Working with the parents and teachers of exceptional children

Abstract

Since the advent of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) in 1990, with subsequent revisions in 1997 and 2005, parents and teachers of specially challenged children have been called to face new demands. IDEA emphasizes, among other things, the importance of early intervention for the development of full potential in exceptional children and requires parental participation in all aspects of special education. This increases the need for collaboration between parents and schools to new and, at times, even more stressful levels. The literature on early intervention (Cunningham and Slopper, 1980; Hayden and McGinnis, 1977) stresses the role of change agent played by the parent of the specially challenged child. Most early intervention programs include supportive parent-counseling services in recognition of the emotional demands of this role. It is the central contention of this chapter that the basic techniques and philosophy of cognitive-behavioral therapy, generically and specifically Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), can assist those working with these parents to better address their emotional demands. REBT provides a rationale for the development of parent counseling programs based on an empirically derived theory of emotional distress, assessment constructs that allow a clear conceptualization of parents practical and emotional problems, and a variety of specific therapeutic techniques of demonstrated utility with similar problems in other populations. Parents of specially challenged children face many demands in their daily efforts to meet the needs of their child. The supportive counseling so often advocated for such parents, although of some value, usually makes no specific attempt to teach parents the relationship among rational thinking, reasonable emotions and purposive behaviors. Although some parents may temporarily feel better with support, they frequently do not necessarily cope better or work more effectively with their exceptional child. Parents distressing negative emotions can result in patterns of behavior that defeat their expressed purposes. These goals are to stimulate their child for maximum development and to effectively play their part in their childs educational planning. As pointed out by Ellis and Greiger (1977) cognitive behavioral approaches, best exemplified by REBT, have considerable potential in teaching parents and others working with specially challenged children as it demonstrates ways to manage emotions so that they may better meet the childs many requirements for care and stimulation. Special education and related services are provided within a service delivery system whose critical components include not only parents and children, but also special educators and a variety of related service professionals. Current legislation mandates parent participation in team planning as well as teacher accountability for educational services that most effectively meet the childs needs. REBT informed parent counseling as suggested here will also reciprocally create new challenges for special educators in the given system. Despite this teachers, no less than the parents, experience a variety of distressing negative emotions that can interfere with the effective completion of their critical responsibilities. Angry, frequently anxious or "burned out" teachers and related services professionals may behave in self-defeating ways that adversely affect their students, students families and themselves. Teachers, like parents, can be taught to manage their excessive negative emotions and self-defeating behaviors through individualized consultation, group counseling and/or training experiences based on the principals of REBT. It is the contention of this chapter that such training has a practical utility for special educators, is resource efficient as in-service education and takes advantage of the demonstrated clinical effectiveness of the REBT approach with other similar populations. © 2006 Springer Science+Business Media, Inc.