Collaborating Effectively with Paraprofessionals with these 5 Ideas

Working with paraprofessionals is a gift! There is no way around that! I have had years where I have had NO paraprofessionals or teaching assistants as they are often called. No matter who the person is and what their skills and talents are, they are a gift in the special education classroom. It can be extremely difficult to manage a SPED classroom without these special people.
How well the special relationship between you and the paraprofessional evolves takes communication, teaching, feedback and compromise to make it work well. And just like any relationship, it requires constant attention and care.

So you are new to special education or perhaps you are getting new paraprofessionals because you have changed jobs.

 Where do you start?
One of the most important things in working with adults in the special education classroom is establishing a relationship. Here are a few ideas on how to make the most of YOUR paraprofessionals/teaching assistants in YOUR classroom.

One of the first places I decided to start  was to start was the same place I start for students.
 I knew I wanted to establish a good relationship with them and a safe and friendly environment for everyone to be in.  I wanted them to feel comfortable in the classroom. I wanted them to have a stake in how are kids performed.

Establish a relationship. Get to know the person.

Share your story with them. What makes YOU tick? What goals do you have for the classroom and the kids? Sometimes I did this in a casual way with just chatting with them in getting to know them other times I did this in a more formal way with a kind of get to know you form.

1. Often I would set up times outside of school where we could meet, have coffee and chat. This usually worked best for me because I could focus on getting acquainted with this new person with whom I was going to work closely.
2. Set aside time during the school day to get acquainted. Sometimes impromptu chats ended up being interrupted. I found it worked best if we set aside a time to chat. I liked to have the opportunity to share my classroom goals, a little about myself such as likes, dislikes, and expectations. 
3.  Sometimes its just impossible to get a moment before you and your paraprofessional are working side by side in your classroom. In those circumstances, I occasionally used  a Get Acquainted form. While it sounds stuffy and formal, I found when I had to use it, it gave my parapro time to sit down at their convenience and reflect and give thoughtful answers. This usually gave me a lot of useful information  it gave me information about how they saw themselves, what they felt their strengths and weaknesses were.  I also share an expectations list of things that are expected in their job, not only by me but in our Special Education department and school. If you would like a copy of the form and the expectations I used, you can get yours HERE.

Introducing students
This is one of the most important things to do. I liked to have a student information sheet ready to share with the paraprofessional.
Start with their strengths.  Everybody has strengths and weaknesses and paras are no different. When assigning tasks,  I selected an activity or task I knew would be an area of strength for them. Perhaps it would be something they shared with me they liked to do. The next thing I do is to look at where they think they are weak whether that is in things such as discipline, recording data,  in managing children with severe behavior issues, or changing diapers/pull ups. This might be something I observed or something they had shared with me was weakness.

STRESS Confidentiality

One of the first areas I always share with paras, to begin training is the importance of confidentiality. Who we share information with and who we do NOT. The other important area to get to immediately is how to take data. Utilize all your resources at hand whether that is webinars videos one the one teaching training or even on the job training use your resources to give the information you need them to have.

Share Share Share
Share your knowledge. Talk out loud. That may sound so funny to say, but how many teachers do so much  of their work mentally?
Share your kids IEPs with the paras. Explain the goals and objectives. Share  the prompting levels, behavior plans, tokens systems because they are an integral part of your success and the success of your students.
Another way to share information about your students with teaching assistants is with a STUDENT INFO form. I design a short information form that I complete on each student. It includes things such as a picture of the student, their likes & dislikes, Their medical needs and behavioral issue and reinforcers and techniques that work best for that specific student. I have a few examples of ones I have used in my store FREE. Check them out. Check back often for new additions.

Assess, reteach, adjust and GIVE FEEDBACK!
Give positive and constructive feedback to your teaching assistance. Set a time aside to give feedback and guidance to the paraprofessionals. Always be open to hear what they are saying. What is working for them?
We all like to hear whats going well. Share the good things you see. Share and reteach what isn't going as well.

