#SpedChatSaturday Back to School Edition

Today is the first #SpedChatSaturday and I'm so excited for this! I think it's a great way to get the world of Special Ed. out in the open for all to see and learn about. Thanks goes to Ashley at Lattes, Lesson Plans, and IEPs for hosting the first week's topic.

So let's get down to business...to defeat the Huns. {Mulan reference, anyone?}

Let's start with 5:

I don't go back to school until August 17th (thankfully) so I'm really not ready to tackle any of this. However, I usually go back a few weeks before and get started with at least arranging my room. At my school there are 2 deaf/hard of hearing (DHH) teachers, 1 speech/language teacher (SLP), 1 itinerant teacher, 1 family counselor, 1 occupational therapist (OT),  (1 only this year!) mainstream teachers, and 14 (I think) students. This makes for a lot of scheduling NIGHTMARES! Seriously, there was a year where we took a combined total of 25 hours to create a workable schedule that then changed 4x before the first week of school was over. It's an absolutely horrendous task that I dread every year. The OT, SLP, and family counselor, and itinerant teacher all work with other students and/or at other schools so we have limited flexibility with their schedules. Plus, our students work on so many different levels that it's hard to create good groups for academics. Most years the schedule is tolerable but never ideal. Here's hoping there's one schedule year coming up though...

The first week I go back is dedicated to teacher planning (yay!) but I'm in so many meetings that all-in-all I end up with about 2 1/2-3 actual days of prep. And on top of that, I have to have my room ready by 10am on Friday because of Kindergarten orientation... That's another reason I try to get back into my room early. If my room is at least partially set-up before August17, then that makes things that much easier.

Organization is my thing. I live for it. My room and everything in it is completely organized by the time school starts...and then the first few weeks go by and I get lazy. :( And then I get annoyed that I never seem to be organized anymore. So I work on it, and then the cycle repeats itself...

But, in all honesty, these four things are vital to making the school year run smoothly. I keep *tons* of post-it notes all over my room to make lists of things I need to do. And then I cross them off as they get down. Every teacher planning or early release day I take time to file. I have individual folders for each student to put IEP paperwork into. Then it gets filed into their individual IEP folder kept in a locked file cabinet. I have binders all over the place filled with different things- master copies, IEP at-a-glance pages, student data, etc...it makes it easier for me to find things when I need them. Seriously, get yourself some binders and get stuff organized- it'll be so much easier to stay organized- in fact those are the few things that actually STAY organized throughout the year. :)

What I wouldn't give for the three things mentioned above. Seriously. Hands-down, these are the 3 things that make me want to give up every year. I have some serious behavior issues in my room from students not labeled anything other than DHH. When I say behavior issues I mean being punched in the face, kicked, sexually assaulted, groped, plus other things. It means DAYS spent dealing with this student at the expense of the other students (to the point where they literally cower and hide when this student walks in the room). And all of this is ok with my administration because I work in a self-contained special needs class. It's perfectly ok for these students to act like this- so I'm expected to accept it. Seriously. I cannot begin to tell you how upset ANGRY I get when that's the response I get from not only my school administration but from district personnel as well. We've tried everything within our rights in the classroom (PBIP, removal, suspension, etc.) to get the behavior under control- but nothing seems to work.

I digress...anyway, if these three things were under control I could focus on my students' needs a lot better and maybe actually teach once in a while.

Use a planner. I can't stress it enough. It's a great way to keep track of all those meetings (and we all know there's a ton of them), due dates, field trips, etc. I LOVE planners. Love. Love. Love.

Have a plan- delegate the important to-dos to the top of your lists and make sure they get done first, have a short list of things that MUST be done by the end of that day and make sure it gets done, ignore social media (I'm so guilty of not doing this). Step 1 is admitting you have a problem, right? Seriously. Addicted to my phone and computer. I'm really going to try and be better about this.

I promise to teach with fidelity. I mean serious-don't-give-a-crap-about-pacing-guides-or-test-questions fidelity. I'm so tired of hearing "I need them 3rd grade ready" {3rd grade is our state-mandated retention grade if they don't pass the test}. I can't put the cart before the horse. Can't. Won't. I'm done. I teach kids that are behind in all areas- the biggest of which being communication and incidental learning. They need to have fun. Hands-on learning. And if that means taking 2 days, 2 weeks, 2 months, or 2 years (no, really, I'm going on 2 years of teaching some kids to count to 10 with 1:1 correspondence) to teach about nouns or counting or volcanos or whatever, then so be it.

So that's it folks. Feel free to leave comments with your thoughts. I love comments. :)