The practice of inclusion (i.e., educating children with and
without disabilities together) derives from the principle of least
restrictive environment and the civil rights movement. Although some
parents and professionals call for universal full inclusion (Peck,
1995), others advocate For the maintenance of a continuum of services
(Bricker, 1995; Strain, 1995), suggesting that periods of special
education-only instruction may at times be beneficial (Fuchs &
Fuchs, 1994). However, most current research on service delivery has
shifted from questions about the relative efficacy of inclusion to
questions about effective inclusion models (Guralnick, 1990; Salisbury
& Vincent, 1990). The present study represents a return to the
earlier concern, the efficacy of varying degrees of inclusion.
The key issue in this debate is whether the individual needs of
some children may be lost when a single approach is applied universally.
Because children with disabilities form all extraordinarily
heterogeneous population, there are risks in adopting a "one size
fits all" philosophy across different subgroups of this population.
For example, in a multisite study of inclusion models for elementary-age
children with learning disabilities, approximately half of the children
showed little or no growth in reading achievement (Zigmond, Jenkins,
Fuchs, Deno, & Fuchs, 1995; Zigmond, Jenkins, Fuchs, Deno, Fuchs,
Baker, et al., 1995). In contrast, children with more severe
disabilities were found to generally benefit from inclusion (Buysse
& Bailey, 1993), although the generality of this conclusion has been
challenged by MacMillan, Gresham, and Forness (1996). Because preschool
children with disabilities also constitute a diverse population, varying
broadly in social, linguistic, cognitive, and motor skills as well as in
other factors, individual children may respond differently to different
educational environments. Thus, studies seeking to uncover best
practices must take into account the characteristics of the research
participants.
Most research on special education preschool programs has
concentrated on group effects, providing information about the average
benefit of a practice such as inclusion (Buysse & Bailey, 1993;
Lamorey & Bricker, 1993; Odom & McEvoy, 1988). However, there is
evidence that subgroups of children may not respond similarly to the
same approach. In a previous study involving random assignment to either
special education-only classes or integrated classes (i.e., four
children developing typically and eight children who qualified for
special education services), Cole, Mills, Dale, and Jenkins (1991) found
no main effect differences for children in either model, but significant
Aptitude X Treatment interactions (ATIs). Specifically, children with
disabilities who performed relatively higher on pretest measures
benefited more from integrated special education classrooms, while
children who performed lower on pretest measures benefited more from
special education-only classrooms. These findings suggest that service
delivery models may relate to developmental outcomes in more complicated
ways than first thought (i.e., interactions between the type of service
delivery arrangements and child characteristics). It is possible that
the findings of no differences in developmental measures in earlier
studies of mainstreaming may have masked ATIs.
If some young children are better served academically in special
education-only settings and others are better served in integrated
special education settings, then a continuum of service delivery options
is preferable to any single approach. Given our earlier findings, we
felt it important to seek replication. We also wanted to examine the
relative effects of a third, even more inclusive model of integration,
one in which typically developing children are in the majority. Thus,
the present study examined the effects of three different levels of
integration--special education-only (classrooms which enroll only
children with disabilities), integrated special education (more children
with disabilities than typically developing children), and mainstreamed
(more typically developing children than children with disabilities)--on
developmental outcomes of young children with disabilities.
METHOD
Subjects
A total of 66 children, enrolled in a laboratory school in the United
States, participated in this study. These children, ages 31 months to 75
months (SD = 11.23), qualified for special education under the
state's noncategorical system of funding for preschool children.
Children qualify for special education if they exhibit a delay of at
least 1.5 standard deviations on a normed test in two or more
developmental areas (gross motor, fine motor, language, cognition, or
social-emotional development) or if they exhibit a delay of 2 or more
standard deviations in one of these areas. Forty-six of the students
exhibited a significant delay in gross motor (70%), 55 in fine motor
(83%), 55 in language (83%), 36 in cognition (55%), and 56 in
social-emotional development (85%). One-way ANOVAs on each area of delay
by level of integration revealed no significant differences. The sample
contained 49 boys (74%) and 17 girls (26%), with an ethnic mix of 45
European American (68%); 13 African American (20%); and 8 Asian
American, Native American, Pacific Islander American, or other (12%).