ABOVE ALL
Adjust, modify and BE FLEXIBLE!  Of course, we know FLEXIBILITY is key in Special Education!

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Cooking through Sequencing

Reading comprehension is one of the most essential skills to teach, yet one of the most complex. It is an essential skill, not just in the subject of reading but many other subjects as well.
Sequencing is a key component in comprehension strategies. It helps us find meaning in the text we read, not only as students in reading and school but in a multitude of situations in real life.

What Is Sequencing?

📚 Sequencing is one of the core skills that help us to comprehend and make sense of what we read.

📚 It is identifying the parts of the story, such as what happens first, second,
        third and last.
 📚 It is the beginning, middle and ending of a story.

When we sequence what is read, we find meaning in what is read by using the details of the text, the order of the events and keywords to make sense of what we read in a larger context.
We use the parts of the text such as beginning, middle and end of the passage as well as keywords in passages such as first, then, later, afterward, finally and in the end, to place the details in order in the bigger scheme of what is being read.

Why is Sequencing Important?

In order to remember things we read and share with others, it's important to be able to tell things in order. Sequencing helps the information be more organized thereby making the retelling easier to understand. 

Recalling the information in chunks such as beginning, middle and end makes it easier to tell and remember.

What to do

Integrate sequencing into other areas of your teaching. 

Reading
Use great sequencing stories to introduce and practice sequencing.
Here are just a few books that work well to teach, practice and have fun with sequencing. Having taught primary age students for much of my career, one of my favorites is
 📚The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle

 📚Bring the Rain to Kapiti Plain by Verna Aardema
 📚If You Give a Mouse a Cookie by Laura Joff Numeroff
   
 📚There Was An Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly by Simms Taback

Many of my students had very low reading levels but I still wanted them to be able to sequence events and ideas. We started our work at the picture level. Here is a great simple way to introduce and practice sequencing at the picture level.

Writing

Pick an activity such as cooking or a science experiment. These lend themselves well to using a follow-up activity of putting the steps in order or even retelling how they were done.
Graphic organizers are a great way to begin writing and putting the events of what happened in the activity in order.

Math

Math provides an optimal method of integrating sequencing, math skills, directions and more. Take an easy recipe such as making no bake cookies or jello or putting together a snack. 

Perform these with the group, then have them illustrate the steps and the order in which they were done. Its also a great time to emphasize how important order is since often when we put cookies together in the wrong order, the cookies do not turn out well. 

Some great recipes I have used for this include:

Rice Krispies treats

Reindeer Poop Cookies - while these cookies may need a different name in your classroom they are great fun. 

Here is a great resource for no bake ideas. 

Science

Science is an excellent opportunity for working on sequencing skills. Practice sequencing following the steps of an experiment. Work on retelling how the experiment was done. Drawing pictures of the steps of an experiment is an awesome way to integrate science and sequencing.

That's all for now! 

Happy Sequencing!

Mary Ann

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Nailing Down Main Ideas

Reading has always been a favorite of mine to teach. I adore working on decoding with students but my passion lies in helping them detect the meaning in the words on the page and grow in their comprehension skills. After all, isn't that what reading is all about? Detecting the meaning behind the words?

In a previous blog post I wrote about some simple ideas to increase understanding of what the main idea is. Here is a blurb from that post.

MAIN IDEA is finding the information that tells what the entire text or picture is about. It is the message or the point the author of the materials wants to convey.
When teaching main idea I use key words such as WHO and WHAT. Another idea to use is what is the BIG IDEA of this story or what you are trying to teach is how to pinpoint what the author is targeting.

HOW

Picture Main Idea
Start at the picture level. Use an easy to understand pictures from magazines, photos, picture books or comic book.  These can be  extremely useful for main idea. When working with materials at the picture stage, be sure and include the use of key phrases to prompt the correct answer such as What is happening in this picture?  What is the boy/girl doing? Pictures depicting things familiar to the student are particularly  helpful at this stage such as the one below.

