What I Learned This Week: Special Education

Sarah Wilde

McKay Student Ambassador

Special Education (Severe/Profound Disabilities Emphasis)

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This semester is my first time doing practicum. My practicum takes place in an elementary classroom with students from 3rd to 6th grades. It's been so good to have somewhere to apply the knowledge I am learning in my classes! In each class, we have assignments to carry out in our practicum settings that go with whichever unit we are learning in class.

Assessing and Evaluating

In my Assessing and Evaluating Students class, we have been learning about certain types of standardized tests that are often used to determine if a student qualifies for special education services. These are the type of tests that determine what questions to ask based on how the examinee is responding, but we are doing it all by hand! We are learning what the rules are for the different tests for moving to harder or easier questions, requirements for administering standardized tests, and how to record and interpret results. Later in the semester, I will get the opportunity to administer a few of these tests myself!

Instruction

In my Curriculum and Instruction Class, we are learning how to write and teach explicit instruction lesson plans. I felt that I had it down after writing the plan, but when I tried to teach it to my practicum student this week, it was harder than I thought! I submitted a video of me teaching this lesson to my professor, and I don't have my grade back yet, but I don't think I got all the points. This is okay, because it gives me something to work on and an opportunity to grow! By the time I graduate, it will be cool to go back and see how I have progressed.

Reading Instruction

In my Elementary Language Arts for Disabilities class, we are preparing to take the FRA. The FRA is a General Education test, but we are still required to take it to get our Special Education teaching license. This means we have to learn how to teach language arts in a GenEd classroom and a SPED classroom! These last few weeks, we have been focusing on phonological awareness. Phonological awareness is the first step in learning to read. At this point, students don't need to know any letter shapes or names; they just need to be able to identify words verbally. A student only needs to use their ears. While it may seem like a waste of time to go over words verbally before introducing written words, studies show that having a better sense of phonological awareness predicts later reading scores! If a student begins to fall behind in reading, the problem may secretly lie in their phonological awareness skills.

Behavior Analysis

In my Social and Behavior Strategies class, we are building on what we learned in our previous applied behavior analysis (ABA) class. ABA is the science of human behavior. Contrary to what most people might think, human behavior is predictable! Every behavior is caused by one of the four functions: escape/avoidance of a task, attention, tangible access, or automatic reinforcement. If addressing an inappropriate behavior, it is more effective to address the function behind the behavior than the behavior itself. If a student is trying to "escape" from a worksheet, maybe you can teach him to ask for a water break between problems instead of throwing a large tantrum. Over time, you can let the student go for water breaks less and less. If a student is calling out during class to get your attention, teach her to raise her hand and consistently call on her (for a time) to teach her that is an appropriate way to get attention. You can also praise this student at a higher rate than before. She won't feel the need to find your attention because she already has it. It's like being a detective; what is the student really trying to tell you with their behavior?

My first semester of practicum has been great so far! I am finally getting to apply what I learn in my classes out in the real world. It has been busy and difficult, but it's also so fun! I can't wait to see what the rest of this semester brings me!

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