See Table 1 for a demographic breakdown of the sample.
In addition, 51 typically developing children were enrolled in
integrated and mainstreamed classrooms. These children, ages 32 months
to 65 months (M = 47 months, SD = 7.88), included 31 boys (61%) and 20
girls (39%), representing ail ethnic mix of 39 European American (76%);
9 African American (18%); and 3 Asian, Native American, Pacific Islander
American, or other (6%). For this group the McCarthy General Cognitive
Index (GCI; McCarthy, 1972) mean was 105 (SD = 15.28) and the Preschool
Language Assessment Instrument (PLAI; Blank, Rose, & Berlin, 1978)
mean proportion for totally appropriate responses was .62 (SD = .20).
Only data from children with disabilities are reported in the remainder
of this article.
Design
Children were randomly assigned to one of three levels of inclusion
(special education-only, integrated special education, and mainstreamed
classrooms). Each classroom enrolled 14 children. Special education-only
classrooms enrolled 14 children with disabilities and no typically
developing children. The integrated classrooms enrolled 3 typically
developing children and 11 children with disabilities. Mainstreamed
classrooms enrolled 9 typically developing children and 5 children with
disabilities.
Final Sample Selection. The original sample included 114 children
with disabilities, but some of these had participated in the preschool
program for more than 1 year. To ensure comparability, we used only data
from a child's first year in the program. Moreover, the number of
children with disabilities who had been assigned to the three types of
treatment ranged from 22 in the mainstreamed condition to 48 in the
special education-only condition. Because differential weighting from
disproportionate samples creates problems in interpreting interaction
terms, we equated sample size by matching a subsample of children from
the integrated special education and special education-only programs (n
= 22 each) with students in the mainstreaming condition, using the PLAI
pretest scores for total appropriate responses as the matching variable.
As shown in Table 2, the three groups were similar at pretest, with no
significant differences among the final groups on any pretest measure.
Even though we had randomly assigned children to classrooms and
conditions, our final selection of students matched for pretest PLAI
performance resulted in a quasi-experimental design. However, a
comparison of results found for the larger sample mirrored those for the
smaller sample reported here. Table 1 gives descriptive statistics for
each classroom composition.
Note: McCarthy GCI = McCarthy Scales of Children's Abilities
General Cognitive Index: PLAI = Preschool Language Assessment
Instrument.
Data collection extended over a 3-year period, with all three
types of classrooms represented each year. Children attended preschool
for 2 hr and 15 min per day, 5 days per week, for 180 school days. There
were morning and afternoon sessions for each of the three classroom
compositions. Across the 3 years, four different teachers taught the
mainstreamed, five taught integrated, and four taught special
education-only classrooms.
Curricula
In the first 2 years of the project each classroom used one of two
curricula. Five of the six classrooms used the Mediated Learning (ML)
Curriculum (Osborn, Sherwood, & Cole, 1991) and one of the special
education-only classrooms used the Direct Instruction (DI) program as
developed by Engelmann and his colleagues (Becker, 1977; Becker,
Engelmann, & Thomas, 1975). Due to the implementation of another
research project in the third year, the curricula used in the classrooms
changed. At that time one classroom representing each level of classroom
composition employed direct language teaching methods (Waryas &
Stremel-Campbell, 1984), with the other three classrooms employing an
interactive curriculum (Drummond, 1989). One-way ANOVAs on posttest
scores for children enrolled in each curriculum revealed no significant
differences. Treatment fidelities were consistently high for each
curricular approach; details of those analyses are available in Cole,
Dale, Mills, and Jenkins (1993) and Cole, Mills, Dale, and Jenkins
(1996).
Each classroom was staffed by a head teacher with a Master's
degree in Special Education, an assistant teacher, a practicum student,
and related service personnel who provided services in the classroom
during segments of the school day. On average, three adults were in each
classroom.
