Desk Schedules

Hello again!  I have another lovely organizer for you!  Since I pull students out for resource work during the day and every day tends to be different, I've found that it is easier to make a schedule for each student.  It is small enough that it can be laminated and taped down so that students and their classroom teachers can reference it during the day.

I uploaded the Word doc version of the schedule so you can input your own schedules and change fonts and colors, if need be! 

Following Directions

I'm student teaching with a resource teacher, which means that I often get to push into other classes and observe what is going on in the general education classrooms.  I had the pleasure, while taking data last week, to witness the most hilarious lesson I think I've ever seen!  Apparently the students had been experiencing difficulty with following directions so to assess who could follow directions and who could not, the teacher and student teacher in this classroom made a list of directions to follow, the first of which was to read all the directions before doing anything and the second direction was to simply write their name on their paper followed by a list of ridiculous directions.

Students had privacy folders up so they couldn't copy one another and I will say that all the adults in the room enjoyed watching the students folding their paper, tearing things, banging on their desks, etc.  Not a single student followed the directions correctly and I liked this assignment so much that I made my own version of it!

Behavior Management Tally Chart

I have to say that the hardest thing for me when I was an early childhood aide, when I was working in clinical settings, when I've gone into my mother's classroom, and now as a student teacher has been behavior management.  I think I struggle with it because I am young and look much younger than I am, but also because I babysit quite frequently and like to be the kids' friend.  I'm learning a lot right now about how to manage behavior and have come up with a chart that works wonders in my current setting.

It is a simple tally chart with spaces for credits and debits.  Each student has their own row where their credits and debits are tracked.  If they get 75 tallies, they get to bring a friend and have lunch with me in my classroom.  When they are acting up, all I have to do is hover my pen over the debit column of their row and they usually get the hint right away.  For a while, I was giving tons of tallies and not taking any away, and found that if every so often I give them a debit when they are being too crazy, it stops the off-task behavior for at least the next few days.  Every Friday I total their tallies so they know where they fall and how many they need to earn to get lunch.  

Here is an abbreviated version of the chart.  You can download it below at my Teachers-Pay-Teachers site. 

When students reach 75 tallies, I give them a fancy invitation to lunch, which makes the luncher feel epically special and motivates those who are still working towards their lunch to work harder.  Here is a copy of my invitation.  You can download it at my Teachers-Pay-Teachers site! 

Welcome!

Hello everyone!  You may recognize me from : the daily savant:, which is where I write all about my first love of fashion.  However, I am also finishing my master's degree in special education and I am currently student teaching and coming up with all sorts of goodies for the classroom that I thought I would share!