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part than previously in many ways, particularly in
the giving of grants for research into new projects
in education and in attempts to help minority
groups, be they culturally, racially, intellectually
or physically handicapped. But whereas we in
Britain have a firm reference point in the 1944
Education Act, with the three As of Age, Ability
and Aptitude governing suitable educational
provision as applying to all children in our
country, and similarly to the statutory requirements
of provision for ten main categories of
handicapped children, there is nothing quite
comparable universally in the United States as a
mandatory requirement for all districts and States.
Terminology, of course, differs too—for example,
many of the children who in Britain would be
termed maladjusted would, say, in California be
called educationally handicapped (EH) and placed
in EH classes in ordinary schools. A good deal of
provision for handicapped children, especially for
the equivalent of our ESN group (sometimes
referred to as Educable Mentally Retarded or
EMR in the United States) would be in special
classes in ordinary schools, and in some areas
there are also special classes in ordinary schools
for deaf or physically handicapped children, and
now in some States also for brain injured or
perceptually handicapped children. Further
differences are the length of the school year and
the training of teachers. Although the school year
for 1967/68 began on the same day—the day after
Labor Day, 5th September—as it did in
Hounslow, many schools work to two semesters
and not three terms, and the school year finishes
about mid-June. From then on, the summer school
and summer camp sessions go into full swing.
This is a time for many children to get extra
tutoring and for many teachers to amass further
credits by taking special summer school courses,
including those organised by some centres which
have produced rather specialised methods for
teaching the educationally disabled child. Teachers
get their practical experience in these centres by
working with the children who have come in for
the summer school session. The summer vacation,
also, is the time when many Headstart
programmes go into action, attempting to remedy
in a few short weeks the so-called cultural
deprivation of the child's earlier upbringing.
With regard to the training of teachers, although
some Colleges of Education and University
Departments in England may have more prestige
in the educational world than others, the teaching
qualification achieved by all teachers carries
national recognition regardless of this fact. In the
United States, on the other hand, States and
districts do not recognise the teaching
qualifications awarded by every teacher training
establishment and University, so that the mobility
of teachers between States (or even sometimes
between different areas in a State) is somewhat
restricted.
'Before continuing with these observations, it is
necessary first to make a cautionary statement that
so far as visits to schools were concerned, I did
not see a strictly representative selection of the
whole of American special education, especially
the public system. Some private schools have
earned themselves a high reputation in this field,
and it was to the pace-setters particularly that I
went. Because many of these schools, whether day
or residential, charge very high fees by British
standards, they can afford to have very favourable
teacher-pupil ratios—classes of five or six, and
often an assistant or trainee teacher or two as well,
or some form of auxiliary helper who gets some
training but works under supervision. The concept
of the master-teacher is quite widely accepted,
the teacher who uses her superior skills to help
individual children while she supervises her
assistants, who organises and takes any special
group work, or just acts at times as director of
operations and observer and recorder. Other staff
attached to some of these schools is frequently
also in generous ratios, and rather high powered
. .. social workers, psychologists, psychiatrists,
speech therapists, etc., depending on the special
interests of the school and what it conceives the
need of the children to be.
'On my return to Britain, for clarity's sake I
made some groupings of the variety of institutions
I had visited, and this is set out below:—
Schools for Children with Learning Disabilities,
whether specifying brain injury or not.—Both
day and residential.
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