Measures
McCarthy Scales of Children's Abilities (MSCA). The MSCA
(McCarthy, 1972) is an individually administered intelligence test for
children ranging in age from 2 1/2 to 8 1/2 years of age. Subtests
include Verbal, Perceptual, Quantitative, Memory, Motor, and the General
Cognitive Index (GCI), composed of a combined set of the subsets. The
MSCA is widely used and covers the appropriate developmental range for
preschoolers with developmental delays. The following average split-half
reliabilities are indicated: GCI = .93, Verbal = .88, Perceptual = .84,
Quantitative = .81, and Memory = .79. Test-retest reliability ranges
from .75 to .91. Sattler (1988) characterized it as "well
standardized and psychometrically sound" (p. 295). We obtained
complete pre- and posttesting results for 64 of 66 children on this
measure.
Preschool Language Assessment Instrument (PLAI). The PLAI (Blank
et al., 1978) is an experimental test designed to measure
children's ability to respond to increasingly difficult and
abstract language, similar to that encountered in teaching situations
with four distinct ascending levels of abstraction: 1 Matching
Perception (e.g., What do you see?); 2 Selective Analysis of Perception
(e.g., What is different?); 3 Reordering Perception (e.g., How can you
tell?); and 4 Reasoning About Perception (e.g., What will happen?). The
split-half reliability for each level is: group 1 = .64, group 2 = .80,
group 3 = .83, and group 4 = .86. Test-retest reliabilities for each
group are: group 1 = .73, group 2 = .83, group 3 = .86, and group 4 =
.88. A variety of scores can be derived from the test. For the present
study, the total number of adequate responses (a scoring category
defined in the test manual) was used as an overall measure. We obtained
complete pre- and posttest results for 65 children on this test.
Testing Procedures
The McCarthy and PLAI were administered as pre- and posttests between
October and May. The minimum period between pre- and posttests was 6
months. Research staff consisting of graduate students in speech
language pathology, special education, and psychology as well as
undergraduate students in psychology conducted all testing. Testing
staff were not involved in classroom activities arid were not informed
of the nature of the hypotheses involved in the study. Guidelines were
in place to ensure that research staff tested approximately equal
numbers of students across the three conditions.
RESULTS
Means and standard deviations for pre- and posttest measures of the
three treatments are presented in Table 2. Analyses of variance (ANOVAs)
compared the three groups' pretest levels on the following six
measures: McCarthy GCI, Verbal, Perceptual, Quantitative, and Memory
scale scores, arid PLAI number of total appropriate responses. There
were no statistically significant pretest differences among the three
groups.
Pre- and posttests were examined through repeated-measures ANOVAs,
with treatment (i.e., class composition) as a between-subjects factor
and time (pre- and posttest) as a within-subjects factor. The
interaction of Treatment X Time, reflecting differences among treatment
in amount of change, was not statistically significant for any of the
six measures.
The main effect for time reached statistical significance on
McCarthy GCI, F(1, 61), p [is less than] .05 and the PLAI, F(1, 62), p
[is less than] .001. Recall that McCarthy scores are age-based standard
scores; thus the same standard score on pre- and posttest indicates that
children grew at the average of their norm-referenced group. The
statistically significant pre- to posttest difference on the GCI
resulted from participants' higher scores, relative to the norm
group, at posttest than at pretest. The PLAI provides only raw scores
(confounding maturation and education effects), so the overall pre- to
posttest changes cannot be easily interpreted.
Exploring further the gains by treatment groups on the six
measures, we computed effect sizes to quantify difference between pre-
and posttest for each group (Glass, McGaw, & Smith, 1981). As shown
in Table 3, the largest effect sizes were associated with the integrated
treatment, followed by the special education-only treatment. The
smallest effect sizes were associated with the mainstream treatment, for
which all effect sizes from the McCarthy measures were either negative
or near zero. Effect sizes observed for the PLAI, ranging from 60 to 78,
were larger than those for the McCarthy, again reflecting a difference
in the type of scores produced by the two tests (i.e., raw vs. standard
scores). Contrast analyses were performed to evaluate the pre- to
posttest change on each measure for the three groups separately. For the
integrated treatment, differences between pre- to and posttest means
were significant for McCarthy GCI (p = .036) and Verbal scale (p =
.004), and nearly so for the Perceptual scale (p = .059). For the
special education-only treatment, the pre- to posttest difference on the
McCarthy GCI (p = .05) approached significance. For the mainstream
treatment, no pre- to posttest differences approached significance on
any McCarthy measure. All three treatments produced significant pre- to
posttest changes on PLAI raw scores.
