Our blog has been designed to keep our educators, parents and clinicians up-to-date on trending topics in special education.
This blog will guide you through how you can collaborate with parents/families to continue to support positive learning outcomes in your classroom. Did you know that active parental participation and academic success have a positive correlation? It’s true - research notes that parents/guardians play a key role in boosting student outcomes. Below are tips you can implement to enhance parental/family involvement.
It can be quite challenging to give all of your students the differentiated, individualized attention they need. For many special educators, classroom rosters may span three different grades, or four different levels of students with moderate to severe disabilities. Does this sound like you? Let’s navigate how you can use small group instruction to improve your classroom management, individualized learning opportunities, differentiated instruction, and even data collection!
Schedules and routines help your students to learn independence, responsibility and agency…and serve as a great way to keep your classroom running smoothly. If you are out for the day, do your students know what to do? Can they navigate their day with minimal prompts from you or your classroom staff? Let’s discuss how to create, teach, and implement a routine that helps you and your students stay on task throughout the day.
Self-determination can be a driving force for students, especially those with moderate to severe disabilities. Self-determination provides the skills needed for these students to thrive in school, friendships, relationships, employment, community living and beyond. In fact, self-determination is a research-based predictor of positive outcomes for individuals with disabilities.
Play and social skills are the building blocks for early learners to succeed in the classroom. While neurotypical children tend to learn these skills naturally through play, our students with moderate to severe disabilities often require more systematic instruction. However, this does not mean that we cannot teach these skills through play-based activities!
In March 2020, teachers were given no other choice but to pivot to distance learning after the COVID-19 pandemic temporarily shut the doors to schools across the country. While the majority of districts seem to have stabilized back to an in-person learning environment, if the last few years have taught us anything, it’s that plans can shift quickly.
Collecting data while juggling all the other responsibilities of a teacher can be challenging. That being said, the benefits of compiling data and using it to guide your teaching practices can save you time in the long run, all while drastically improving outcomes for your students. How can you balance these benefits with the lack of time and resources? Read on for some helpful tips on how you can collect data quickly and efficiently.
While the field of education is no stranger to a shortage of qualified special educators, the pandemic has fueled teacher burnout and turnover in a way that we didn’t see coming. The big question is – how can we continue to support students despite the growing number of teachers leaving the classroom? In this blog, we’ll provide tips for administrators, special education teams and teachers to prepare for and navigate teacher and staff turnover.
The prevalence of teacher burnout has always existed, especially within the field of special education. But when you’re trying to navigate an unprecedented global pandemic alongside the normal challenges of teaching, burnout heightens. In this blog, we’ll discuss what contributes to burnout and explore recommendations for what administrators can do to help combat burnout before it happens.
Social emotional learning is a critical element of education and development that helps students to better recognize, comprehend and self-manage their emotions. Additionally, SEL teaches students vital skills so they can begin to empathize with their peers, families, friends and others. Think of social emotional learning as a key that can open a door to enhanced learning outcomes, social behaviors and the creation of strong personal relationships that are built.
