizes service over self-interests. The program manager practices stewardship in all aspects of program management.
Consultant
The assistant principal at Pinkerton Elementary School recognized that the school’s vision and goals were not helping teachers make difficult decisions about classroom practice. The assistant principal called the staff developer and asked for her help. After some conversation, the staff developer discovered that neither the teachers nor the principal referred to the vision and goals which they had written a number of years ago.
The staff developer helped the assistant principal define the problem and design a plan for on-site assistance. The assistant principal wanted to facilitate the process of identifying common beliefs, revising the vision, and aligning school goals with the vision. To assist the assistant principal, the staff developer assumed the role of consultant.
The staff developer met jointly with the principal and assistant principal to review various models of school improvement and strategic planning, and discussed the appropriateness of each model for the task at hand. The staff developer helped the school leaders examine the potential value and use of a shared vision, and the need to explore the beliefs of all members of the school community before revising the current vision and goal statements.
The staff developer helped the clients design the agenda for the first meeting with the faculty. Following this faculty meeting, the staff developer debriefed the principal and assistant principal.
Since the staff developer did not attend, she could ask questions that encouraged the administrators to reflect on the meeting from various perspectives. The staff developer and principals jointly developed the next steps in the process including agendas and strategies for accomplishing the tasks.
This cycle continued for several months. Throughout the process, the interval between visits, debriefing sessions, and joint planning sessions became increasingly longer. Never once did the staff developer work directly with the staff. After several months invested in the school and the leadership development of the administrators, the staff developer realized that her guidance, coaching, and assistance were no longer needed.
By then, the school staff had revised their vision and aligned the school goals so they would guide critical instructional and management decisions and promote professional development and systemic change. The staff developer celebrated the accomplishments of the administrators and recognized that they both acquired skills, strategies, knowledge, and the confidence to engage in this process again without the same level of assistance.
Staff developers often serve as consultants. "A consultant is a person in a position to have some influence over an individual, a group, or an organization, but who has no direct power to make changes or implement programs" (Block, 1981, p. 1). Consultants help, guide, assist, and support. As a consultant, a staff developer provides assistance to a single client, small group, or team and views each client as a microcosm of the entire organization (Phillips & Shaw, 1989).
Consultants rely on sets of skills for each of the four phases of their work (Block, 1981; Friedman & Yarbrough, 1985; Phillips & Shaw, 1989). The first phase establishes a relationship with the client. The next phase clarifies expectations for the consultant’s work and negotiating the specifics of the working contract between the consultant and the client. Third, the consultant diagnoses the situation by selecting and using appropriate means for data collection, analysis, and presentation to the client. Fourth, the consultant guides the client in determining the best intervention to accomplish the goal.
In the consultant role, staff developers assist clients in thinking through situations, provide guidance and resources, design interventions, and lend expertise and a fresh perspective. What distinguishes consultation for other roles is that the goals or outcomes are unknown as the staff developer enters the situation. The goals must be determined through a careful organizational diagnosis which guides the consultant’s intervention.
As a consultant, the staff developer has several key responsibilities. The first is facilitating organizational change and development by working with individuals who comprise the organization (Phillips & Shaw, 1989; Schein, 1988). A consultant’s second key responsibility is sharing skills and knowledge to build the capacity of others. The third is helping the client be successful in his or her work by coaching, advising, considering consequences, and suggesting alternatives.
The consultant promotes client learning and development by working collaboratively with the client rather than being the expert who prescribes solutions, strategies, or specific approaches. The consultant works at the client’s invitation, provides another perspective, asks questions, and offers a variety of possibilities, but refrains from directing or having a single right answer.
As consultants, staff developers depend on many skills. One key skill is deep listening, not only to the content but to the implicit messages underlying the words. The consultant listens for the client’s understanding and consideration of the various perspectives, openness to change, and sense of efficacy or futility.
Other skills include data gathering, questioning, and analyzing information about the organization and its members to be used when designing appropriate interventions. Since much of the interaction between the consultant and the client centers around identifying problems and designing interventions, the staff developer needs these skills.
Staff developers also need skills in contracting, the process of reaching agreement between the client and the consultant about the scope of the work, the relationship between the consultant and client, the expectations each has of one another and for the work, and the logistics related to the work such as the time frame or financial resources available.
The greatest challenge the consultant faces is having the patience to allow the client to learn "in process." Since one of the consultant’s goals is to build the capacity of others, the consultant must "think aloud" concerning the steps of the process, the rationale for his or her decisions, the process for making decisions, and the information used in each decision.
In addition, the need to fix, heal, solve, or correct the situation by identifying the right solution often traps the consultant. Consultants must strive to let go of that need and instead find multiple solutions and assist the client in deciding which solution is best in the particular situation. The final choice must always rest with the client.
Another challenge for the staff developer-as-consultant is letting go of the ego needs for recognition. When moving into a less public or visible role, the loss of accolades, acknowledgement, and public recognition requires a strong sense of self.
Instead, the reward is found in valuing the success and new skills of others and sharing knowledge, skills, and practices so they might use them in new situations. There is never enough support within an organization. By building the capacity of others through consulting, however, the staff developer increases the chances of accelerating change.
Task Facilitator
The middle school principal asked a staff developer to facilitate the school’s budget committee as it developed the next year’s budget which required an 8% budget reduction. At the first meeting with the principal and the school’s steering committee which would oversee the budget committee’s work, the staff developer clarified what was expected of budget committee members and the staff developer.
The first several budget committee meetings were devoted to helping the group of parents, community members, students, and staff form a sense of community by establishing norms, building an information base about past budgets, and understanding the committee’s charge. It was particularly important for the committee to understand that it would be making a recommendation, not a final decision.
The staff developer established agendas for the first two meetings and helped the group prepare "press releases" to communicate their work to the school community, clarify the problems, generate solutions, make decisions about the best solutions, and assess its progress toward the outcome.
After several meetings, the facilitator gradually became less active, allowing members to co-facilitate and, eventually, to facilitate themselves. When the task was accomplished, the staff developer ensured that there was a celebration to honor the committee members.
An increasingly common role for staff developers is that of facilitator, one who makes things happen with ease. The role of facilitator differs from a consultant in that the consultant is responsible for conducting a diagnosis to determine a course of action. That consultant role is broader than that of facilitator, usually occurs before facilitation, and may result in the need for a facilitator.
Facilitators have defined goals to achieve, such as designing a parental involvement program or strengthening the working relationship among teams of teachers. Consultants must seek to define their goals based on an intensive analysis of the context and situation.
There are two roles of facilitators. A task facilitator orchestrates a project or assists a group complete its task; a process facilitator focuses on the interactions among group members. Commonly, the facilitator assumes both task and process responsibilities.
A task facilitator works directly with the group, unlike the consultant who is more invisible to the group. Task facilitation is typically initiated by a client who needs assistance with a project or task. The goal of the staff developer as task facilitator is to ensure that the group achieves its desired outcomes (Schwarz, 1994). Unlike a committee chair, a task facilitator has no vested interest or necessarily any expertise in the task area.
A task facilitator is responsible for designing the process the group will use to accomplish its task. In task facilitation, the staff developer is responsible for initiating the group, working with the group to accomplish its task or charge, and reaching closure with the group and its work.
Each phase of facilitation involves specific tasks. For example, in initiating the group, the staff developer must establish a sense of team or community through team-building activities; identify explicit norms or agreements about how the group will work together; contract with the group about the roles and responsibilities of both the facilitator and group members; and clarify the group’s purpose and non-purpose (McNellis, 1992).
The facilitator must draw from a wide repertoire of strategies to help the team gather data, organize information, evaluate information, determine a course of action, communicate with the larger community, and make decisions. The facilitator must be ready to assist the group in making decisions and handling conflicts that may occur during the work.
In addition, the facilitator must help the group periodically assess its progress. Finally, the facilitator must help the group bring closure to its work and celebrate its accomplishments. One goal of all task facilitations should be developing team members’ skills to assume future group facilitation themselves (Schwarz, 1994).
Facilitators undertake a wide range of tasks such as planning for change as in school improvement teams, revising or designing curriculum, creating a process for implementing a districtwide program in shared decision making, or exploring ways to involve more parents of at-risk students in school activities. Regardless of the nature of the task or its breadth, the role of the staff developer remains the same–to assist the group in achieving its goals.
Groups with a specific task to accomplish by a certain time succeed better with trained facilitators than groups that have no facilitator (Schwarz, 1994). The facilitator who is not directly invested in the project’s outcome or task is a better facilitator because he or she is able to remain more neutral and ensure that all perspectives are incorporated into the best possible outcome.
Task facilitators rely heavily on skills for organizing, listening, planning, anticipating, observing, making decisions, and intervening appropriately. The facilitator must be careful to attend to what is happening in the group in the present, focus on the many dimensions of task completion, and make a constant stream of decisions about how to help the group with the next logical step. Understanding the task thoroughly is prerequisite to successful facilitation.
In addition to a wide array of skills, the facilitator needs a broad repertoire of strategies to help groups accomplish their work. The staff developer-as-facilitator needs group strategies for identifying problems, setting the purpose, gathering, organizing, and assessing data, generating and evaluating solutions, and decision making.
Maintaining neutrality is a facilitator’s greatest challenge in working with task groups. As a facilitator of either task, process, or both, the facilitator’s chief responsibility and goal is to help the group reach its outcome. The facilitator must be especially careful to keep his or her focus on facilitating the group rather than becoming involved with the task. Sometimes, it is particularly difficult to facilitate a group when the group’s topic or work is something about which the facilitator has strong feelings.
Process Facilitator
The elementary school principal asked the staff developer for assistance. She said her staff had difficulty getting along professionally and agreeing on any issue. Acknowledging that the staff had some animosity toward her, Ms. Fredericks recognized that she might also need to change her own behavior.
