Brochure Final 110409

The 12th Annual Conference on Educating Students with Disabilities in General Education Classrooms

Tuesday, December 8, 2009 Crowne Plaza, Cromwell, CT 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Tuesday, December 8, 2009 Crowne Plaza, Cromwell, CT 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Agenda 8:00 a.m.

Registration/Refreshments/ Networking/Exhibits Open

8:30 a.m.

Welcome and Opening Remarks

9:00 a.m.

Keynote Presentation Keith Jones, President SoulTouchin’ Experiences

9:40 a.m.

Concurrent Sessions, I Short Courses Begin

10:40 a.m.

Break

11:20 a.m.

Concurrent Sessions, II Short Courses, cont.

12:20 p.m.

Lunch (provided)

1:30 p.m.

Movie Screening: “Including Samuel”

2:50 p.m.

Facilitated Dialogue Dan Habib, Filmmaker in Residence University of New Hampshire (UNH) Institute on Disability (IOD)

3:30 p.m.

Closing/Evaluation/Door Prizes

Exhibitors Please take the opportunity to visit the Conference exhibits, which open at 8:00 a.m. and will be available throughout the day. Displays will include assistive technology devices, software, curricular resources, professional development resources, videos, and information about organizations invested in the education of Connecticut’s youth.

Please Note: SERC will be photographing and videotaping the conference for possible use for Web and print publications.

Keynote Speaker Keith Jones

President SoulTouchin’ Experiences Somerville, Massachusetts

Keith Jones is active in multicultural, cross-disability education and outreach. He is the President and CEO of SoulTouchin’ Experiences, an organization created to call attention to the issues of access, inclusion, and empowerment for people with disabilities, including himself. Mr. Jones conducts trainings on how to strengthen efforts to provide services and information to people with disabilities.

Movie Screening Followed by a conversation with

Dan Habib

Filmmaker in Residence University of New Hampshire (UNH) Institute on Disability (IOD)

Before his son Samuel was diagnosed with cerebral palsy, photojournalist Dan Habib rarely thought about the inclusion of people with disabilities. Now he thinks about it every day. Habib's award-winning documentary film Including Samuel honestly chronicles the Habib family's efforts to include Samuel in every facet of their lives. The film also features four other families with varied inclusion experiences, plus interviews with dozens of teachers, young people, parents, and disability rights experts. Including Samuel is a highly personal, passionately photographed film that captures the cultural and systemic barriers to inclusion. Dan Habib, the director, producer, and cinematographer of Including Samuel, has been Filmmaker in Residence at the Institute on Disability at the University of New Hampshire since April 2008. From 1995 to 2008, Habib was the photography editor of the Concord Monitor. He was named the national Photography Editor of the Year in 2006 and 2008 for papers under 100,000 circulation.

9:40 a.m. to 12:20 p.m. This year the Expanding Horizons Conference will offer three Short Courses featuring national programs as an alternative to Concurrent Sessions. Each Short Course is designed to run for nearly two and a half hours to allow Conference participants an opportunity to gain more in-depth knowledge of each program. As seating is extremely limited, participants must preregister for each Short Course they would like to attend. There will be an additional fee of five dollars for each Short Course selected. More information about registration and fees is located on the back page of this brochure. Notice of your acceptance and a ticket into a Short Course will be included in your letter of confirmation for the Conference.

A. Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) Nicole Natale, CREC and Smita Worah, SERC Most students have opportunities within the school routine to develop their social communication skills under the scaffolding support of experienced adults, helping them become competent communicators. Students with intellectual and developmental disabilities such as autism, cerebral palsy, and Down syndrome, however, may not be able to take advantage of these opportunities. Often, they are unable to rely on their speech to communicate with others and therefore depend on unambiguous modes of communication. This may severely restrict their participation in social activities within the school environment. Augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) provides a means for individuals with significant communication disabilities to access the magic and power of communication to meet their full potential. AAC systems include the use of signs, communication boards and books, and computer-based assistive technologies that provide speech output. Participants in this session will understand the significance of communication; recognize the need to provide augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) systems to children with autism and other significant disabilities; and learn strategies to support social communication within the school routine.