Note: Effect sizes computed by dividing pre-posttest difference by
the pretest standard deviation, pooled across groups. McCarthy GCI =
McCarthy Scales of Children's General Cognitive Index; PLAI =
Preschool Language Assessment Instrument.
We next examined ATIs for each posttest measure, using multiple
regression analyses with hierarchical ordering as follows: age, pretest,
class composition, and ability-(pretest cognitive and language
scores)by-treatment. Ability pretests used in the regression were either
PLAI total appropriate responses or McCarthy GCI. Because of the
complexity of the ATIs, we conducted pairwise comparisons of the groups
(R. Abbott, personal communication, April 28, 1992), that is,
mainstreamed versus integrated special education, special education-only
versus integrated special education, and special education-only versus
mainstreamed. Results are summarized in Table 4. From the total of 36
regressions, 9 significant ATIs were observed.
TABLE 4 Summary of Aptitude x Treatment Multiple Regression Analysis
for Students in Special Education-Only, Integrated Special Education,
and Mainstreamed Settings
Note: ISE = integrated special education; SE-O = special
education-only; McCarthy GCI = McCarthy Scales of Children's
Abilities Genergal Cognitive Index; PLAI = Preschool Language Assessment
Instrument.
(a) The direction of the slope is highest far ISE.
Special Education-Only Versus Integrated Special Education. After
controlling for age and pretest, the interaction of pretest PLAI scores
and treatment significantly predicted three posttests: McCarthy Verbal
(p [is less than] .01), Quantitative (p [is less than] .01), and Memory
(p [is less than] .01) posttest scale scores. The interaction between
McCarthy GCI pretest and treatment also predicted McCarthy Quantitative
(p [is less than] .05) posttest scale scores. The direction of the
interaction for all four ATIs indicated that higher performing students
at pretest gained more from the integrated special education classes,
whereas lower performing students gained more from the special
education-only classes. Figure 1 illustrates the pattern of all
interactions.
[Figure 1 ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Integrated Special Education Versus Mainstreamed. Again, after
controlling for age and pretest, the integrated versus mainstreamed
treatment significantly interacted with pretest PLAI scores in
predicting four posttests: McCarthy Verbal (p [is less than] .01),
Quantitative (p [is less than] .05), Memory (p [is less than] .01), and
GCI (p [is less than] .05) scale scores. The interaction between
McCarthy pretest GCI and treatment was also a significant predictor of
posttest McCarthy Memory (p [is less than] .05). The direction of the
interactions was the same for all five ATIs: higher performing students
at pretest gained more in integrated special education and lower
performing students gained more in the mainstreamed classes.
Special Education-Only Versus Mainstreamed. No significant
interactions with pretest ability measures were found.
We used the Johnson-Neyman procedure (Pedhazur, 1982) to determine
the region of nonsignificance for each pair of regression lines. The
statistically significant differences for lower performing students
noted on the nine interactions of pretests and treatments did not occur
within the range of scores observed in our sample. The differences
between the higher performing students in the integrated special
education relative to the special education-only or mainstreamed
classrooms were, however, significant. Thus, while the ATIs are
significant, their impact is greater for the higher performing children
than for the lower performing children.
DISCUSSION
This study contrasted three classroom ratios of children with
disabilities to typically developing peers. Across the total sample of
children, we observed significant growth from pre- to posttest on
cognitive (McCarthy GCI) and language (PLAI) measures. Although analyses
of variance did not reveal significant treatment differences,
within-group analyses of pre- to posttest gains indicated moderate
effect sizes (.25 -- .48) for the integrated special education
treatment, which was primarily responsible for the significant McCarthy
gains. The special education-only treatment also produced a moderate
level effect size (.36) on the McCarthy GCI. In contrast, effect sizes
for the mainstream treatment were either negative or near zero across
all McCarthy measures. All three treatments resulted in significant
gains in language development, as shown by increased PLAI raw scores.