 Here are a couple of examples of picture stage.

Here are a few types of questions  you can ask about pictures when working on main idea.
1. What is happening in this picture?
2. What do you see in the picture?
3. What are they doing?

Main Idea
Here are some ideas for working on comprehension skill of main idea in your classroom.
Sometimes real pictures are better than words. Use a real object such as target with a bull eye on it.



One that works really well is a velco target.
This is a great way of emphasizing with students, how we need to get to the most important piece of information in text. We always need to drill down to the the bulls eye to understand what is being said.  I like to modify the  target with details of a well know story, such as a fairy tale or such.
I fasten story details in several of the places on the bull eye and the main idea in the center. The kids LOVE throwing the balls to try and get to the center of the target. This becomes a great learning "hook" on which to refer back to during main idea instruction to help them understand what we are looking for in a main idea.

Another idea for working with main idea is to use headlines from newspapers or magazines. I find kids newspapers and magazines the best to use for this. Headlines are great for finding what the main topic is.
I like to laminate them so the kids can use wipe-off markers or crayons on them and circle the word(s) that are the main topic of that sentence.
Following the activity, they are easy to wipe off and use again.



You have any ideas for teaching main idea to those kids that really struggle with this skill?
I'd love to hear about them.

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Fire Drills-Another look from past posts

Do you have one of these your Special education classroom?  I did! One in the main classroom, One in my office, one in the bathroom, the storage room...well they are everywhere and continually are frightening our kiddos. What can you do to help your students with fire drills. Here are ideas from posts of yesterday.

When I was a kid, fire drills were a welcomed interruption to the day. However, fire drills  can be a very difficult thing to students with disabilities.
Fire drills, especially for those on the Autism Spectrum or those with auditory sensory disabilities, can be a frightening event that is dreaded sometimes for days in advance and whose effects last way beyond the 15 or 20 minutes a routine fire drill lasts in schools.
Some of the most common behaviors I had in my classroom, were  screaming, crying, hiding under furniture and even escaping the situation entirely by running away. I had one student that could anticipate when the fire drills would occur and would start crying, attempting to run away and scream prior to the drill.
For some children its the loud sound of the fire drill, for others its the disruption of their normal schedule that frightens them. Some children don't know what to do or what is expected of them during a fire drill.
Behaviors such as these whether  they occur before, during and after a fire drill  can be a major strain on the teacher, the classmates and staff and of course the student.

Other students in the class are often negatively affected by the behaviors and staff is diverted from you what you need them to do in order to tend to the screaming, yelling, hiding or escaping. It takes a toll on everyone.  Fires drills are an important part of safety awareness and preparedness. They are not something we can abandon.

What can we as teachers do to help children when this happens to them?

One thing that can be important in the classroom is for the teacher to work with administration.

•  See if  you can be informed about the fire drill ahead of time. The administration at my school puts it in our weekly teacher bulletin and calls me 15 minutes prior to the drill. This gave me some time to put some calming strategies into place with the students.
• Go over the rules of a fire drill. Walk the class through the process of a fire drill, step-by-step.
•  Role play what will happen during a fire drill.
• Desensitize the student to loud sounds such as the fire alarm. Try using an app on your smart phone or tablet that has loud sounds on it. There are even some apps that have examples of fire drill alarms. Start off with the sound soft, introduce it to the student. 
• Try doing mock drills with a lowered fire drill sound. As the student becomes more acclimated to the lowered sound, raise the sound level up and continue mock drills. Continue doing this until the sound is at full level.
• Purchase an alarm such as a smoke detector, and follow the same procedure as above for desensitization. Muffle the sound, then progress as the student gets used to the sound.
• Take the student outside prior to the alarm going off. Doing this could alleviate the behaviors that occur during the fire drill as the alarm may not be as close or loud, as it would be in the classroom. This option should really only be a stopgap solution. We need to be teaching the students what to do and how to be safe in emergency situations.