At their first meeting, the staff developer contracted with the principal to address roles, expectations, and outcomes. The staff developer asked the principal for permission to collect more data to identify issues. Both agreed that information would only be shared with the staff, not with the principal’s supervisor or parents at the school. The staff developer designed questions for discussions with staff members. After the discussions, the staff developer analyzed the responses and identified patterns.
In a meeting with the principal, the staff developer shared the data, including information that directly related to the principal’s leadership. The meeting was difficult for both the principal and staff developer since sensitive and hurtful information had to be shared. The staff developer had to be careful to maintain the data’s integrity, her relationship with the principal, and a problem-solving orientation. During the meeting, the staff developer helped the principal prepare for the full-staff meeting at which the data would be shared.
Emotions and tension were high at the staff meeting. At the beginning of the meeting, the staff developer helped the group establish norms. Next, the staff developer identified the patterns of responses gathered from the data collection. After a question-and-answer period, the staff developer helped the staff design several interventions.
The staff developer worked with the staff for about nine months by building skills, facilitating meetings where some conflict mediation occurred, and providing feedback to the staff on observed behaviors as they worked with one another. At the end of the nine months, the follow-up assessment indicated that the situation had improved but that the staff still had more work to do. The staff designed a second year’s plan to continue their work. The new plan involved only periodic assistance from the staff developer.
As a process facilitator, the staff developer helps groups of individuals when they request help with group interactions or when they struggle with their work. "Process relates to the underlying feelings and motivations people bring to the task and to each other" (Phillips & Shaw, 1989, p. 46).
Process is less visible and accessible than the task or work a group has to do, but the success of the task depends on the process. When groups request help with their interactions, the process facilitator becomes a mirror for the group by describing behaviors which promote and which hinder the group’s productivity and relationships.
The group’s productivity is reduced when there are strained relationships and conflict among group members or when the group is struggling with its task. The process facilitator works to create productive and healthy interaction among participants so they can achieve their goals. The group invites the staff developer to assist by facilitating the group as an outside, neutral facilitator. Process facilitation occurs in large groups, small groups, and, occasionally, between two individuals.
Process facilitators have three responsibilities:
1. Help group members or individuals recognize their behaviors and the impact of their behaviors on others (Schwarz, 1994);
2. Help individuals change unproductive behaviors; and
3. Help the group agree upon and implement expectations or norms for interactions to maintain the safe environment in which to accomplish their work (Schwarz, 1994). Process facilitators give group members feedback about the way they communicate with each other so they can improve their group interaction in order to accomplish their task.
In addition to the skills needed by the task facilitator, the process facilitator needs strong expertise in conflict resolution. The staff developer must be comfortable addressing difficult issues and intervening appropriately (Schwarz, 1994). Collecting and analyzing data are critical for process facilitators since they must diagnose the situation thoroughly before recommending appropriate interventions.
Process facilitators must be able to give nonjudgmental feedback and use nonjudgmental, descriptive language. They must be aware that they model salient communication skills to group members. They need fluency with a wide range of interventions that improve group members’ relationships and productivity.
Most of all, the process facilitator must remain neutral. It is far too easy to be swept into the emotions of those involved or the issues with which the group is struggling. The staff developer must be cautious about withholding judgment about anyone’s behavior while focusing the group on necessary changes to increase the group’s productivity and improve relationships among its members.
Walking the delicate balance between enabling the group by intervening too quickly or allowing the group to solve its own problems is a particularly difficult challenge for process facilitators.
Catalyst for Change
The staff developer has a unique role in the school district. She has been involved in designing many major district and school-based innovations in the past 10 years. In her work with staff members, she has been perceived as someone who is honest, willing to help others, unafraid to ask hard questions, and comfortable challenging the status quo.
The large numbers of students who returned to summer school year after year frustrated the staff developer. Summer school was designed to help students who failed to earn the credits they needed and be successful students the following school year.
Yet, judging from the number of students who repeated summer school each year, summer school seemed to do nothing to provide these students with the skills they needed to be successful when they returned to their regular schools in the fall.
What needed to change, both in the summer school program and within the regular school program, to prevent a high rate of student failure? If the summer school program engaged students, emphasized learning how to learn, and provided support for at-risk students, would the failure rate decrease?
When the staff developer asked these questions at principal meetings, they sparked both excitement and frustration. The staff developer wondered if summer school could be an exciting place for all students who wanted to extend their learning rather than exclusively a place for students who needed remediation. The staff developer proposed creating a summer school that incorporated a professional development school for researching and sharing ideas on teaching at-risk students.
The staff developer gathered information about other nationally recognized innovative programs, collected information from neighboring school districts about their summer school programs, and scheduled a meeting with the summer school administrator.
Being a catalyst for change is a demanding and new role for staff developers. In this role, the staff developer suggests new ideas and questions existing practices. By examining ways to be more effective, to move beyond the status quo, and to question underlying mental models and personal theories (Schön, 1987; Senge, 1990), the staff developer promotes learning and continuous improvement throughout the organization.
Learning organizations are built on the premise that learning in organizations means continuously testing the way people think, act, and interact (Senge, 1990; Senge et al., 1994).
The process of change begins with exploring the "truths" or assumptions upon which people base their actions. The staff developer, acting as a catalyst for change, reveals truths and identifies what is often unspoken as a way of initiating discussion about alternative ways of behaving and thinking.
The staff developer has two key responsibilities as a catalyst for change. One responsibility is promoting and guiding continuous analysis and reflection among members of the organization. To improve, members of the organization must examine the effectiveness of their current practices, policies, and procedures.
The staff developer-as-catalyst for change is also responsible for initiating alternatives to current practices. The staff developer is committed to bringing members of the organization new perspectives, ideas, and suggestions for consideration. The staff developer must be courageous and comfortable being perceived by others as "on the edge." Success in this role depends on the staff developer’s status within the organization as a respected and trusted leader.
Staff developers who are catalysts for change have their "ears to the ground" and research new practices and programs. To be credible as catalysts for change, staff developers model continuous improvement in their own work by searching for ways to improve, inviting critical friends to work with them, listening to suggestions for change, and viewing their work through the perspectives of their clients.
They read avidly and widely within and outside the field of education, always searching for applicable ideas and new perspectives. They network with colleagues to inquire about others’ approaches and perceptions regarding similar tasks or projects. They use a variety of strategies, including sharing readings, arranging visits, creating newsletters to share information, and suggesting innovative practices.
Another powerful strategy catalysts use is asking a few key questions: How did it come to be this way? Whose needs are being served here? What do these actions convey to our community?
To be successful in the role of catalyst for change, the staff developer needs to be comfortable challenging current practices in a positive and constructive manner. The staff developer depends on questioning skills to encourage others to explore possible changes. The catalyst for change must be gentle, yet persistent and provocative.
Since the staff developer’s key responsibility is encouraging others to examine their own practice and propose possible changes, the catalyst for change depends on both task and process facilitation skills to lead teams through the process of creating and implementing plans for change. The staff developer needs skills in needs assessment, planning, evaluation, resource acquisition, forecasting, and action planning.
It is particularly important to analyze data and look for significant trends that may need attention. Most importantly, the staff developer must have a firm foundation in research about organizational development and processes for initiating, implementing, and institutionalizing change.
The staff developer walks a delicate line between initiating the needed change she wants and planting seeds which allow others to craft the change they want. The staff developer must give the group, team, or initiator ownership of the change without directing the outcome.
It is critical for the staff developer to realize that others will be responsible for implementing the change. As a catalyst for change, the staff developer typically works behind the scenes and often gets no recognition. When the group says, "We did it," the staff developer knows she has been successful.
As catalysts for change, staff developers must realize that not every new idea comes to fruition through their efforts. Staff developers must be willing to question, challenge, probe, and initiate change many more times than they expect to see change take place.
While this may be frustrating, the catalyst for change knows change is a long-term process and occurs most successfully when those who are responsible for implementing change are ready for the change and have had a significant role in shaping the change.
Conclusion
The staff developer’s work is multifaceted, challenging, and demanding. Staff developers are responsible for juggling numerous roles simultaneously. Staff developers must depend on their flexibility, creativity, and adaptability to respond to the disparate responsibilities and requests which shape their daily work.
Despite these demands, staff developers have assumed additional roles while striving to balance the new ones with those already in place and while making a meaningful contribution to the overall improvement of student success.
As they assume new roles and accompanying responsibilities, staff developers must assess their own skills, seek opportunities to develop those that are associated with their new roles, and monitor how they respond to many challenges.
References
Block, P. (1981). Flawless consultant. San Diego, CA: University Associates.
Block, P. (1993). Stewardship. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler.
Friedman, P. & Yarbrough, E. (1985). Training strategies from start to finish. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Henkelman, J. (1991, Feb.). Staff developers as consultants. The Developer, p. 3.
Hall, G. & Hord, S. (1984). Change in schools: Facilitating the process. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
Killion, J. & Harrison, C. (1991, March). Staff development is more than training. The Developer, p. 3,7.
McNellis, J. (1992). Creative planning. New Brighton, PA: The McNellis Company.
National Staff Development Council. (1994). National Staff Development Council’s standards for staff development, middle level edition. Oxford, OH: Author.
National Staff Development Council. (1995a). National Staff Development Council’s standards for staff development, elementary level edition. Oxford, OH: Author.
National Staff Development Council. (1995b). National Staff Development Council’s standards for staff development, high school level edition. Oxford, OH: Author.
Phillips, K. & Shaw, P. (1989). A consultancy approach for trainers. San Diego: University Associates.
Schein, E. (1988). Process consultation: Its role in organization development (Vol. 1). (2nd ed.). Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
Schön, D. (1987). Educating the reflective practitioner. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Schwarz, R. (1994). The skilled facilitator. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Senge, P. (1990). The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. New York: Doubleday.
Senge, P., Roberts, C., Ross, R., Smith, B., & Kleiner, A. (1994). The fifth discipline fieldbook: Strategies and tools for building a learning organization. New York: Currency-Doubleday.
