Oct 01
The absolute best way for people to learn vocabulary is through natural and repeated exposure: both in conversation and reading. However, I know many of my students are not hearing higher-level vocabulary with their friends or at home, and I also sadly know their reading is often limited to emojis and Facebook posts. So we …
Sep 07
Oedipus the King is one of the oldest works taught in high schools, and by far it is one that gets the best reactions from my students: “Ugh! Why are we reading about this?!” If you do choose to (or are forced to) read about poor Oedipus, here are a few things that may help …
Aug 04
Monster, by Walter Dean Myers, is a text frequently read in middle school about a 16-year-old boy on trial and facing a life sentence. Because it has a Lexile score of 670L, students at the middle school level can read the text. This actually makes it perfect for my special education students (and sometimes standard …
May 30
It’s true co-teaching is not for everyone. Sometimes, it’s a lot of extra work, and sometimes you get stuck with someone who has a different style or personality that doesn’t match well with yours. But then sometimes, all the planets align perfectly and it’s teaching heaven. Here’s my list of reasons I love (most of) …
May 07
Isolating images to create your own clip art is a great way to professionally add interest and aid in comprehension when creating your worksheets. Here, I’ll show to do it in PowerPoint on my MacBook Air. I have no idea if this works the same with Windows, though I would assume it does. Drag an …
Apr 25
Feeling like an overpaid teacher’s assistant in your new role as a special education teacher in a co-taught class? It’s not just you; co-teaching is taking the difficult task of teaching to a whole new level. It took me years to come out from the teacher’s assistant shadow even though I’ve always been proficient when …
Apr 13
Student-led IEP meetings are the latest craze in special education. Unfortunately, it’s leaving a lot of special educators overwhelmed. We’re already overworked. How are we going to coach struggling students on how to run an IEP meeting on top of all our other responsibilities? Don’t get me wrong, in theory and in practice this sounds …
Apr 11
Begin talking to a general educator about a student’s IEP, and you will usually get one of four different responses: 1. complete enthusiasm, 2. some enthusiasm and some confusion, 3. complete confusion, and 4. annoyance and denial. I’m hoping to help with responses 2-4 with this post. The Legal Aspect It’s federal law all students …
Apr 08
I was part of an iPad 1:1 initiative in Maryland back in 2012. I remember in our first training session they kept emphasizing one specific point with the iPads: it’s not about just replacing pen and paper, it’s about creating and learning in ways that aren’t possible with just pens and text books. With that in …