B. Can the Connecticut Preschool Curriculum and Assessment Frameworks Meet the Needs of ALL Students? Anne Marie Davidson and Paquita Sims, SERC Positive Outcomes for Children with Disabilities: Recommendations for Curriculum, Assessment, and Program Evaluation, a publication from the Division for Early Childhood, says that a comprehensive curriculum framework encompasses four elements: assessment; scope and sequence; activities and intervention strategies; and progress monitoring. “A curriculum framework is a dynamic system that should guide all aspects of a high quality program,” the report says. In Connecticut, our system is the Preschool Curriculum and Assessment Frameworks. Join us for this short course to explore Connecticut’s early learning goals. Learn a process to extend the expectations for children in a classroom who have not yet achieved at the beginning level, as well as tools to support this process and your teaching in the classroom. This short course also will explore the implementation of these adjusted early learning goals and how to connect with community agencies to emphasize the use of these goals to meet the learning outcomes for young children with disabilities.

C. Technology Tools to Provide Access to Literature and Curriculum for Struggling Readers Amy Norton and Carol Magliocco, EASTCONN What happens when a student’s struggle to read becomes a barrier to accessing the general education curriculum? This session will offer participants the opportunity for hands-on exploration of technology tools that assist students, grades 3-12, in accessing literature and core content materials in a variety of formats, including electronic text presented at grade level utilizing Bookshare literature and NIMAS (National Instructional Materials Accessibility Standards) files, and other online resources with text reader support; audio text on CD or in MP3 format through RFB&D (Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic) and other sources; scaffolded reading resources such as Don Johnston “Start-to-Finish” materials; and Cricksoft “Find Out & Write About.”

9:40 a.m. to 10:40 a.m. 1. Connect-Ability

11:20 a.m. to 12:20 p.m. 1. Freeware Assistive Technology Lab

Patti Clay, Bureau of Rehabilitation Services (BRS) Connect-Ability

Arlene Lugo, CT Tech Act Project

2. A Fully Inclusive Theater Experience: Unified Theater™

2. Teacher Panel on Curriculum Adaptation

Micaela Connery and Jeff Giliberto, Unified Theater West Hartford, CT

Sheila Blachman, Colleen Bryant, Robyn Cologna, Miryam Kuligowski, Ingrid McClay, Jenn Sinal, and Marianne Young, Newtown Public Schools, CT

Keith Jones, SoulTouchin’ Experiences

3. The Mini Computer We Are Not Allowing Our Students to Use

4. Exploring Open Technologies for All Students

4. What Every Connecticut Educator Needs to Know about NIMAS

3. A Conversation with Keith Jones

John Mercier and Greg Glidden, SERC

Sean Kavanaugh, SERC

Elizabeth Hess, Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic Karen B. Narvol, Bookshare Mike Smith, CSDE

5. The Intersection of EIP and SRBI

5. Secondary Transition Services

Gerald Hairston and Leigh Jones-Bamman, SERC

6. Meeting the Needs of All Students Through Co-Teaching

Melissa Wrigley, SERC

6. Disability and Race Sally Esposito, SERC

Stefanie Carbone, SERC

7. Living with Autism Teagen and Tyler Comeau, Students Facilitated by Kate Weingartner, Consultant, SERC

7. Strategies for Teaching Students with Autism Jacqueline Kelleher, Consultant, CSDE Kate Weingartner, SERC

CEU Information SERC will award .7 CEUs. To be eligible for CEUs, participants must be preregistered, receive written confirmation from SERC, attend the full Conference, complete a participant evaluation form, and provide evidence of post-conference application/reflection. Evaluation forms and information about the post-conference application/reflection will be available at the Conference. Certificates of Attendance also will be available.

Registration Information This Conference can accommodate three hundred (300) preschool to grade 12 general and special education teachers, paraprofessionals, student support services personnel, administrators, and family members. Registration will be on a first-come, first-served basis, with consideration for regional distribution. There is a registration fee of $75.00 per person for the Conference. For each Short Course selected, there is an additional $5.00 fee. Lunch will be provided. Purchase orders will be accepted but payment MUST be received prior to December 8, 2009. The closing date for submitting applications is November 30, 2009. Applications received after November 30, 2009 will be accepted as space permits. Checks and/or purchase orders must be made payable to Rensselaer at Hartford. Registration fee waivers are available, if needed, for parents and other family members. A limited number of stipends also are available to help defray the cost of child care and transportation. Please indicate your need in the appropriate areas on the application form. Please direct questions regarding registration to Heather Penfield, Education Services Specialist, at SERC, (860) 632-1485, ext. 263. Content questions should be directed to Craig Struble, Consultant, at SERC, (860) 632-1485, ext. 392.

It is the policy of the State Education Resource Center (SERC) that no person shall be discriminated against or excluded from participation in any SERC programs or activities on the basis of race, color, religion, age, marital or civil union status, national origin, ancestry, sex/gender, intellectual disability, physical disability, political beliefs, or sexual orientation. 12th Annual Expanding Horizons Conference

(10-09-005) LRE/hp-brochure

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