Research On Promoting Students' Abilities Of Self-determination In The Process Of Individualized Education Programs

Self-determination is a combination of skills, knowledge, and beliefs that enable a person to engage in goal-directed, self-regulation, autonomous behavior. An understanding of one's strengths and limitations together with a belief in oneself as capable and effective are essential to self-determination. When acting on the basis of these skills and attitudes, individuals have greater ability to take control of their lives and assume the role of successful adults.From the analysis of self-determination of 26 students with mental retardation in three resource classes in YuZhong District in Chongqing, the researcher found that the students' scores of autonomy, goal-setting, task performance which infered students had low abilities of these aspects.In foreign countries and Taiwan areas, the studies of self-determination have highly developed and there are so many teaching models and curriculums available. This research put the teaching model of self-determination from foreign countries into practice, combining with Individualized Teaching Programs in the resource class of Dongshenglou Primary School in Yuzhong District. In this teaching research ,researcher divided 26 students into 2 groups, 10 students from Dongshenglou Primary School as the experimental group and other 16 students from Lianglukou Primary School and Zhongshan Primary School as the control group, and compared the increase of the teaching outcomes between the experimental group and the experimental group for one term.Through the Union topic activity teaching which was link to the procedures of Individualized Teaching Programs, the students of Dongshenglou Primary School took part in preparation for IEP meetings, participation IEP meetings, setting long and short teaching goals, participation activities and self-evaluation. And the students developed their skills notably in the four aspects of self-determination: autonomy, self-regulation, psychological empowerment and self-realization, at the same time the natural increase of the control group didn't. All above can indicate teaching intervention is effective.This research brought in advanced foreign teaching models of self-determination so as to search for new teaching strategies for Chinese special education. During the research, researchers compiled school-based curriculum with two teachers, which focused on promoting students' abilities of self-determination, hoping to provide references to teaching students with metal retardation which can arouse new thoughts of special educators.