Sparks, D. & Loucks-Horsley, S. (1990). Models of staff development. In R. Houston (Ed.), Handbook of research on teacher education (pp. 251-263). New York: Macmillan.
About the Authors
Joellen Killion is a staff development trainer and a past president of the National Staff Development Council, and Cindy Harrison is director of staff development, Adams Twelve Five Star Schools, Staff Development Training Center, 11080 Grant Drive, Northglenn, CO 80233-3312, (303) 450-3772, fax (303) 450-3777, (e-mail: killionj@aol.com and cindy_harrison@together.cudenver.edu).
http://www.nsdc.org/library/publications/jsd/killion183.cfm
http://www.teachervision.fen.com/special-education/curriculum-planning/26106.html
Special Needs Resource Center Find answers to questions about issues such as ADD/ADHD, inclusion, and assessment. This extensive collection of tips, articles, and materials was put together in collaboration with the Council for Exceptional Children.
Adapting Materials for the Inclusive Classroom
These helpful articles describe ways to modify the curriculum to reach all of students.
ADD/ADHD
These articles and resources will help you to deal with the special nature of students with ADD/ADHD.
Behavior Management
From environmental considerations to behavior programs – our resources will help you in this key area.
Being a Resource to Others
Descriptions of roles that will help you define your job as a schools' resource teacher.
Children's Books About Disabilities
This extensive list details books for both children and adults that deal with disabilities. The books are sorted by readability and their descriptions include the type of disability addressed.
Crossover Children – LD and Gifted
These resources will help you to work successfully with children who are both learning-disabled and gifted.
Culturally Diverse Students with Learning Problems
Learn how to meet the needs of students who come from diverse backgrounds.
English-Language Learners
There are many effective strategies and procedures for providing learning opportunities for English-language learners (ELL), even when the teacher doesn't speak their native language.
Helping Students Deal with Crises
You can help yourself and your students in your most needy times at school.
IEP Resource Center
These articles define, organize, and enhance the process and functioning of IEPs (Individualized Education Programs).
Learning Disabilities: Glossary of Terms
This glossary provides definitions of important terms related to learning disabilities.
Making Assessment Accommodations
Including students with disabilities in state- and district-wide assessment programs became a requirement in the 1997 Reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Find over 25 practical accommodations that can be made in most classrooms. Social Skills and Autism
Techniques and strategies to help autistic students interact with their peers.
Strategies for Effective Document Management
Managing mounds of paper requires organization. These suggestions are successful strategies for creative and efficient document management.
Study Skills
These articles and handouts will help students to study more effectively.
Adaptations and Modifications for Special Needs Students
These articles and resources detail easy modifications to incorporate in your classroom.
Assessment and Accommodations
Read our suggestions for modifying assessments and trying new techniques to improve your knowledge of your students.
Behavior Management
From environmental considerations to behavior programs – our resources will help you in this key area.
Inclusion
Read best practices and handy tips to make inclusion a success in your school.
Learning Disabilities: Glossary of Terms
This glossary provides definitions of important terms related to learning disabilities.
Special Needs Web Resources
Use these sites to learn more about special learning needs.
Student Behavior Web Resources
Find strategies to change student behavior problems into positive behaviors.
Teaching English-Language Learners with Learning Difficulties
Practical information and guidelines for those working in districts or schools that provide services to students with a variety of learning difficulties for whom English is a second language.
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Adapting Materials for the Inclusive Classroom
When you're teaching in an inclusive classroom, it can be difficult to accomodate your materials to fit everyone's needs. These helpful articles describe ways to modify the curriculum to reach all of your students.
Adapting Instructional Materials -- Providing Direct Assistance
Providing one-on-one assistance to a student is perhaps the most demanding adaptation that needs to be made in an inclusive classroom.
Adapting Reading and Math Materials in the Inclusive Classroom
Descriptions of eight principles for making reading and math adaptations in the inclusive classroom.
Simplifying or Supplementing Existing Materials
Students with special needs can successfully become part of the regular classroom setting when existing materials are simplified or supplemented for them.
Structuring Lessons to Promote Learning from Materials
This article offers suggestions on modifying materials while teachers are planning for a lesson, not during the lesson.
Teaching Strategies for Using Materials in an Inclusive Classroom
Two well-defined strategies are described for helping special needs students become independent learners.
Adapting Language Arts, Social Studies, and Science for the Inclusive Classroom
A list of steps that provide a suggested framework for making decisions about using material adaptations effectively.
Adapting Existing Materials
An article on adaptations that can be used when existing materials are judged to be inappropriate but may only need simple modifications.
http://www.teachervision.fen.com/reading-instruction/teaching-methods/6729.html
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ADD/ADHD These articles and resources will help you to deal with the special nature of students with ADD/ADHD.
Frequently Asked Questions on ADD/ADHD
These questions address issues around dealing with ADD and ADHD.
Learning Disabilities: Glossary of Terms
This glossary provides definitions of important terms related to learning disabilities.
Teaching Children with ADD/ADHD
This article details practice and theory behind teaching children with Attention Deficit Disorders.
Teaching Strategies for Students with ADD
A collection of articles outlining suggestions and strategies to use when working with students with ADD/ADHD.
ADHD and Children Who Are Gifted
Some children are both gifted and have Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Diagnosing and working with these students can be challenging; this article will help teachers and parents better understand this complex combination.
ADHD
Learn about attention deficit disorders and how they are treated.
Organization: Advice for Parents
Offer these tips to parents to help them teach their children to become more organized.
Parent/Teacher Relations
Handy suggestions for creating and maintaining positive parent/teacher relationships.
Children's Books About Disabilities
This extensive list details books for both children and adults that deal with disabilities. The books are sorted by readability and their descriptions include the type of disability addressed.
What Teachers and Parents Should Know About Ritalin
Read about the most prescribed medication for children -- the facts and fables of Ritalin.
Six Tips for Dealing with ADD Students
Learn practical, easy-to-implement ideas for dealing with ADD students.
http://www.teachervision.fen.com/add-and-adhd/resource/5348.html
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Behavior Management
From environmental considerations to behavior programs – our resources will help you in this key area.
Awards and Certificates
Reward your students by recognizing great effort, achievement, or progress with these printable certificates and awards.
Behavioral Contracting: A Technique for Handling Disruptive Behavior
This disruptive behavior technique involves using behavior contracts to prevent poor behavior.
Behavior Management Forms
Use these charts, forms, and contracts to monitor your students' behavior.
Behavior Management -- Proactive Measures
A list of proactive measures that can be taken to keep order in your classroom.
Behavior Techniques
These behavior techniques are particularly appropriate for younger children, but can be adapted to meet the needs of students of all ages.
Bully-Proof Your Classroom
Find suggestions on how to make your classroom a peaceful, non-threatening environment.
Catch Them Being Good: A Technique for Handling Disruptive Behavior
This behavior technique includes ways to focus on the good behavior a child displays.
Characteristics of Effective Behavior Managers
Characteristics of teachers who are effective behavior managers.
Charting and Reinforcing Behaviors
Two handy charts are given to track student behavior as well as a list of possible positive reinforcers.
Classroom Forms
Use these all-subject forms to help organize your classroom.
Controlling Aggressive Behavior
These references describe how behavior and classroom management are interrelated. Included are strategies for success.
Convey Acceptance
This handy list of techniques will help you build trust and establish a positive environment in your classroom.
Decision-Making Sheet
This sheet is designed to help students write about and organize their behaviors in a productive, positive manner.
Elementary Classroom Survival Tips
These survival tips will assist elementary teachers in reading, math, social studies, science, health, and more.
Environmental Interventions
Adapting the environment to the learner is a key to managing disruptive behavior. This list details some basic environmental interventions.
Are Teachers the Culprit Behind Poor Behavior?
If you're having behavioral problems in your classroom, find out if your own actions could be creating an environment that encourages students to misbehave. Students' Contributions to the Rules
Brainstorm classroom rules with your students at the first of the year so your students know what is expected of them and feel responsible for following the rules.
Tips for Achieving and Maintaining Discipline
There are certain steps you can take to ensure that your students are disciplined and behave in an appropriate manner. Find those tips here.
Establishing Trust
The key to effective behavior management is establishing trust. This article details the key points to facilitating a trustworthy environment.
Expeditionary Learning: Building Confidence by Risking Failure
Expeditionary Learning is a unique program that emphasizes hands-on, project-based, group learning, where students participate in expeditions and the real world becomes the classroom.
Getting to Know Your Students
This resource page will give you plenty of tips and suggestions for getting to know your students, from icebreakers to self portraits to first-day celebrations.
How to Manage Disruptive Behavior in Inclusive Classrooms
Managing disruptive behavior is examined in detail.
Positive Classroom Behavior
Read ideas and find resources on establishing and maintaining acceptable behavior in your students.
Putting a Positive Spin on Peer Pressure
Peer pressure has the potential to be a powerfully positive force. By leading students through self-awareness activities, you can create a group of peers who value individualism, practice it in their own lives, and encourage it in others.
Personalizing the Secondary Classroom
These excellent resources will provide you with ideas and activities for back to school, as well as the rest of the school year.
Positive Descriptions of Student Behavior
An extensive list of verbs and phrases that will help you to prepare positive, descriptive statements about a student's behavior.
Room Arrangement
Arrangement of class space is crucial when dealing with disruptive students and important to consider for all students.
Setting Limits
The general guidelines for setting limits with all ages of children are listed here.
Classroom Management Strategies
Get instant ideas on how to manage your toughest behavior challenges.
Tough Love: How to Work with a Disruptive Student
You're a teacher challenged with a difficult student. You've tried being nice and not so nice, going back and forth between these extremes. Now may be the time to try "tough love," an approach that works.
What I Wish I'd Known When I Was a New Teacher: Advice
A compilation of valuable and effective pieces of advice from experienced teachers on classroom management, lesson planning, and more.
http://www.teachervision.fen.com/classroom-discipline/resource/5806.html
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Being a Resource to OthersIn the past, the role of the special education teacher did not offer much interaction, if any, with the rest of the school. The job was to work with the students and keep them "out of the way." Special education teachers belonged to their students in their room.
