[Nfb-or] Fw: [nfbwatlk] Food for Thought
Renee Squier
squierr at comcast.net
Sat Jun 5 19:15:00 UTC 2010
----- Original Message -----
From: "Denise Mackenstadt" <dmackenstadt at comcast.net>
To: <NFBwatlk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Saturday, June 05, 2010 10:46 AM
Subject: [nfbwatlk] Food for Thought
> Recently I saw on a listserve for AER (Associaiton for Rehabilitation and
> Education of Blind and Visually Impaired Children and Adults) a listserv
> for individuals working with blind children and adults a message which has
> bothered me for some time. I do not typically respond to posts but I felt
> that a small part of this post needed to be commented on. This is for the
> NFBwatlk to understand what we are dealing with in the professional area
> of work with the blind. I would be interested in any of your comments.
>
> Recently in response to a question posted by Sheila one of the posts
> stated "Weaknesses: 1. still no published research proving or disproving
> that poor teacher braille skills are responsible for poor braille outcomes
> for students. Nevertheless, we've gone full steam ahead addressing a
> "problem" that may not exist. Assertions by advocacy groups are not
> evidence, nor are gut hunches. We need DATA. And thus far no data
> exists." I find it astonishing that an assertion is being made that
> teacher competency in an essential skill to be taught to students is not
> relevant to student outcomes. Lack of Data cannot take the place of
> common sense or best practice. I cannot think of another subject area,
> for example: Language Arts, Math, Science or Art, where a decent state
> licensing entity will not expect an instructor to demonstrate competence.
> As a parent I would be very concerned if my child's English teacher could
> not read or write English. Let us not throw out critical thinking as an
> alternative to non-existent DATA Collection. I do not want to say that
> legitimate research and legitimate data results are not beneficial to best
> practices. But let us not sacrifice common sense to the altar of
> statistics.
>
> Denise Mackenstadt
> dmackenstadt at comcast.net
>
>
>
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