Regarding the different levels of inclusion, our statistically
nonsignificant Treatment X Time interactions are consistent with
findings of previous studies (Buysse & Bailey, 1993; Odom &
McEvoy, 1988) in which preschool children with disabilities, on average,
made comparable progress in special education-only and integrated
special education classrooms (Cole et al., 1991; Jenkins, Odom, &
Speltz, 1989; Jenkins, Speltz, & Odom, 1985) and in special
education-only and mainstreamed classrooms (Fewell & Oelwein, 1990;
Rule et al., 1987). On the other hand, our analysis of effect sizes and
within-group pre- to posttest gains suggest that only one treatment,
integrated special education, consistently produced growth that
significantly exceeded normal development.
Cole et al. (1991) found ATIs between child characteristics and
type of placement; specifically, higher performing children made
relatively greater gains in integrated special education classrooms, and
lower performing children made relatively greater gains in special
education-only classrooms. In the present study, multiple regression
analyses testing the same treatment conditions (i.e., integrated special
education and special education-only) and child characteristics (i.e.,
pretest McCarthy GCI and PLAI scores) replicated the pattern of ATIs
reported in our earlier study.
Were one to consider only the results of the integrated special
education and special education-only classroom compositions in both the
present study and that of Cole et al. (1991), it would be tempting to
suppose that further increasing the ratio of typically developing
children to children with disabilities would further improve the
development of higher performing children with disabilities. The
addition of the mainstream treatment in the present study permits an
examination of this hypothesis. Mainstreamed classrooms had more than
twice as many typically developing children than integrated special
education classrooms (proportionally 64% were typically developing in
the mainstream treatment vs. 21% in the integrated special education
treatment). Rather than benefiting from the larger numbers of typically
developing classmates, higher performing special education children in
the mainstreamed classrooms showed less growth than their counterparts
in the integrated special education classrooms. Higher performing
children in mainstream classrooms performed no better than those in
special education-only classrooms. Thus, increasing the proportion of
typically developing children does not in itself appear to yield better
outcomes for higher performing children.
These results indicate that the mix of typically developing to
special education children provided by integrated special education
classrooms (3 children who are typically developing and 11 children with
disabilities) results in improved outcomes for higher performing
children relative to outcomes produced by either higher (mainstreamed)
or lower (special education-only) ratios of typically developing
classmates. The nonlinear relation between child ratios and
developmental outcome is not easily interpreted, but it appears that
introducing a high ratio of typically developing children changes
classroom dynamics in ways that do not favor higher functioning special
education children. Perhaps the academic demands in mainstreamed classes
exceed the abilities of the special education participants, or perhaps
the ratio of typically developing children in mainstream classes affects
child interaction patterns such that special education and typically
developing children keep more to themselves.
It is also difficult to understand why children with lower
language and cognitive skills achieved more in mainstreamed and special
education-only treatments (extreme opposites), relative to their
achievement in the integrated special education treatment. Perhaps these
different student mixes induce teachers to establish instructional
groupings that are more or less beneficial to low performing students.
Alternatively, the different mixes may induce teachers to deliver
instruction at levels which are more or less accessible to lower
functioning students.
IMPLICATIONS
Our earlier findings (Cole et al., 1991) that lower functioning
children benefited more from special education-only than from integrated
special education raises a potential dilemma for practitioners,
especially those who arc committed to inclusion on philosophical, legal,
and social grounds. The results of the present study may help resolve
this dilemma. Thc finding that lower performing children advanced
comparably in mainstreamed and special education-only settings, combined
with the finding that higher performing children benefited more from
integrated settings suggest that both higher and lower performing groups
can profit from some level of inclusion. However, the optimal degree of
inclusion differs for these two groups; relatively higher functioning
preschoolers with disabilities did not derive as much benefit from a
full inclusion (i.e., mainstreamed) model as they did from an integrated
model. In contrast, lower functioning preschoolers benefited as much
from a full inclusion model as they did from a special education-only
placement. These findings challenge the idea that one type of placement
(full inclusion) is best for all children. By limiting placement for
special education children to mainstreamed classrooms only, some
children may experience a less than optimal learning environment. As
Bricker (1995) reminds us, the needs of the child should not be lost in
a movement to advocate one type of placement over all other
considerations.
