ABSTRACT
Although educational equity is a concern of those who support standards based reform efforts, the only national content standards to include students with specific disabilities are the National Science Education Standards, as noted above (McDonnell, McLaughlin, & Morison, 1997). Even so, the emphasis is on adapting instructional approaches to meet the needs of “special students.” This discourse suggests there is some static quality located within certain students (those identified as “special” or as having “disabilities”) that impedes them from learning in instructional sci-
C H A P S E
Kathleen M. Collins University of San Diego
ence contexts. The implication is that it is the students who are deficient, and who therefore require adaptations of classroom learning contexts in order to overcome their deficiencies.
