This year, for the first time ever, I managed to build in a dedicated half hour to centers. For anyone reading outside the state of Florida this might be a bit of a shock...after all most of you guys have school days that last 7 hours- here in Florida ours are only 6 hours. I never thought I'd day this- but I could really use that extra hour! Anyway, after some back and forth, I decided to dedicate this half hour to IEP related activities and centers. Because my kids are all on such different levels I felt that it was the only way I could monitor and collect accurate data on their specific goals while still managing to teach 3 different grade level standards. And, quite frankly, I'm happy I made the decision to do this.
So, how does it work?
Well, I have two of those plastic 3-drawer storage things and since I have 6 kids that worked out perfectly! Each kid gets their own drawer. And then I made life simple, and just created a rotation. Each kid gets the iPad once a week (except for 2 that double up because they can actually handle playing together) and work/counseling the other days. Each week I change out the centers as needed and the night before I put all of their materials for the next day's center in their drawer and they're ready to go!
Now, I admit there are some drawbacks. Namely being that all my pullouts are done during this time (which is also a blessing) so I don't have 5 days of centers with most of my kids so data collection isn't as smooth as I'd like. It also means that fun activities I have planned that I want to complete during this time aren't always completed. There's pros and cons to everything.
I'm still trying to find ways to tweak this process so it's better for my kids...if you've got suggestions I'd love to hear them! :)