One thing that has worked in my classroom and in many other classrooms is to use Social Stories. Social Stories were created by Carol Gray  in 1991 to help teach social skills to people with autism. They are stories with short descriptions of situations with statements about what is expected of the student or what the student can expect.

Here are a few suggestions for using Social Stories for situations such as fire drills in the classroom.

Use of Social Stories

1.   Prior to implementation of a new social story, be sure to communicate the new task being taught to all the people involved in your student’s program. Provide a copy or share the steps of the task being taught in the story to those professionals working with the  student so everyone is approaching the task in the same manner.

2.   Introduce the book to the student as you would other literary selections (i.e. look at the cover, discuss it, look at the pictures. Adapt as necessary for your student. 

3.   Read the story aloud. Reread the story on a regular basis so you can review the steps and the student(s) become very familiar with what is expected. 

4. After the student becomes familiar with the book and its content, send a copy of the book home with the student. Integrate the parents into the teaching process as well by sharing the book with them.
5. If you do practice fire drills as I  have done, also review the book immediately prior to the fire drill practice as well as on other days to make sure the information presented in the book becomes second nature.  Review the book as necessary to keep the steps fresh and supplement the teaching with the visual schedules and step poster.

 Check out the revised social narrative.
Click the pictures to visit my store.

WHAT SHOULD I DO IN: A FIRE DRILL IN SCHOOL

http://bit.ly/superteachfiredrills

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GRAB A FEW READING IDEAS.....from Halloween pasts

How do you deal with Halloween in special education classroom? You might have 6 students or 7 or 8. Perhaps you have more with 12, 13 , 14? And with each one of those students often comes multiple  special needs; many of them have allergies, some are on special diets such as a gluten free diet, or sugar-free diet. What do you do for Halloween when you have so many different needs to meet?

I had multiple students on different diets, other students that had food allergies, yet we still wanted to have fun at Halloween in Ms Reeve's classroom. How can you have the typical party with all these special requests and needs?

This happened to me for several years so I partnered up with parents so that we could give the kids a great experience. First, I asked each parent to submit a short list of 5 things their child could and would eat. Items they were not allergic to, enjoy. It could be a Halloween treat or another item if they preferred. I ok'd all the other items with each parent for their child and from there I began to "build" my Halloween party.

 Once we had all the edible items straighten out, the rest was easy. First I set up the Halloween story area. Our school had strict rules about what we could do for Halloween so I had to adhere to those. A few of the books I used was How Big Could Your Pumpkin Grow by Wendell Minor

Another book I loved to use was

 

Pinkalicious by Victoria Kann

My all-time favorite book is, was and perhaps always will be:

 

It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown

by Charles M. Schulz

All three of these books and many more lend themselves to quick, fun reading in a group and then you can use them for comprehension activities or acting out activities...perfect for a party.

The next activity was taking the story we read and putting it into sequencing order with pre-drawn pictures. The kids loved coloring and putting the pictures together on the back of an orange paper plate. 

On the front of the plate we made a pumpkin/jack o' lantern face. 

For eating, most of the time, we were able to work it out so everyone had their own item to eat and a choice of one other item.  The kids loved all the activities so much. All the activities were spaced out around the classroom at different center tables. 

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Get Your Students Interacting on the 1st day of School

Your teacher planning days are almost over. You have your class list and the pile of IEPs sitting in front of you. You know what each student needs to work on and your room is all set up! Congratulations! Now what are you going to do on the very first day of school? 

In special education it's very common to have the same kids year after year with perhaps 1 or 2 new ones thrown in. How do you meld these groups together into 1 awesome classroom. 

With a class like this it will be very important to work on making the new kids feel welcome and part of the group while acknowledging the kids from the previous year(s) as experienced. 

What can you do ? 

Here's an idea I have used for many years, adapting it as the technology changed from drawing pictures to taking pictures to taking selfies.

