U12   Education and the Government

教育与政府

Special Education’s Best Intentions

       Reading Comprehension

       (包括“答案与题解”)

       Notes

       课文参考译文

       练习

         ●Cloze

●Reading Passages(包括“疑难长句翻译与注解”)

         ●Translation

●Writing(包括“审题指导”)

Special Education’s Best Intentions

The American public’s growing recognition of the educational rights of handicapped children heightened in the 1975 enactment of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, Public Law 94-142. Once the need to provide quality education for all students was clearly established as a matter of public record, it also became a need that would demand immediate action on the part of parents and educators; the issue at hand shifted from a question of whether it should be done to how it could be done.

It is natural in the midst of such change to turn to experts for guidance about how to face the challenges that lie ahead. In the years following the passage of PL 94-142, educators attempted to develop methods for identifying the needs of handicapped students. These methods would allow for the development of educational programs designed to serve their individual needs.

Of course developing a system for helping students whose needs are out of the ordinary has been a necessary step in helping those students get into the world of public education. Putting handicapped students into a regular education classroom without careful assessment of their needs would unquestionably lead to frustration on all sides. The need to determine the level of each student’s skills clearly indicates the need for some type of testing program, and demands that some people be trained to administer and interpret those tests. The entire process is obviously a crucial element in meeting the educational needs of handicapped children.

However, the challenge of efficiently offering help to massive numbers of students inevitably has resulted in the evolution of a bureaucratic network with all of the disadvantages inherent in such a system. The means for attempting such a big task involves the use of a standard process of evaluation and diagnosis that will enable the experts to assess not only each child’s present levels of performance educationally, but ultimately to make judgments about the child’s potential for classroom performance in the future.

It is in this respect that the bureaucratic nature of the special education program falters in meeting the needs of the individual child. Since such a system has to handle large volumes of work, it becomes difficult in practice to maintain a focus on evaluation as the necessary means to the worthwhile end of providing children with new educational opportunities. Too often it becomes an end in itself, a source of a convenient label which in turn is used to predict where a child’s limits will lie. It is a tragedy of our educational system that the machinelike efficiency of our program has achieved most of its goals without addressing the needs of students as individuals. However, few real live children fall neatly into the categories that represent the conclusion of the process. Once their futures have been charted by the system, it becomes increasingly difficult for them to prove that they have potential beyond that which has been predicted by the experts.

There is no question about the fact that the special education bureaucracy serves a useful purpose in helping students to find the classrooms and programs most suited to their needs. At the same time, it often appears to be a tendency for any bureaucratic system to become so absorbed with its own structure, so convinced of the infallibility of the experts it employs, that it fails to devote adequate attention to each person it attempts to serve. Because special education involves so many thousands of unique students, it seems almost impossible to find a balance between the efficiency that benefits everyone and the personal attention that is a crucial part of the process. Yet with children’s lives at stake, it is critical that we never give up the effort to do so.

1. In 1975 after the enactment of Public Law 94-142, educators             .

 ［A］ recognized the need to provide special education for handicapped children

 ［B］ began to cooperate with parents in formulating education programs for handicapped children

 ［C］ began to turn their attention to how to provide quality education for handicapped children   

 ［D］ took immediate action to take care of the need of handicapped children

2. To successfully put handicapped children into regular classroom, it is important to             .

 ［A］ find out their needs and skill levels  

 ［B］ provide some kind of training to prepare them for it

 ［C］ design the right entrance examinations to assess their capacity

 ［D］ teach them with a special kind of curriculum

3. The author remarks that the present education system is flawed because it fails to             .

 ［A］ meet the needs of students as individuals   

 ［B］ work out a systematic evaluation system

 ［C］ predict where students’limits lie

 ［D］ focus on evaluation as an end in itself

4. From the last sentence of Paragraph 5 we learn that the evaluation and diagnosis system             .

 ［A］ actually limits the student’s potential for further development

 ［B］ can usually provide an accurate picture of the student’s capacity

 ［C］ can generally identify the difficulties the student may have in study

 ［D］ discourages the student from going beyond his potential capacity

5. According to the author, the needs of individual students are diverse             .

 ［A］ so it is impossible to meet them all

 ［B］ so teachers should teach towards the average

 ［C］ so educators can do nothing in this respect

 ［D］ yet it is important to meet them to the greatest extent

答案与题解

1.［C］  

  根据第一段，自1975年新的残疾儿童教育法实施起，人们所面临的问题由是否应该满足残疾儿童教育的需要，转化为应该如何满足这一需要。

2.［A］  

  根据第三段第二句，让残疾孩子参与正常课堂学习而不了解他们的需要，无疑会对任何一方(指残疾儿童、教师等)造成挫折。下一句接着指出，确定每个(残疾)学生技能的需要清楚地表明需要设立某种测试方法，需要有些人来实施并解释这些测试的结果。