Over the years, special education teachers have gradually moved up and out into the school world. They and their students flow in and out of the hallways, lunchrooms, and classrooms, and interact with the rest of the school. Special education classes are no longer isolated and cannot be ignored. Special education teachers no longer belong just to their students; they are in the mainstream of schools.
Many of you are now in what is called a resource room setting. Your students flow into and out of your room, as well as mainstream into regular education classes. You have to interact with regular education personnel.
Each of the following roles will help define your job as a school's resource teacher. Take what you can and adapt it to your own needs and priorities. Remember that your effectiveness as a resource depends, at least in part, on your being confident and comfortable with the role. Make it fit you and your school.
Salesperson/PR Person
Collaborator/Communicator
Liaison
Disseminator
Time Manager
http://www.teachervision.fen.com/teaching-methods/teacher-training/9853.html
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Children's Books About DisabilitiesThis list has been sorted by the books' readability levels. To find what you want, click on a readability grouping below:
AC = Adult Read to Children. For Pre-K to Grade 3, ranging from 10 to 30 pages, with illustrations; typically designed for parents to read to their children.
JE = Juvenile Easy Reader. For children who are beginning to read on their own, such as those in Grades 1-2; ranging from 30 to 80 pages; illustrations are included to break up the text.
JF = Juvenile Fiction. Children's fiction or chapter books; for children in Grades 2-6; ranging from 60 to 200 pages, the books are generally divided into chapters, contain fewer illustrations, and have more complicated plots or concepts than either AC or JE books.
YA = Young Adult. For young adults in Grades 5-12; more complicated plots and topics of general interest to the young adult population.
A = Adult. Contains language and/or content that may be unsuitable for young adults.
AC – Adult Read to Children
Title: Andy and His Yellow Frisbee
Author: Mary Thompson
Publisher: Woodbine House, 6510 Bells Mill Road, Bethesda, MD 20817; 1996
ISBN #: ISBN-0-933149-83-2
Disability: Autism
Story Profile: Sarah is a new girl at school who is curious about why Andy spins his yellow frisbee every day by himself on the playground. When Sara tries to talk to Andy, Rosie, Andy's older sister, watches and worries about how her brother may react. Rosie knows that Andy is in his own world most of the time, and that he has trouble finding the words to express himself.
Reading Level: AC
Title: A Picture Book of Helen Keller
Author: David A. Adler
Publisher: Holiday House
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8234-0818-3
Disability: Deaf-Blind
Story Profile: Some salient details in the life of Helen Keller are described in this pictorial biography; her frustration and untamed behavior and the radical changes effected by Anne Sullivan Macy.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Armann and Gentle
Author: Kristin Steinsdottir
Publisher: Stuttering Foundation of America, PO Box 11749, Memphis, TN 38111-0749; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-0-933388-36-5
Disability: Stuttering
Story Profile: A six-year-old boy, Armann, stutters when he is frustrated.
Reading Level: AC
Title: A Very Special Friend
Author: Dorothy Hoffman Levi
Publisher: Gallaudet University Press, Kendall Green, 800 Florida Ave., NE, Washington, DC 20002-3695; 1989
ISBN #: ISBN-0-9300323-55-6
Disability: Deafness
Story Profile: Frannie, a lonely little girl, discovers a new friend when a deaf girl her age moves in next door.
Reading Level: AC
Title: A Very Special Sister
Author: Dorothy Hoffman Levi
Publisher: Gallaudet University Press, Kendall Green, 800 Florida Ave., NE, Washington, DC 20002-3695; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-0-930323-96-3
Disability: Deafness
Story Profile: Mixed feelings are experienced by Laura, a young deaf girl, upon finding out her mother will soon give birth. Her initial excitement is replaced by worries that the new child, if able to hear, would be more lovable.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Be Good to Eddie Lee
Author: Virginia FilIing
Publisher: Philomel Books, Putnam & Grosset Group, 200 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016
ISBN #: ISBN-0-399-21993-5
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: Eddie Lee, a young boy with Down syndrome, follows the neighborhood children into the woods to find frog eggs. They are resentful and try to make him stay home.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Big Brother Dustin
Author: Alden R. Carter
Publisher: Albert Whitman & Co., 6340 Oakton Street, Morton Grove, IL 60053-2723; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8075-0715-6
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: Dustin, a young boy with Down syndrome, learns that his parents are expecting a baby.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Cat's Got Your Tongue?
Author: Charles E. Schaefer, Ph.D.
Publisher: Brunner/Mazel, Publishers, 19 Union Square, New York, NY 10003; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-0-945354-45-2 hard copy; ISBN-0-945354-46-0 paperback
Disability: Communication Disorders, Mutism
Story Profile: Anna, a kindergartner, is diagnosed as an electively mute child.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Eukee: The Jumpy Jumpy Elephant
Author: Clifford L. Corman and Esther Trevino
Publisher: Specialty Press; 1995
ISBN #: ISBN-0-921629-8-1
Disability: Attention Deficit Disorder
Story Profile: Eukee is a smart little elephant who likes to chase butterflies,
blow bubbles, and do cartwheels. He always feels jumpy inside, however, and can never finish the march at school. Unhappy that he doesn't have any friends, he consents to a visit to the doctor where he learns he has ADD.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Clover's Secret
Author: Christine M. Winn and David Walsh, Ph.D.
Publisher: Fairview Press, 2450 Riverside Avenue South, Minneapolis, MN 55454; 1996
ISBN #: ISBN-0-925190-89-6
Disability: Child Abuse
Story Profile: Clove attempts to hide family violence. She feels much better when she confides in her teacher and the family receives help.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Danny and the Merry-Go-Round
Author: Nan Holcomb
Publisher: Jason and Nordic, Publishers, PO Box 441, Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1987
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-00-X
Disability: Cerebral Palsy
Story Profile: Danny, who has cerebral palsy, visits the park with his mother and watches other children playing on a playground. He makes friends with a young girl after his mother explains cerebral palsy to her and points out that it is not contagious.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Happy Birthday Jason
Author: C. Jean Cutbill and Diane Rawsthorn
Publisher: IPI Publishing Ltd., 50 Prince Arthur Avenue, Suite 306, Toronto, Ontario, M5R 1B5 Canada; 1984
ISBN #: 0-920702-37-6
Disability: Reading Disability, Dyslexia
Story Profile: A delightful story that will help children better understand their world by understanding Jason's. His story reveals that children with learning disabilities are more similar to other children than they are different.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Having a Brother Like David
Author: Cindy Dolby Nollette and Others
Publisher: Minneapolis Children's Medical Center, Early Childhood Center,
2520 Minnehaha Ave., South, Minneapolis, MN 55404; 1985
ISBN #: N/A
Disability: Autism
Story Profile: Marty's brother, David, is autistic. Marty explains that David looks a lot like other children but has special needs.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Ian's Walk: A Story About Autism
Author: Laurie Lears
Publisher: Albert Whitman and Company, 6340 Oakton St.,
Morton Grove, IL 60053-2723; 1998
ISBN #: 0-8075-3480-3
Disability: Autism
Story Profile: Tara feels frustrated while taking a walk with her autistic brother, Ian. After she becomes separated from him, she learns to appreciate the way Ian experiences the world.
Reading Level: AC
Title:Keith Edward's Different Days
Author: Karen Melberg Schwier
Publisher: Impact Publishers
ISBN #: ISBN-0-915166-74-7
Disability: Down Syndrome; Physical Disabilities
Story Profile: Keith meets a variety of people with differences, including Down syndrome and physical differences, and learns that being different is okay.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Knots on a Counting Rope
Author: Bill Martin and John Archambault
Publisher: Henry Holt
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8050-0571-4
Disability: Blindness
Story Profile: A boy is told a story by his grandfather of a boy born blind.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Lee: The Rabbit with Epilepsy
Author: Deborah M. Moss
Publisher: Woodbine House, 5615 Fisher's Lane, Rockville, MD 20852; 1989
ISBN #: ISBN-0-933149-32-8
Disability: Epilepsy
Story Profile: Lee is a young rabbit who experiences occasional
blackouts and trances. After Dr. Bob, the wise owl, administers a series
of neurological tests, Lee is told she has epilepsy.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Leo the Late Bloomer
Author: Robert Kraus
Publisher: Harper Collins, 1971
ISBN #: ISBN-0-87807-042-7
Disability: Developmental Delays
Story Profile: Leo is a tiger cub who just can't keep up with what the other animals are doing. He can't read, write, or speak, and he is a sloppy eater; he's a late bloomer.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Luke Has Asthma, Too
Author: Alison Rogers
Publisher: Waterfront Books, 98 Brookes Ave., Burlington, VT 05401; 1987
ISBN #: ISBN-0-914525-06-9
Disability: Asthma
Story Profile: Luke has an older cousin who teaches him some aspects of asthma management and serves as a general role model.
Reading Level: AC
Title: My Brother, Matthew
Author: Mary Thompson
Publisher: Woodbine House, 5615 Fishers Lane, Rockville, MD 20852; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-0-993149-47-6
Disability: Mental Retardation
Story Profile: David is a young boy who describes life with his younger
brother who was born with a mental disability.