On orientation day spend a few moments one on one time with each student and help them take a selfie with your camera phone. They LOVE being part of one of those special moments you put on your phone. You can use these to complete this Getting Acquainted First day activity.
Once the selfies have been taken,  print them out in a format that works best for you. Here is one that worked for me.
You can print one: 5 in. X 5 in.  at the top and multiple smaller ones on the bottom of the paper. 1 inch X 1 inch worked for me.
Print these on adhesive paper.
Cut the big picture off and  have the kids peel the paper from the backs and attach theirs in their big square at the top of the page.
Cut the little pictures apart and put each child's pictures in a separate container. I have used zip bags, envelopes and even plastic screw-top containers.
To play this Activity- each student should have:

1. Selfie activity page with their selfie affixed to the big square located at the top of the page.

2. One container of the small  selfies with their picture on them.

Here's how to play!

Object of the activity: Collect as many mini selfie pics of other students that have likenesses similiar to their own.

1. Students use the picture clues in the mini selfie squares to approach another classmate and see if  they have the specific item in common with the classmate their approach. 
2. If the specific items (i.e eyes, hair etc) match, then the classmates exchange mini selfie stamps and place them on their selfie papers on top of the item they have in common. Example: If Brad approaches a classmate because they have the same color pants on, they exchange mini-selfie stamps and fasten them to one of the pants squares on their papers.
3. Student continue approaching different students and exchanging mini selfie stamps with those having matching items with them.
4. First student to fill up (or have the most) the mini-selfie stamps correctly "wins". You can also eliminate the "winner" portion of this activity and use the time instead for a conversation about what makes each "friends" similar to them. 
   
   
   

With an activity such as this, you have provided an opportunity for new and old students to open new pathways of communication about their similarities and given them common factors to start great new friendships on.

This activity is available in my TPT store free for a limited time. You can find it here:

Limited Time Freebie

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Reinforcers and How to Find the Right One to Make It Work

Whatever skill or behavior we want to increase in the classroom, using positive reinforcement is a tried and true method of increasing appropriate behaviors or academic skills. Using positive reinforcement correctly is imperative to increasing desired behaviors or skills and transitioning toward building independence. Today I want to share about reinforcers and how I used them in my classroom as part of a positive reinforcement program a special education classroom.

REINFORCERS

In my classroom, I made sure I used finely tuned incentives that were tailored to each child's likes and preferences because my positive reinforcement program and the reinforcers used were at the heart of everything we did. Reinforcers kept the classroom functioning; it helped kiddos with strong ideas about what they thought they should make better choices. Having an effective reinforcement program helped keep us moving forward. It helped them to see that one more big push to practice this next step in math could be rewarding.

Having the correct reinforcers and breaking down tasks and or behaviors down into segments a students would complete, were two of the most important components of the my classroom reinforcement program.  Here are some pieces of  my positive reinforcement program that worked for me.

Step 1- ALWAYS MAKE SURE YOU ARE USING THE BEST REINFORCER

I found it imperative to always have a meaningful reinforcer. If the reinforcer wasn't an important activity / item to the student, I saw little improvement.  One way I tried to always have the best reinforcers for each child was by using a reinforcer inventory with every student. This form was administered to every student at the beginning of each school year. I kept it updated by reviewing it every grading period. As we all know, things children like change frequently so I often found myself updating it anytime I was experiencing difficulty with a child's behavior program. This helped me make sure I had the most effective reinforcers. It wasn't always the answer, of course, but it was the place I started to reevaluate what was going on.

When reinforcers aren't working it can be for a variety of reasons. Sometimes the child has matured and their interests have changed. Sometimes the item just isn't such a preferred item any more and other options need to be sought out.

Here is an example of a reinforcer inventory I have used in the past. I used it when a new student entered my classroom, at the beginning of every school year with each student, plus periodically during the year whenever I felt the current reinforcers weren't working any more.