Transportation costs, personnel, geography, and population density
affect school districts' ability to maintain a full continuum of
services for preschool children with disabilities. In such cases,
decisions on which program(s) to offer become important. Our results
suggest that providing integrated and special education-only programs,
or integrated and mainstream programs is most likely to meet the needs
of preschool children who fall into the moderate range of disabilities.
Two aspects of this research strengthen confidence about the
findings. First, our findings replicate and extend our earlier results
which showed that children vary in their response to the same
educational environments. Second, the research classrooms in this study
employed a broad range of curricular approaches, one emphasizing
cognitive strategies, another emphasizing academic learning, another
direct language training, and another child-initiated language
techniques. Thus, our findings would appear to have applicability across
a variety of curricular approaches.
Still, caution is warranted in applying these results. The
reliability of our findings would have been enhanced by adding growth
measures between the pre- and posttest points. Moreover, the interaction
between aptitude and treatment accounts for a relatively small
proportion of the variance on cognitive and language measures.
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BooksNow
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days: (800) BOOKS-NOW (266-5766) or (801) 261-1187, or visit them on the
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or AMEX or send check or money order + $4.95 S&H ($2.50 each
add'l item) to: BooksNow, 448 E. 6400 South, Suite 125, Salt Lake
City, UT 84107.
PAULETTE E. MILLS, Assistant Professor, Department of Human
Development, Washington State University, Pullman. KEVIN N. COLE, Senior
Researcher, Washington Research Institute; JOSEPH R. JENKINS, Professor,
Experimental Education Unit; PHILIP S. DALE, Professor, Department of
Psychology, University of Washington, Seattle.
This research was supported by Grants H024A80030 and H024V00002 from
the U.S. Department of Education to the University of Washington. Points
of view or opinions stated in this report do not necessarily represent
official agency positions.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to
Paulette E. Mills, Department of Human Development, 311 Hulbert Hall,
Washington State University, P. O. Box 646236, Pullman, Washington
99164-6236. Electronic mail may be sent via Internet to
pmills@mail.wsu.edu.
Manuscript received March 1997; revision accepted March 1998.
TABLE 1 Description of Subjects/hr Each Level of Integration
Special Education-
Descriptive Variable Only
n 22
Age 51.77 months
Range 36-72 months
n %
Gender
Boys
Girls 5 23
Ethnicity
European American 14 64
African American 4 18
Other 4 18
Integrated Special
Education
n 22
Age 52.05 months
Range 36-70 months
n %
Gender
Boys
Girls 6 27
Ethnicity
European American 13 60
African American 7 31
Other 2 9
Mainstreamed
n 22
Age 55.95 months
Range 31-75 months
n %
Gender
Boys 16 73
Girls 6 27
Ethnicity
European American 18 82
African American 2 9
Other 2 9TABLE 2 Repeated Measures ANOVAs on McCarthy Scales and PLAI
Pretest
Measure M (SD)
McCarthy GCI
Special education - only 67.05 (19.78)
Integrated 67.73 (20.26)
Mainstreamed 64.91 (16.52)
Time
Interaction
McCarthy Verbal
Special education - only 33.95 (10.69)