Reading Level: AC
Title: My Mom Is Handicapped: A "Grownup" Children's Book
Author: Barbara Turner Brabham
Publisher: Cornerstone Publishing, PO Box 2896, Virginia Beach, VA 23450; 1994
ISBN #: ISBN-1-882185-22-6
Disability: Physical Disabilities
Story Profile: A six-year-old boy describes life with his mother, a teacher with physical disabilities.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Otto Learns About His Medicine: A Story About Medication for Hyperactive Children
Author: Matthew Galvin
Publisher: Magination Press/Brunner Mazel, 19 Union Square West, New York, NY 10003; 1995
ISBN #: ISBN-0-945354-04-5 hard copy; ISBN-0-945354-03-7
Disability: Hyperactivity
Story Profile: Otto, a fidgety young car that has trouble paying attention in school, visits a special mechanic who prescribes a medicine to control his hyperactive behavior.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Russ and the Apple Tree Surprise
Author: Janet Elizabeth Rickert
Publisher: Woodbine House, 5615 Fishers Lane,
Rockville, MD 20852; 1992
ISBN #: 1-890627-16-x
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: Russ, a five-year old boy with Down syndrome longs for a swing set. All his backyard has to offer is an apple tree. When his grandparents visit, Russ discovers the job of picking apples and making them into apple pie. He decides that his apple tree may be just as good as a swing set.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Russ and the Fire House
Author: Janet Elizabeth Rickert
Publisher: Woodbine House, 5615 Fishers Lane,
Rockville, MD 20852; 1992
ISBN #: 1-890627-17-8
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: Russ is a young boy with Down syndrome whose everyday life experiences - not his disability - are the subject of books in this series. Russ goes "on-duty" with his Uncle, a fireman. Their shift includes a full inspection of the fire equipment, including keeping it clean. He also encounters Spark, the firehouse dog. At the end of this exciting day, all the firemen thank Russ for his hard work and invite him back for another visit.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Russell Is Extra Special: A Book About Autism for Children
Author: Charles A. Amenta III, M.D.
Publisher: Brunner/Mazel, Publishers, 19 Union Square, New York, NY 10003; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-0-945354-43-6
Disability: Autism
Story Profile: This portrayal of an autistic boy and his family is designed to help children (ages 4 to 8) and their parents understand this serious developmental disorder.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Silent Observer
Author: Christy MacKinnon
Publisher: Gallaudet University Press, Kendall Green, 800 Florida Ave. NE,
Washington, DC 20002-3695; 1993
ISBN #: ISBN-1-56368-022-X
Disability: Deafness
Story Profile: Christy MacKinnon is a young girl born in 1889 on a farm on Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, Canada who became deaf after having whooping cough. She describes her life in adjusting to deafness, her relationships with family, and her problems trying to understand and be understood by hearing individuals.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Talking to Angels
Author: Esther Watson
Publisher: Harcourt Brace, 525 B Street, Suite 1900, San Diego, CA 92101-4495; 1996
ISBN #: ISBN-0-15-201077-7
Disability: Autism
Story Profile: Christa is an autistic girl who is described in this picture book by her sibling. Her behavior is described and illustrated in mixed media, including her favorite sounds and textures, occasional staring and fixation on stimuli, and interactions with others.
Reading Level: AC
Title: There's a Little Bit of Me in Jamey
Author: Diana M. Amadeo
Publisher: Albert Whitman & Co., 6340 Oakton Street, Morton Grove, IL 60053-2723
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8075-7854-1
Disability: Leukemia
Story Profile: Brian struggles with the fact that his brother Jamey has leukemia and submits to a bone marrow test, which leads to a transplant.
Reading Level: AC
Title: Thomas Alva Edison: Great Inventor
Author: David A. Adler
Publisher: Holiday House
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8234-0820-5
Disability: Deafness
Story Profile: Thomas Edison's life and his many inventions, despite his deafness, that shape our lives today are explored in this book.
Reading Level: AC
Title: What Do You Mean I Have a Learning Disability?
Author: Kathleen M. Dwyer
Publisher: Walker and Company, 720 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10019; 1991
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8027-8102-0
Disability: Learning Disabilities
Story Profile: Ten-year-old Jimmy is having problems at school and believes he is stupid. After a parent-teacher conference, he is tested and found to have a learning disability.
Reading Level: AC
Title: What It's Like to Be Me
Author: Helen Exley
Publisher: Friendship Press, 1984
ISBN #: ISBN-0-377-00144-9
Disability: Various Disabilities
Story Profile: Children from all over the world write about themselves and their disabilities. They tell us how they see themselves and how they want to be seen. All of the illustrations are created by the children.
Reading Level: AC
Title: You Can Call Me Willy. A Story for Children About AIDS
Author: Joan C. Verniero
Publisher: Brunner/Mazel Publishers, 19 Union Square West, New York, NY 10003; 1995
ISBN #: ISBN-0-945354-60-6
Disability: Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS)
Story Profile: Willy is an eight-year-old girl with Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV). Describing her life, she shares her hobbies, friends, family life, and aspects of her medical care and how it impacts her activities.
Reading Level: AC
Children's Books About Disabilities
JE - Juvenile Easy Reader
Title: Andy Finds a Turtle
Author: Nan Holcomb
Publisher: Jason and Nordic Publishers, PO Box 441, Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1988
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-02-6
Disability: Physical Disabilities
Story Profile: Andy enjoys physical therapy most of the time, but sometimes he doesn't. One day he's told he acts like a turtle with his legs and arms drawn in tight - but Andy doesn't know what a turtle is, so he goes in search of one. In this search he protects his baby sister from a strange invader and discovers something important about himself.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Andy Opens Wide
Author: Nan Holcomb
Publisher: Jason and Nordic Publishers, PO Box 441, Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1990
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-06-9
Disability: Cerebral Palsy
Story Profile: Andy, a young boy with cerebral palsy, is frustrated by his inability to open his mouth wide enough for his mother to feed him easily.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Anna Joins In
Author: Katrin Arnold
Publisher: Abingdon Press, 201 Eighth Ave. South, Nashville, TN 37202
ISBN #: ISBN-0-687-01530-8
Disability: Cystic Fibrosis
Story Profile: Anna is a young girl who has a difficult pattern to her days because she has cystic fibrosis.
Reading Level: JE
Title: A Smile from Andy
Author: Nan Holcomb
Publisher: Jason and Nordic Publishers, PO Box 441, Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1989
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-04-2
Disability: Cerebral Palsy
Story Profile: Andy, who has cerebral palsy, is very shy. One day he meets a girl who helps him discover something that he can do to reach out to others in his own special way.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Buddy's Shadow
Author: Shirley Becker
Publisher: Jason and Nordic Publishers, PO Box 441, Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1991
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-08-05
Disability: Down syndrome
Story Profile: Buddy, a five-year-old boy with Down syndrome, purchases a puppy.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Can't You Be Still?
Author: Sarah Yates
Publisher: Gima B. Publishing Inc., Box #713-740 Corydon Ave., Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada R3M 0Y1; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-0-9696477-0-0
Disability: Cerebral Palsy
Story Profile: Ann, who has cerebral palsy, attends school for the first time.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Charlsie's Chuckle
Author: Clara Widess Berkus
Publisher: Woodbine House, 5615 Fishers Lane, Rockville, MD 20852; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-0-933149-50-6
Disability: Down syndrome
Story Profile: Charlsie, a seven-year-old boy with Down syndrome, has an infectious laugh and enjoys bicycling around his neighborhood. On one such excursion he inadvertently wanders into a disputatious city council meeting and brings humor and harmony to the argumentative adults.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Cookie
Author: Linda Kneeland
Publisher: Jason and Nordic, Publishers, PO Box 441, Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1989
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-50
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: Molly, a four-year-old girl with Down syndrome, has difficulty talking. Her frustration with communication difficulties is relieved when someone comes to teach her sign language.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Fair and Square
Author: Nan Holcomb
Publisher: Jason and Nordic Publishers, PO Box 441, Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-10-7 hardback; ISBN-0-944727-09-3 paperback
Disability: Physical Disabilities
Story Profile: Kevin is confined to a wheelchair and has limited motor skills. A therapist introduces him to a computer game he can play and win, and shows him how to adapt other games for his use.
Reading Level: JE
Title: How About a Hug
Author: Nan Holcomb
Publisher: Jason and Nordic Publishers, PO Box 441, Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1987
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-01-8
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: A young girl with Down syndrome includes the details of a typical day in her life. While her daily activities require a degree of concentration and don't go perfectly smoothly, she is surrounded by helpful, supportive, and affectionate friends, family, and teachers, all of whom she agrees to hug when they offer.
Reading Level: JE
Title: I'm Like You, You're Like Me: A Child's Book about Understanding and Celebrating Each Other
Author: Cindy Gainer
Publisher: Free Spirit Publishing, Inc., 400 First Avenue North, Suite 616,
Minneapolis, MN 55401-1724; 1998
ISBN #: ISBN-1-57542-039-2
Disability: General Disabilities
Story Profile: Children interact with people who are different from themselves; share, take turns, work and play together; discover and develop traits and skills that make them unique; and explore the many ways in which they are like and unlike others.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Joey and Sam
Author: Illana Katz and Edward Ritvo
Publisher: Real Life Story Books; 1993
ISBN #: ISBN-1-882388-00-3
Disability: Autism
Story Profile: Sam is five and has autism, and Joey is his six-year-old brother. They describe an ordinary day at home and at school, showing some of the ways they are different and alike.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Kathy's Hats: A Story of Hope
Author: Trudy Krisher
Publisher: Albert Whitman & Co., 6340 Oakton St., Morton Grove, IL 60053; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8075-4116-8
Disability: Cancer
Story Profile: Kathy is a young girl who develops cancer and loses her hair as a result of chemotherapy.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Kevin's Story
Author: Dvora Levinson, Ph.D.
Publisher: IPI Publishing Ltd., 50 Prince Arthur Avenue, Suite 306, Toronto, Ontario, M5R 1B5 Canada; 1984
ISBN #: 0-920702-22-88
Disability: Reading Disability, Dyslexia
Story Profile: Kevin exhibits reading problems and is referred for testing with a psychologist who explains reading and learning disabilities to him and his family.
Reading Level: JE-JF
Title: Little Tree: A Story for Children with Serious Medical Problems
Author: Joyce C. Mills, Ph.D.