3.［A］  

  根据第五段，在实施特殊儿童教育项目过程中所表现出的官僚主义作风，使得它所制定的评估标准不能得以名副其实地发挥作用，事情往往是：这个评估手段本身成了目的，而没有更好达到服务于残疾儿童的教育这一最终目的，因此未能满足每个孩子的个体需要。

4.［A］  

  本句强调了评价结果对学生的限制，使他们受限于这个结果，错误地估计自己的潜力。

［D］不对，因为该选项强调的是超潜力发挥能力，而原句强调的是让学生发挥出(全部)潜力。

5.［D］  

最后一段最后两句指出，因为特殊教育涉及许多个体状况不同的学生，所以要在满足每个人的利益和照顾个体的利益之间找到一个平衡点似乎看来是不可能的，虽然如此，由于这涉及孩子将来的生活，我们不能放弃这方面的努力，即：我们要努力去寻找这个平衡点。

Notes

1． 第一段第二句是一个并列主从复合句，两个分句由分号连接。句架是Once the need...was...established..., it also became a need that...; the issue...shifted from a question of whether...to how...。前面句子的主句是it also became a need..., that引导定语从句，修饰need; 句首Once引导的是状语从句，Once译为“一旦”。分号后面句子中whether it should be done是名词从句，作介词of的宾语；同样，how引导的名词从句，也作介词to的宾语。

2． 第三段第三句是一个简单主从复合句。 句架是The need...clearly indicates..., and demands that...。句中that引导的名词从句是demands的宾语。

3． 第五段第二句是一个简单主从复合句。句架是Since such a system has to..., it becomes difficult...to maintain a focus...as...。句中handle作“处理”讲。end作“目标”讲。

4． 第五段第六句是一个简单主从复合句。 句架是Once...， it becomes...difficult...to prove that...。句中Once引导状语从句；that引导名词从句，作prove的宾语；在宾语从句中beyond that指beyond that potential；which引导定语从句，修饰that (potential)。

课文参考译文

特种教育的最好意图

美国公众越来越认识到残疾儿童受教育的权利，这种认识在1975年制定《所有残疾儿童教育法》，即94－142号公共法时增强了。一旦明确认识到需要向所有学生提供素质教育是一件公众有案可查的事，这件事情也就变成要求家长和教育工作者立即采取行动的需要；手头的问题从是否应该做的事情变成怎样才可能做成的事情。

在这个变化过程中，自然需要在如何面对面前的挑战问题上求助专家的指导。在通过94－142号公共法之后的几年中，教育工作者曾试图设法确定残疾学生的需要。这些方法考虑到制定旨在满足他们个人需要的教育计划。

当然，制定帮助具有非同寻常需要的学生的制度已成为帮助这些学生进入公共教育世界的必要的一步。把残疾学生放到正规教育的教室而不仔细评估他们的需要无疑会导致各方受到挫折。需要

确定每个学生的技能水平，这一点显然表明需要某种类型的测试程序，并要求对一些人进行培训以便管理和解释那些测试。这整个进程显然是在满足残疾儿童的教育需要方面的一个关键因素。

但是，有效地帮助大量学生的挑战必然引起的结果是逐渐形成一个官僚网，而这个网具有这样一个制度所固有的一切弊端。试图完成这样一个巨大任务的手段涉及使用标准的估价和诊断程序，能使专家不仅评估每个儿童目前在受教育方面的表现水平，而且最后还要判断儿童将来在教室的表现潜力。

这种特殊教育计划的官僚主义性质正是在这方面失去效力而无法满足每个孩子的个体需要。既然这样一个制度必须处理大量工作，在实践中就难以在评估方面保持重点。这种评估是达到向儿童提供新教育机会的非常有价值的目的的必要手段。经常发生的情况是，这种评估本身成为目的，成为一种方便的标签的来源，这种标签反过来又被用来预言一个儿童的（能力）极限在哪里。我们的教育制度的悲剧之处在于我们的计划的效率像机器一样已达到了大部分目标，却没有解决儿童作为个体的需要。但是，在现实生活中几乎没有孩子会代表评价过程中所归纳出的这种种类别。一旦他们的前途被这个制度确定，他们就越发难以证明他们具有超出专家预测范围的潜力。

毫无疑问，特殊教育机构要达到的有益目的就是帮助学生找到最适合他们需要的课堂和计划。同时，任何官僚制度都常常有这种倾向，即它变得如此全神贯注于自己的结构、如此深信自己请来的专家不会犯错误，以至于不能充分注意自己试图服务的每个人。由于特殊教育涉及成千上万名特殊学生，因此看来几乎不可能在有益于每个人的效率和作为这个进程的关键部分的对个体的关注之间找到平衡点。然而，由于涉及儿童的生活，因此关键在于我们决不能放弃这样做的努力。

练习