Disability Studies in Special Education Teacher Preparation: An Autoethnography of Course Development

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session 9
  In Roundtable Session: Transforming Teacher Education for Radical Inclusive Education (Table 20)

Abstract

Disability studies is an interdisciplinary approach to theorizing, researching, and understanding disability often from an emancipatory framework. Special education and disability studies emerged and evolved as distinct fields, however, special education can benefit from incorporating ideas from disability studies as a means to cultivate equitable educational systems. This autoethnography explores how disability studies affected the development of one course, Introduction to Autism and Severe Disabilities, which is part of a specialized, Master’s level teaching certificate. The autoethnography focuses on how language and terminology, as well as a disability studies informed syllabus and course structure, could be used to help students understand the socially constructed nature of disability and schools can create disabling conditions for people with impairments.

Author

• Sarah L. Curtiss, University of Delaware