Publisher: Brunner/Mazel Publishers, 19 Union Sq. West, New York, NY 10003; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-0-94534-52-5 hardback; ISBN-0-945354-51-7 paperback
Disability: Chronic Illness
Story Profile: A small tree that loses some branches in a storm is used to illustrate the questions and feelings children may experience during and after medical problems.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Luna and the Big Blur: A Story for Children Who Wear Glasses
Author: Shirley Day
Publisher: Magination Press, 19 Union Square West, New York, NY 10003; 1995
ISBN #: ISBN-0-945354-66-5
Disability: Visual Impairments
Story Profile: Luna resents the fact that she needs glasses to correct her nearsightedness.
Reading Level: JE
Title: My Sister Is Different
Author: Betty Ren Wright
Publisher: Steck-Vaughn Company, PO Box 26015 Austin, TX 78755; 1990
ISBN #: ISBN- 0-8172-1369-4
Disability: Mental Retardation
Story Profile: Carlo tells us what it is like to have an older sister with mental retardation.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Naomi Knows It's Springtime
Author: Virginia L. Kroll
Publisher: Boyds Mills Press Inc., 910 Church St., Honesdale, PA 18431; 1987
ISBN #: ISBN-1-56397-006-0
Disability: Blindness
Story Profile: Naomi tells us of the signs of spring through the mind of the blind.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Patrick and Ima Lou
Author: Nan Holcomb
Publisher: Jason and Nordic Publishers, PO Box 441, Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1994
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-03-4
Disability: Cerebral Palsy, Spina Bifida
Story Profile: Three-year-old Patrick has cerebral palsy. He is having a hard time managing his new walker, but with the help of a new friend, Ima Lou, who is six and has spina bifida, they both discover something very important about each other.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Sarah and Puffle: A Story for Children About Diabetes
Author: Linnea Mulder
Publisher: Henry Holt
ISBN #: ISBN-0-94534-41-X hardback; ISBN-0-945354-42-8 paperback
Disability: Diabetes
Story Profile: Sarah feels resentful of the limitations the disease places on her activities until a stuffed animal (Puffle) comes to life and offers her encouraging rhymes about coping with diabetes.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Sarah's Surprise
Author: Nan Holcomb
Publisher: Jason and Nordic Publishers, PO Box 441, Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1990
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-07-7
Disability: Articulation Impairments
Story Profile: Six-year-old Sarah, who is unable to talk, has used a picture board to communicate. She is now ready for an augmentative communication device. With the help of her speech therapist she gives everyone a surprise at her mother's birthday party.
Reading Level: JE
Title: See You Tomorrow, Charles
Author: Miriam Cohen
Publisher: Greenwillow
ISBN #: ISBN-0-688-01804-1
Disability: Blindness
Story Profile: Charles is a first grader who is adjusting to school as a blind student.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Shelley: The Hyperactive Turtle
Author: Deborah M. Moss
Publisher: Woodbine House, 5615 Fisher's Lane, Rockville, MD 20852; 1988
ISBN #: ISBN-0-933149-31-X
Disability: Hyperactivity
Story Profile: Shelley is a young hyperactive turtle who faces difficulties due to his inability to sit still and his frequent behavior problems, which lead to problems at school and on the bus, at home, and with friends, eventually leading to a poor self-image and depression. After a visit to a neurologist, he no longer thinks of himself as a bad turtle and his condition gradually improves.
Reading Level: JE
Title: The Bob (Butterbean) Love Story
Author: Terry Page and Bob Love
Publisher: Boo Books, Inc., PO Box 201128, Chicago, Illinois 60620-1128; 1995
ISBN #: ISBN-1-887864-40-7
Disability: Speech Impairments
Story Profile: Bob's autobiography tells his story: a famous basketball player with a speech impediment.
Reading Level: JE
Title: The Night Search
Author: Kate Chamberlin
Publisher: Richard S. McPhee, Jason & Nordic, Pubs., PO Box 441,
Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-31-X
Disability: Blindness
Story Profile: Heather, who is blind, resists using her white cane until her puppy wanders off.
Reading Level: JE
Title: There's a Blue Square on My Brother's School Bus
Author: Sally Craymer
Publisher: The Wishing Room, Inc., PO Box 58, Studley, VA 23162
ISBN #: ISBN-0-931563-12-7
Disability: Disabilities
Story Profile: This book discusses various types of disabilities. An emphasis is placed on what children with disabilities are able to do and ways in which they can participate in mainstream student life.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Thumbs Up, Rico!
Author: Maria Testa
Publisher: Albert Whitman & Co., 6340 Oakton Street, Morton Grove, IL 60053-2723; 1990
ISBN #: ISBN- 0-8075-7906-8
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: Rico is a boy with Down syndrome who loves basketball. The story describes his relationship with a neighborhood boy named Caesar, his older sister Nina, and his art class.
Reading Level: JE
Title: We Can Do It!
Author: Laura Dwight
Publisher: Checkerboard Press, Inc., 30 Vesey St., New York, NY 10007; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-1-56288-301-1
Disability: Disabilities
Story Profile: The daily activities of five children who each have either cerebral palsy, blindness, spina bifida, or Down syndrome. Color photographs show the children engaging in their favorite pastimes at home and at school, with family members and with peers.
Reading Level: JE
Title: We'll Paint the Octopus Red
Author: Stephanie Stuve-Bodeen
Publisher: Woodbine House, Inc., 6510 Bells Mill Road, Bethesda, MD 20817; 1998
ISBN #: ISBN-1-890627-06-2
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: Ima is a little girl who has a new baby brother with Down syndrome.
Reading Level: JE
Title: What About Me? When Brothers and Sisters Get Sick
Author: Allan Peterkin, M.D.
Publisher: Brunner/Mazel Publishers, 19 Union Sq. West, New York, NY 10003; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-0-94534-48-7 hardback; ISBN-0-945354-49-5 paperback
Disability: Chronic Illness
Story Profile: Laura is a young girl attempting to cope with her brother Tom's chronic illness. The story describes her wide range of emotions including guilt, fear, anger, anxiety, and a general sense of disruption of normal family life.
Reading Level: JE
Title: When I Grow Up
Author: Candri Hodges
Publisher: Jason & Nordic Publishers, PO Box 441, Hollidaysburg, PA 16648; 1995
ISBN #: ISBN-0-944727-26-3
Disability: Deafness
Story Profile: Jimmy is a deaf youth who takes a field trip and encounters various careers of deaf individuals.
Reading Level: JE
Title: Where's Chimpy?
Author: Berniece Rabe
Publisher: Albert Whitman & Co., 6340 Oakton Street, Morton Grove, IL 60053; 1988
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8075-8928-4
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: Misty, a young girl with Down syndrome, misplaced her stuffed monkey and reviews her day with her father to try to remember where she left him.
Reading Level: JE
Children's Books About Disabilities
JF - Juvenile Fiction
Title: Adam and the Magic Marble
Author: Adam and Carol Buehrens
Publisher: Hope Press, PO Box 188, Duarte, CA 91009-0188; 1991
ISBN #: ISBN-1-878267-30-2
Disability: Tourette Syndrome; Cerebral Palsy
Story Profile: Adam, Chris, and Matt are often harassed by bullies until they discover a magic marble.
Reading Level: JF
Title: A Zebra Named Al
Author: Wendy Isdell
Publisher: Free Spirit Publishing, 400 First Ave., North, Suite 616, Minneapolis, MN 55401; 1993
ISBN #: ISBN-0-915793-58-X paperback; ISBN-0915793-59-8 manual
Disability: Learning Disability
Story Profile: Julie is an eighth grader who has trouble in math. Frustrated, she rests her head on her book... and is awakened by an Imaginary Number who suddenly appears in her room. When she follows the Number through a mysterious portal, she enters a strange land of mathematics, where she meets a zebra named Al.
Reading Level: JF
Title: A Season of Secrets
Author: Alison Cragin Herzig and Jane Lawrence Mali
Publisher: Little, Brown
ISBN #: ISBN-0-316-35889-4
Disability: Epilepsy
Story Profile: Benji is a six-year-old who has been fainting at school and Brooke and Jason, his teenage sister and brother, wonder all summer long what is wrong with him.
Reading Level: JF
Title: At the Back of the Woods
Author: Claudia Mills
Publisher: Four Winds
ISBN #: ISBN-0-07830-5
Disability: Mental Retardation
Story Profile: Davey is a young boy with mental retardation who is at a special care facility. His sister, Clarisse, and his parents come to visit him.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Eagle Eyes: A Child's View of Attention Deficit Disorder
Author: Jeanne Gehret, M.A.
Publisher: Verbal Images Press, 19 Fox Hill Dr., Fairport, NY 14450; 1991
ISBN #: ISBN-0-9625136-4-4
Disability: Attention Deficit Disorder
Story Profile: Ben, a boy with attention deficit disorder, describes the frustrations and feelings associated with his initially unidentified syndrome.
Reading Level: JF
Title: First Star I See
Author: Jaye Andras Caffrey
Publisher: Verbal Images Press, 19 Fox Hill Drive, Fairport, NY 14450; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-1-884281-17-6
Disability: Attention Deficit Disorder
Story Profile: Paige is a young girl with ADD who is trying to win a school writing contest.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Here's What I Mean To Say...
Author: Sarah Yates
Publisher: GIma B. Publishing Inc., Box #713-740 Corydon Ave., Winnipeg,
Manitoba, Canada R3M 0Y1; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-0-9696477-2-7
Disability: Cerebral Palsy
Story Profile: Ann (age nine) who has cerebral palsy, takes us through her struggles with everyday activities.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Hi, I'm Adam. A Child's Story of Tourette Syndrome
Author: Adam Buehrens
Publisher: Hope Press, PO Box 188, Duarte, CA 91009-0188; 1991
ISBN #: ISBN-1-878267-29-9
Disability: Tourette Syndrome
Story Profile: Adam, a ten-year-old boy diagnosed with Tourette syndrome, wrote this book to help children with Tourette syndrome understand that they are not alone and that other children are experiencing similar difficulties.
