Ronald Gulliford is Emeritus Professor of Special Education at the University of Birmingham, and has been involved in teacher education for special educational needs since the early 1950s. His first book (with A. E. Tansley) in I960 aimed to broaden ideas and practice in educating slow learners. Special Educational Needs (1971) outlined the difficulties and needs of children with various kinds of disability - it is a sign of how the field has developed that this new edition of the book requires specialist contributions.Graham Upton is Professor and Head of the School of Education at the University of Birmingham. He has taught in ordinary and special schools, and been involved in teacher education in colleges of education, a polytechnic and two university education departments. In addition to research conducted in conjunction with his own higher degrees, he has conducted large-scale funded research in a number of areas of special education.

Keith Bovair, Brian Fraser, Heather Mason, Carol Miller, Heather Murdoch, Christina Tilstone and Colin Smith, all of the University of Birmingham; Neil Hall, Senior Educational Psychologist, Birmingham LEA and Ian Glenn, Headteacher, Victoria School for the Physically Handicapped, Birmingham

The contributors focus on particular areas of special educational need, arguing that effective educational provision can be enhanced with reference to the particular problems experienced by children. Set in the context of a generic understanding of special education, this timely book addresses commonly-raised questions: what is the condition and how can I recognise it? why does it occur? what sort of educational, personal, and social consequences are there associated with it? are there any specialist skills and resources which I should know about? what are the implications for educational provision, teacher support, curricular access, assessment and classroom management? This popular book has been fully revised to provide a comprehensive overview of special needs provision. A such it is the key text on special needs in the '90s.