USF St. Petersburg campus Faculty Publications

ROTE: Reality Oriented Teacher Education.

SelectedWorks Author Profiles:

H. William Heller

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1973

Abstract

In 1971, the State of Alabama Legislature passed Act 106, "Mandatory Education for the Exceptional Child," which mandated that all exceptional children were to receive appropriate special education services no later than 1975-76. Five hundred new teacher units were authorized for each of the interim fiscal years, and new graduate and preservice teacher programs were initiated. Unfortunately, too many teachers remained untrained and uncertified, and in-service training received a low priority compared to preservice. A Reality Oriented Teacher Education Program (ROTE), requiring both faculty and students to work in the field, was instituted. This program placed advanced undergraduate special education majors (prior to student teaching) in classrooms where they had full responsibility for instruction on a one-day or half-day basis. Their presence released the regularly employed teacher to attend, for credit and with no cost to the school system, field-based course instruction from college and university instructors. Thus, faculty members not only taught in the field but also interacted with school personnel in actual school settings. Courses were based strictly on teacher needs. Student interns coordinated their teaching activities with the regular teacher to ensure maximum continuity and interrelation of instruction for the children.

Comments

Abstract only. Full-text article is available only through licensed access provided by the publisher. Published in ERIC: ED087711. Members of the USF System may access the full-text of the article through the authenticated link provided.

Language

en_US

Publisher

Education Resources Information Center (ERIC)

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.

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