Reading Level: JF
Title: How Dyslexic Benny Became a Star: A Story of Hope for Dyslexic Children and Their Parents
Author: Joe Griffith
Publisher: Yorktown Press, PO Box 795667, Dallas, TX 75379-5667; 1998
ISBN #: ISBN-0-9569379-0-9
Disability: Dyslexia
Story Profile: Benny, who has dyslexia, struggles while his fifth-grade classmates' skills improve. He is suddenly terrified when he is called upon by his teacher to read aloud.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Howie Helps Himself
Author: Joan Fassler
Publisher: Albert Whitman & Co.; 1975
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8075-3422-6
Disability: Cerebral Palsy
Story Profile: Howie has cerebral palsy. He gets around in a wheelchair, or rather, other people get him around in his wheelchair. More than anything, Howie wants to move that chair himself.
Reading Level: JF
Title: How Many Days Until Tomorrow?
Author: Caroline Janover
Publisher: Woodbine House
ISBN #: ISBN-1-890627-22-4
Disability: Dyslexia
Story Profile: Josh is a 12-year-old who has dyslexia. When he spends a summer on an island with his grandparents, he develops his strengths and discovers talents he did not know he had.
Reading Level: JF
Title: I'm Joshua and "Yes I Can"
Author: Joan Lenett Whinston
Publisher: Vantage Press, Inc., 516 West 34th St., New York, NY 10001; 1989
ISBN #: ISBN-0-533-07959-4
Disability: Cerebral Palsy
Story Profile: Joshua, a young boy with cerebral palsy, describes his fears and insecurities about his disability on his first day in first grade.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Josh: A Boy with Dyslexia
Author: Caroline Janover
Publisher: Waterfront Books, 98 Brookes Ave., Burlington, VT 05401; 1988
ISBN #: ISBN-0-914525-18-2 hardcover; ISBN-0-914515-10-7 paperback
Disability: Dyslexia
Story Profile: The life and adventures of Josh, who has dyslexia, as he moves to a new town and school.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Learning Disabilities and the Don't Give Up Kid
Author: Jeanne Gehret
Publisher: Verbal Images Press, 19 Fox Hill Drive, Fairport, NY 14450; 1990
ISBN #: ISBN-9625136-0-1
Disability: Dyslexia
Story Profile: A dyslexic boy wants to grow up to be an inventor like Thomas Edison but is constantly frustrated by problems at school. He switches into a small special education class of children with auditory processing difficulties. The teacher gives him more personal attention, using an example from Edison's life to inspire him.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Ludwig van Beethoven: Musical Pioneer
Author: Carol Greene
Publisher: Childrens Pr.
ISBN #: ISBN-0-516-04208-4
Disability: Deafness
Story Profile: The life of Beethoven is chronicled from his despair over his worsening deafness to his deepening commitment to his music.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Margaret's Moves
Author: Bernice Rabe
Publisher: Dutton
ISBN #: ISBN-0-525-44271-5
Disability: Spina Bifida
Story Profile: Margaret is nine years old and has problems with the fact that she is in a wheelchair and blames it for slowing her down.
Reading Level: JF
Title: My Friend Ben
Author: Wanda Gilberts Kachur
Publisher: Peytral Publications, PO Box 1162, Suite 976, Minnetonka, MN 55345; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-0-9644271-4-1
Disability: Head Injuries
Story Profile: Narrated through the eyes of a classmate, this story tells of Ben, a boy with traumatic brain injury who is included in a general education, third-grade class.
Reading Level: JF
Title: My Name Is Brain Brian
Author: Jeanne Betancourt
Publisher: Scholastic Inc., 730 Broadway, New York, NY 10003; 1993
ISBN #: ISBN-0-590-44921-4
Disability: Dyslexia
Story Profile: Brian, a sixth-grade boy is diagnosed as having dyslexia. His initial trepidation at being singled out for attention and diagnosis is gradually replaced by enthusiasm for learning new ways of learning.
Reading Level: JF
Title: My Sister Annie
Author: Bill Dodds
Publisher: Boyds Mills Press Inc., 910 Church St., Honesdale, PA 18431; 1989
ISBN #: ISBN-1-56397-114-3
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: Charlie is an 11-year-old boy who attempts to cope with growing up in the shadow of an older sister with Down syndrome.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Rosie: A Visiting Dog's Story
Author: Stephanie Calmenson
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Co., 215 Park Ave. South, New York, NY 10003; 1994
ISBN #: ISBN-0-395-654477-7
Disability: Disabilities
Story Profile: Rosie, a Tibetan terrier who is trained to work as a visiting dog, provides therapeutic comfort and entertainment to children and adults who are hospitalized or in nursing homes.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Sara's Secret
Author: Suzanne Wanous
Publisher: Carolrhoda Books; 1995
ISBN #: ISBN-0-87614-856-9
Disability: Cerebral Palsy
Story Profile: Justin is five with cerebral palsy and mental retardation. He "can't walk or talk or feed himself, or even sit up," but still, he makes his sister Sara happy. Sara is not happy, however, when her teacher plans a unit on disabilities. Sara doesn't want her friends to know about her brother.
Reading Level: JF
Title: The Best Fight
Author: Anne Schlieper
Publisher: Albert Whitman & Company, 6340 Oakton Street, Morton Grove, IL 60053-2723; 1995
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8075-0662-1
Disability: Reading Difficulties
Story Profile: Jamie is an adolescent boy who has learning disabilities that impair his reading. Frustration at his low reading ability combines with alienation due to his placement in special classes. His mixed emotions toward his teachers, friends, and family are explored.
Reading Level: JF
Title: The Flying Fingers Club
Author: Jean F. Andrews
Publisher: Kendall Green
ISBN #: ISBN-0-930323-44-0
Disability: Deafness
Story Profile: Donald is a third grader who is bitter about repeating that grade when he meets Matt, who comes to class with an interpreter because he is deaf; they become fast friends.
Reading Level: JF
Title: The Summer Kid
Author: Myrna Neuringer Levy
Publisher: Second Story Press, 760 Bathurst Street, Toronto, Canada M5S 2R6; 1991
ISBN #: ISBN-0-929005-20-1
Disability: Language Impairments
Story Profile: Karen, a ten-year-old girl who stays at a summer cottage with her grandmother encounters Tommy, a nine-year-old boy with a severe language disorder.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Trouble with School: A Family Story About Learning Disabilities
Author: Kathryn Boesel Dunn and Allison Boesel Dunn
Publisher: Woodbine House, 5615 Fishers Lane, Rockville, MD 20852
ISBN #: ISBN-0-933149-57-3
Disability: Learning Disabilities
Story Profile: A family's real-life experiences with learning disabilities follows Allison and her mother as each tells her side of the story of diagnosing and adjusting to Allison's special learning needs.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Wrongway Applebaum
Author: Marjorie Lewis
Publisher: Coward
ISBN #: ISBN-0-698-20610-X
Disability: Learning Disabilities
Story Profile: Stanley is in fifth grade when his awkwardness and inability to tell left from right conflict with his family's interest in baseball.
Reading Level: JF
Title: Zipper, the Kid with ADHD
Author: Caroline Janover
Publisher: Woodbine House, Inc., 6510 Bells Mill Road, Bethesda, MD 20817; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-0-933149-95-6
Disability: Attention Deficit Disorder
Story Profile: Zachary (nicknamed Zipper), a fifth grader who has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) has trouble concentrating and controlling himself until a retired jazz musician recognizes his talent, believes in him, and gives him the motivation to start trying to do better.
Reading Level: JF
Children's Books About Disabilities
YA - Young Adult
Title: Annie's World
Author: Nancy Smiler Levinson
Publisher: Gallaudet Univ. Press, 800 Florida Ave., NE, Washington, DC 20002; 1990
ISBN #: ISBN-0-930323-65-3
Disability: Deafness
Story Profile: The adjustment of 16-year-old Annie to her family move, which necessitates her becoming mainstreamed into a public high school.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Are You Alone on Purpose?
Author: Nancy Werlin
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Co., 222 Berkeley St., Boston, MA 02116-3764; 1994
ISBN #: ISBN-0-395-67350-X
Disability: Autism, Physical Disabilities, Giftedness
Story Profile: This novel focuses on the lives of two Jewish families, one including an autistic boy and his academically gifted sister, the other featuring a bully who suffers a severe spine injury in a diving accident and is paralyzed from the waist down.
Reading Level: YA
Title: A Thousand Lights
Author: Hope Benton
Publisher: Open Minds, Inc., PO Box 21325, Columbus, OH 43221-0325; 1996
ISBN #: ISBN-1-888927-81-X; ISBN-1888927-28-3
Disability: Hearing Impairments
Story Profile: Two brothers, Will and Donnie, one with a severe hearing impairment, climb Mt. Fuji in Japan.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Best Friends
Author: Hope Benton
Publisher: Open Minds, Inc., PO Box 21325, Columbus, OH 43221-0325; 1996
ISBN #: ISBN-1-888927-78-X; ISBN-1888927-25-9
Disability: Physical Disabilities
Story Profile: Kathryn, who uses a wheelchair, coaches her friend in coping with a broken leg.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Bus Girl
Author: Gretchen Josephson
Publisher: Brookline Books, PO Box 1047, Cambridge, MA 02238; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-1-57129-041-9
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: Gretchen, through poetry, describes her emotional development toward independence and adult relationships.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Don't Stop the Music
Author: Robert Perske
Publisher: Abingdon Press, 201 Eighth Ave. South, Nashville, TN 37202; 1986
ISBN #: ISBN-0-687-11060-2
Disability: Cerebral Palsy
Story Profile: Follow our teen hero and heroine (with cerebral palsy) through thrills, romance, and adventure all rolled into this "who-done-it."