Integrated 31.45 (11.22)
Mainstreamed 30.09 (9.84)
Time
Interaction
McCarthy Perceptual
Segregated 31.57 (11.24)
Integrated 33.68 (11.89)
Mainstreamed 33.48 (10.15)
Time
Interaction
McCarthy Quantitative
Special education - only 33.91 (9.59)
Integrated 35.50 (12.73)
Mainstreamed 32.00 (9.19)
Time
Interaction
McCarthy Memory
Segregated 34.38 (11.27)
Integrated 34.64 (10.44)
Mainstreamed 32.38 (9.21)
Time
Interaction
PLAI Total Appropriate
Special education - only .31 (.27)
Integrated .33 (.26)
Mainstreamed .31 (.26)
Time
Interaction
Posttest
Measure M (SD)
McCarthy GCI
Special education - only 74.14 (28.32)
Integrated 75.18 (23.65)
Mainstreamed 65.33 (16.16)
Time
Interaction
McCarthy Verbal
Special education - only 34.33 (12.20)
Integrated 36.41 (13.05)
Mainstreamed 30.14 (9.60)
Time
Interaction
McCarthy Perceptual
Segregated 33.19 (12.05)
Integrated 36.36 (14.47)
Mainstreamed 33.76 (9.54)
Time
Interaction
McCarthy Quantitative
Special education - only 32.91 (11.39)
Integrated 37.82 (13.85)
Mainstreamed 32.95 (9.89)
Time
Interaction
McCarthy Memory
Segregated 34.05 (13.19)
Integrated 37.64 (15.65)
Mainstreamed 30.00 (10.20)
Time
Interaction
PLAI Total Appropriate
Special education - only .44 (.20)
Integrated .44 (.24)
Mainstreamed .37 (.25)
Time
Interaction
Measure Significance
McCarthy GCI
Special education - only
Integrated
Mainstreamed
Time F = 6.01 (1, 61), p < .02
Interaction F = 1.25 (2, 61), ns
McCarthy Verbal
Special education - only
Integrated
Mainstreamed
Time F = 3.47 (1, 61), ns
Interaction F = 2.74 (2, 61), ns
McCarthy Perceptual
Segregated
Integrated
Mainstreamed
Time F = 3.49 (1, 61), ns
Interaction F = .72 (1, 61), ns
McCarthy Quantitative
Special education - only
Integrated
Mainstreamed
Time F = .64 (1, 61), ns
Interaction F = 1.05 (1, 61), ,s
McCarthy Memory
Segregated
Integrated
Mainstreamed
Time F = .01 (1,61),ns
Interaction F = 2.23 (1, 61), ns
PLAI Total Appropriate
Special education - only
Integrated
Mainstreamed
Time F = 31.81 (1, 62), p < .000
Interaction F = 1.58 (2, 62), nsTABLE 3 Effect Sizes for gains from Pre- to Posttests for Three
Classroom Compositions
Classroom Composition
Measure Special Integrated Mainstreamed
Education-Only
McCarthy
GCI .36 .40 -.01
Verbal -.01 .48 -.01
Perceptual .17 .25 .02
Memory -.10 .29 -.24
PLAI .78 .64 .60Pretest Measure Posttest Measure ISE vs. Mainstream
PLAI McCarthy
Verbal p < .01(a)
[R.sup.2] 0.081
McCarthy
Quantitative p < .05(a)
[R.sup.2] 0.046
McCarthy
Memory p < .01(a)
[R.sup.2] 0.106
McCarthy
GCI p < .05(a)
[R.sup.2] 0.055
McCarthy
Perceptual ns
PLAI ns
McCarthy GCI McCarthy
Verbal ns
McCarthy
Quantitative ns
[R.sup.2] ns
McCarthy
Memory p < .05(a)
[R.sup.2] 0.024
McCarthy
GCI ns
McCarthy
Perceptual ns
PLAI ns
Pretest Measure Posttest Measure SE-O vs. ISE
PLAI McCarthy
Verbal p < .01(a)
[R.sup.2] 0.068
McCarthy
Quantitative p < .0.1(a)
[R.sup.2] 0.112
McCarthy
Memory p < .01(a)
[R.sup.2] 0.095
McCarthy
GCI ns
[R.sup.2]
McCarthy
Perceptual
PLAI ns
McCarthy GCI McCarthy
Verbal ns
McCarthy
Quantitative p < .05a
[R.sup.2] 0.039
McCarthy
Memory ns
[R.sup.2]
McCarthy
GCI ns
McCarthy
Perceptual ns
PLAI ns
Pretest Measure Posttest Measure SE-O vs. Maintream
PLAI McCarthy
Verbal ns
[R.sup.2]
McCarthy
Quantitative ns
[R.sup.2]
McCarthy
Memory ns
[R.sup.2]
McCarthy
GCI ns
[R.sup.2]
McCarthy
Perceptual ns
PLAI ns
McCarthy GCI McCarthy
Verbal ns
McCarthy
Quantitative ns
[R.sup.2]
McCarthy
Memory ns
[R.sup.2]
McCarthy
GCI ns
McCarthy
Perceptual ns
PLAI ns