Step 2 - OBSERVATION

Observation is a vital key in determining what is reinforcing for someone. What activities do they gravitate to? What items evoke the most response. Do they play with other students? When out around school grounds, is there a staff member who is important to the student? Observation and establishing a real relationship with the student is a great way to determine the best reinforcers to use. Sitting down with the student and talking about things they find rewarding can provide such insight in about that child and what things mean to him.

Step 3 - KEEP IT SIMPLE

I have found reinforcers are better when kept simple. Don't complicate your life any more than it needs to be. Reinforcers do not have to be elaborate. They do not need to be expensive. They do not need to be complex. They do NOT need to be food all the time. Last year, I had 8 students. We used food as a reinforcer for 1 student. The other students were more interested in things such as play activities or pairing up for activities. Of course any time you use food, you have to keep in mind allergies and I always made sure to include the parent in the behavior plan so they were aware of what we were doing.

Let's look at some simple reinforcers. The simpler the better. Here are some I have used. I'm sure you have more.
Collecting sticky notes
paper clips
pennies
keys (real or paper), read to a buddy teacher, 5 minutes reading a book, spend 5 minutes with a friend in another classroom, computer time, iPad time, take a walk, collect leaves, get a drink from the water fountain in the hall, draw a picture, spend time in the quiet area, listen music on an iPod, play with thera-putty, jump on the mini-tramp, walk the balance beam, spend 5 extra minutes at PE. sit in the spinning chair. Even getting  3 minutes of a staff members attention can be a powerful reinforcer at the right time with the right student. My favorite of that small list is the sticky notes. At that time I had never considered something so mundane to me to be so important to a child.

I had a set of brothers in my class one year who loved orange juice. So I bought a bottle of it and kept it in the refrigerator in the classroom. As a reinforcer for increased attention, they got a little juice. For these boys, it turned out they rarely got juice at home and with their parents' permission, this reinforcer was so powerful, it actually lasted almost the entire school year for one of the boys. The older one developed a preference for building with blocks, so we switched to that as a reinforcer for him.

I had a student who loved bright colored sticky notes and loved to collect them. For his reinforcers for awhile, he received a sticky note for doing 5 math problems or for asking to go to the bathroom. Eventually his preferences changed and he moved on to other items and activities as reinforcers. It certainly was one of the easiest, simplest reinforcers.

Sometimes some special time with a staff member is the valued reinforcer, even more valued than food items. Perhaps going to another class and helping another teacher or student is reinforcing. I had a student once who worked for the opportunity to take off his shoes and wear socks in the classroom. We gave him a short amount of time following the completion of a task in which he could take off his shoes and walk around in his sock feet. I have never seen math work get done so quickly and never saw a happier boy in socks! I have had students who like to go out for a walk or go visit the office staff or the head of our school special ed department. Its amazing what will work.
Remember, incentives and reinforcers don't have to be big and elaborate. What matters is how valuable it is to the student.

STEP 4 - FADE FOR SUCCESS

In any behavior plan we want to aim for success, so remember to always have plan to fade the reinforcers. I had a little boy once who worked for gummy bears. It was the only thing at the time that was effective to him. One of his main goals  was learning to sit in a chair at an instruction table.  At the beginning of the year, when asked, he would go to the chair and touch it but never sit down. At first he received a portion of a gummy bear for just touching chair, then we progressed to touching his leg to the chair, and sitting in the chair even if just for a moment. Each and every time he did this he received his gummy portion. Once he was successful at sitting, even just momentarily, we began to give the gummy bear out every other time. Then we moved to every third time and continued fading out the reinforcer until he would sit in his chair as requested. Eventually, we were able to fade out the gummy bears as reinforcers. He learned to love pats on the back, verbal praise and even became able to be proud of himself.

A few weeks ago, I was privileged to take part in a BLAB with  group of  special educators. We shared our experiences and ideas about reinforcers in our classrooms.

Thanks for stopping by Special Ed Spot today.
Till Next Time

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