This descriptive study sought to examine the resiliency factors families developed when faced with the challenges of raising a child manifesting a severe disability. The study compares and contrasts how families managed the additional responsibility and stress of raising a child with special needs. The study seeks to identify, the key characteristics present in resilient families allowing them to not just survive but thrive. The study found that there is relationship between resilience and Socio Economic Status (SES).The study also found that having the time and the ability to reflect was key to reconfiguration, which is seen as crucial in the development of resilience. Once afforded this type of time the families reconstructed their vision of family, of disability and their child. Lastly, the study found that the development of resiliency was enhanced by the development of rhythm in the family. Rhythm is defined in this study as the establishment of consistent rules, rituals and routines.

Children in poverty have been shown to master only the informal registers of the English language (Payne 1996). Unable to understand the formal register used in schools and on standardized tests, students in poverty achieve at a lower rate in school (Hodgkinson 1995) and choose inappropriate behaviors as a result of misunderstandings that are attributed to the inability to understand the language used in the formal register (Payne 1996). A school in Cincinnati, Ohio is teaching the skills necessary for these children to translate, understand, and use other registers and codes of the English language. This article describes this curriculum and suggests that this method assists young children in poverty to learn the language of formal register and consequently experience greater academic and affective success in school.

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