Discussion Forum #5--PD for General Educators on Working With Special Education Students

[Emily Machado]

As a teacher in DC Public Schools, I am always disappointed by the
professional development workshops set up by the district. These
sessions tend to involve large groups of educators who are not
differentiated by experience, subject matter or grade level. The
topics are usually one-shot sessions that focus on a part of our
IMPACT rubric or another specific aspect of teaching. From what we've
learned in this class, it seems like there is so much to think about
and become aware of when working with special education students. We
need to know about specific disabilities, differentiation techniques,
and legal issues.

If you could design professional development to teach general
education teachers to learn about working with special education
students, what would it look like? Who would lead it? Would it be
lead by a consultant or special education teachers? How would you
differentiate for working with a variety of experience levels? Would
it be one session or year-long course?

http://copsse.education.ufl.edu//docs/RS-4/1/RS-4.pdf
This article gives some insight into what kinds of teacher preparation
programs are effective for special education teachers. We could
potentially use these ideas when designing professional development.

[Betsy]

Emily, I agree with you that most of the DCPS professional development
workshops are a waste of time! I have a new principal at my school
and one of the first things she set up for us was a Kagan Cooperative
Learning Workshop. Have you ever heard of them? I hadn't and it
rhymes with my name! We recently spent our PD day very productively!
The teachers at my school were all in agreement that this was one of
the very best things we have attended and noted that our special
education students would especially benefit from implementing these
cooperative learning methods into our classrooms more. We were
unanimous in asking to attend the rest of the seminars. I think what
I liked best about this PD was learning about structures to introduce
to my students so that they can readily and repeatedly use them to
'talk' about their learning and therefore, reinforce it. Imagine
think, pair, shares on steroids! It was fun, hands on and gave lots
of different kinds of structures to incorporate into the classroom so
that students are moving around, talking about their learning, asking
good questions, socializing with a purpose and everyone is getting an
opportunity to share--not just the talkers in the classroom. It was
really cooperative in nature and clarified how group work is often
dominated by one or two students and the others in the group are
mostly passive. Schools that have used this method have seen their
test scores explode and more importantly, close the learning gap
between kids who seem to stay at below basic levels.

You can check them out at http://www.kaganonline.com/. Warning:
there is a real 'cheese whiz' factor with their art so be aware that
it looks dweeby but it actually valuable.

On another note, I agree with you that we need more 'intentional'
special education training as well. I wrote a paper for our other
class on inclusion and one thing that stood out to me from my research
was the success students achieved when classroom teachers and special
ed teachers collaboratively planned lessons together each week so that
everyone was on the same page. I think differentiating lessons and
making specific accommodations will become easier if collaborative
planning is at the heart of all our lesson planning. Schools that
provide time for this will benefit from the team spirit and sense of
continuity in the classroom and general ed and sped teachers will
really know how to teach all of their students better.