Reading Level: YA
Title: Down the Aisle
Author: Hope Benton
Publisher: Open Minds, Inc., PO Box 21325, Columbus, OH 43221-0325; 1996
ISBN #: ISBN-1-888927-80-1; ISBN-1-888927-27-5
Disability: Physical Disabilities
Story Profile: The story of two sisters, one of whom has a physical disability (Kathryn), as they prepare to participate in a wedding.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Dyslexia My Life: One Man's Story of His Life with a Learning Disability
Author: Girard J. Sagmiller
Publisher: DML, PO Box 537, Smithville, MO 64089-0537; 1995
ISBN #: ISBN-0-9643087-1-1
Disability: Dyslexia
Story Profile: Girard's autobiography dealing with dyslexia chronicles his struggles to overcome the ignorance and prejudice of his friends, family, and society in order to succeed in school, business, and life.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Emily Good as Gold
Author: Susan Goldman Rubin
Publisher: Harcourt Brace & Company, 1250 Sixth Ave., San Diego, CA 92101; 1993
ISBN #: ISBN-0-15-276632-4 hardback; ISBN-0-15-276633-2 paperback
Disability: Mental Retardation
Story Profile: Emily, a 13-year-old girl with mental retardation, experiences adolescence.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Emily in Love
Author: Susan Goldman Rubin
Publisher: Harcourt Brace & Co., 525 B Street, San Diego, CA 92101; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-0-15-200961-2
Disability: Developmental Delays
Story Profile: Emily is developmentally delayed. She is included in a general education high school and has to deal with her feelings of confusion, frustration, and anger towards her parents for protecting her too much, and at herself for being unable to understand and accomplish everything she wants.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Extraordinary People with Disabilities
Author: Deborah Kent and Kathryn A. Quinlan
Publisher: Children's Press, 1996
ISBN #: ISBN-0-516-26074-X
Disability: Various Disabilities
Story Profile: Nearly 50 men and women with mental or physical disabilities are profiled in this collection including well-known figures such as: Thomas Edison, Ludwig van Beethoven, Harriet Tubman, Tom Cruise, Chris Burke, and Robert Dole. In addition to those mentioned are: a champion wheelchair marathoner with spina bifida, a partially blind ballet dancer, a photographer with polio, a deaf author and book reviewer, an Indian chief with muscular dystrophy, and an activist and psychotherapist with cerebral palsy.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Franklin D. Roosevelt: Gallant President
Author: Barbara Feinberg
Publisher: Lothrop, Lee & Shepard
ISBN #: ISBN-0-688-00434-2
Disability: Poliomyelitis
Story Profile: A biography of Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Idea Man
Author: Karen Melberg Schwier
Publisher: Diverse City Press, 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-1-896230-09-1
Disability: Down Syndrome
Story Profile: Erin is angry when her parents leave her overnight with family friends. The family's older son, Jim, has Down syndrome and Erin doesn't want to be seen with him because he's known as the Dork, but kids from school witness Jim giving her a hug. She realizes she misjudged him after he helps her with a homework assignment.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Iron Horse: Lou Gehrig in His Time
Author: Ray Robinson
Publisher: Norton
ISBN #: ISBN-0-393-02857-7
Disability: Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis
Story Profile: Lou Gehrig, nicknamed the Iron Horse for the number of consecutive games he played for the New York Yankees baseball team, died in 1941 after a two-year struggle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Probably Still Nick Swansen
Author: Virginia Euwer Wolff
Publisher: Holt
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8050-0701-6
Disability: Learning Disabilities
Story Profile: Nick is 16 and in special ed classes with "Down" kids and some "hyperactive" students, too. He can't figure out if there's a word for his placement in special ed.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Reach for the Moon
Author: Samantha Abeel
Publisher: Pfeifer-Hamilton Publishers, 210 West Michigan, Duluth, MN 55802; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-1-57025-013-8
Disability: Learning Disabilities
Story Profile: Samantha, a 13-year-old girl with a learning disability in understanding mathematical concepts, provides a collection of illustrated poems and stories. She writes about her difficulties in middle school, including coping with her disability and the accompanying emotional challenges and the
encouragement received by her English teacher to develop her writing talent.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Retarded Isn't Stupid Mom!
Author: Sandra Z. Kaufman
Publisher: Brookes Publishing Co., PO Box 10624, Baltimore, MD 21285-0624; 1988
ISBN #: ISBN-0-933716-96-6
Disability: Mild Mental Retardation
Story Profile: The mother of a child diagnosed as mildly retarded at the age of two recounts experiences of the child's growing up into an adult.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Stevie Wonder
Author: John Swenson
Publisher: Harper & Row
ISBN #: ISBN-0-06-097067-7
Disability: Blindness
Story Profile: Stevie Wonder's life from his birth in Saginaw, Michigan, in 1950, through his rapid rise as a Motown artist in the early 1960s and up to his present-day work.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Tell Me How the Wind Sounds
Author: Leslie D. Guccione
Publisher: Scholastic
ISBN #: ISBN-0-590-42615-X
Disability: Deafness
Story Profile: Amanda is 15 when she meets Jake on Clark's Island. She is angered at every encounter with him until he tells her he's deaf.
Reading Level: YA
Title: The Nautilus
Author: Wanda Gilberts Kachur
Publisher: Peytral Publications, PO Box 1162, Suite 976, Minnetonka, MN 55345; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-0-9644271-5-X
Disability: Physical Disabilities
Story Profile: Kathryn is an adolescent who longs to be a professional ballet dancer but is seriously injured in a car accident and must face her disabilities.
Reading Level: YA
Title: The Worst Speller in Jr. High
Author: Caroline Janover
Publisher: Free Spirit Publishing, 400 First Avenue, North, Suite 616,
Minneapolis, MN 55401-1730; 1995
ISBN #: ISBN-0-915793-76-8
Disability: Dyslexia
Story Profile: Katie Kelso, an adolescent girl with dyslexia, describes her struggles with issues of peer acceptance, dating, and academic achievement, all of which are complicated by her dyslexia.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Turning Around the Upside-Down Kids: Helping Dyslexic Kids Overcome Their Disorder
Author: Harold Levinson and Addie Meyer Sanders
Publisher: M. Evans and Company, Inc., 216 East 49th Street, New York, NY 10017; 1992
ISBN #: ISBN-0-87131-700-1
Disability: Dyslexia
Story Profile: Continuing with the eight characters from The Upside-Down Kids, these students and their compassionate teacher Ms. Jensen, examine the various successful treatments for each child's unique symptoms in a way that is both comprehensive and simple to understand.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Views from Our Shoes: Growing Up with a Brother or Sister with Special Needs
Author: Donald Meyer, Ed.
Publisher: Woodbine House, Inc., 6510 Bells Mill Rd., Bethesda, MD 20817; 1997
ISBN #: ISBN-0-933149-98-0
Disability: Disabilities
Story Profile: Forty-five siblings share their experiences. The children whose essays are featured range in age from four to 18 with a variety of special needs, including autism, cerebral palsy, developmental delays, attention deficit disorder, hydrocephalus, visual and hearing impairments, Down syndrome, and Tourette syndrome.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Waiting for Johnny Miracle
Author: Alice Hendricks Bach
Publisher: Harper and Row
ISBN #: ISBN-0-06-020348-X
Disability: Cancer
Story Profile: Theo and Becky are 17-year-old twins when they find out Becky has a malignant tumor in her right thigh.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Whoa, Nellie!
Author: Hope Benton
Publisher: Open Minds, Inc., PO Box 21325, Columbus, OH 43221-0325; 1996
ISBN #: ISBN-1-888927-79-8; ISBN-1-888927-26-7
Disability: Physical Disabilities
Story Profile: A story of a young girl, Kathryn, who happens to have a physical disability and uses a wheelchair, her friends, and their experiences at summer camp as they search for a favorite horse.
Reading Level: YA
Title: Wish on a Unicorn
Author: Karen Hesse
Publisher: Penguin Books, 375 Hudson Street, New York, NY 10014; 1991
ISBN #: ISBN-0-14-034935-9
Disability: Mental Retardation
Story Profile: A sixth-grade girl, Mags, lives in a trailer and has a younger sister named Hannie with mental retardation. Hannie finds an old stuffed unicorn and believes it is magical when strange things start to happen.
Reading Level: YA
Children's Books About Disabilities
A - Adult
Title: The Doctor He Begged to Be
Author: A. McDonald Vaz
Publisher: Dorrance Publishing Co., Inc., 643 Smithfield Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15222; 1996
ISBN #: ISBN-0-8059-3815-X
Disability: Dyslexia
Story Profile: Garth Vaz is a Jamaican man with dyslexia who wanted to be a physician. His brother tells of his struggles during his two attempts at the University of Florida College of Medicine, and the challenges he faced including neurological, physical, financial, marital, and racial obstacles.
Reading Level: A
Title: The Me in the Mirror
Author: Connie Panzarino
Publisher: Seal Press, 3131 Western Avenue, Suite 410, Seattle, WA 98121-1028; 1994
ISBN #: ISBN-1-878067-45-1
Disability: Physical Disabilities
Story Profile: Connie Panzarino is a woman with Spinal Muscular Atrophy Type III. She tells of her struggles and triumphs, relationships with family, her turn to lesbianism, and her pioneering work in the disability rights movement.
Reading Level: A
Title: The Silents
Author: Charlotte Abrams
Publisher: Gallaudet University Press, 800 Florida Avenue, NE, Washington,
DC 20002-3695; 1996
ISBN #: ISBN-1-56368-055-6
Disability: Deafness
Story Profile: Charlotte writes her autobiography about day-to-day life with her deaf parents. She describes the communication challenges they faced as a Jewish family overcoming the Depression and the hardships of World War II, as well as the additional challenge and fear the mother faced when she found out she was going blind.
Reading Level: A
Title: Under the Eye of the Clock: The Life Story of Christopher Nolan
Author: Christopher Nolan
Publisher: St. Martins Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010; 1988
ISBN #: ISBN-0-312-01266-7
Disability: Cerebral Palsy
Story Profile: The author, a 21-year-old Irishman severely disabled by cerebral palsy, tells the story of his childhood and how he must cope with his handicap, revealing the thoughts and realities of his world.
Reading Level: A
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