A number of years ago I became aware of the power of language when I attempted to recruit mothers of children with disabilities for my doctoral research project. It quickly became evident that the word ‘disability’ was contentious. A number of mothers contacted me to join my project and when

Parents are one of our most valuable resources as research has consistently shown that when we partner with parents the outcomes for students are greatly improved. Partnering with parents is vital when a child has a disability and this is acknowledged through legislation such as the Disability Discrimination Act 1992,

Some students with disabilities use behaviour that can be described as ‘difficult’, ‘hard to manage’, ‘aggressive’ or ‘challenging’. This choice of language reflects an underlying yet misguided belief that the student has control over his/her decisions and teachers may respond with a punitive approach to attempt to manage the behaviour