“Just calm down, breathe!” the teacher was saying as I entered the room to offer support. The student started crying louder. The teacher looked at me upset “I don’t know what he wants and he won’t calm down!” this declaration came as the student landed a punch, right in the teacher’s nose. A teaching assistant…
Read MoreZones of Regulation: You (may) be doing it wrong!
It’s the start of a new school year here in Texas and like most teachers, I hopped on Pinterest to see what other teachers were putting together. I started a new position and wanted to see if anyone had used Zones of Regulation with adults transitioning to the community. In case you are not familiar…
Read MoreTeaching Groupwork Through Cooperative Games
Working in a public school brings its challenges. One of those is group work activities and projects. I often circumvent this by writing into student IEP’s that they can choose to do the project alone. Choosing to do the project alone adds another layer of stress – the kiddo is now in charge of the…
Read MoreSocial Thinking: A Review (from someone who has actually taught it!)
If you follow the academia papers (and really who doesn’t!) you’ve seen this paper on Social Thinking analyzing whether or not Social Thinking is pseudoscience and harmful to those with autism. Michelle Garcia Winner and Pamela Crooke of Social Thinking responded (you can see it here) that while their curriculum has not been tested in…
Read MoreLet’s Talk Antecedent Interventions
About four weeks ago I was working in my classroom with a student on giving up his preferred reinforcer. We were doing a work/break/work/break routine with lots of positive praise being given when the student handed over the IPad at the end of break (signaled by a timer). The student was doing amazing when the…
Read MorePBIS: What is it? What’s the science? And why are people so against it?
If you know anything about education, then you know about PBIS (positive behavior interventions and supports). And if you work in education then you know that there are two definitive camps: people who swear by PBIS and those who don’t. PBIS is based on Behavioral Science principles of the ’60s. The basic (and very simplified…
Read MoreYou Teach Social Skills?
It’s a valid question. I tag myself as the #sociallyawkwardsocialskillsteacher, and often share stories with my students of various social blunders I have found myself in as a kid growing up and as an adult. Which leads one to wonder “Why Social Skills?” and the follow up “Why do you teach it when you don’t…
Read MoreHow I Became the #sociallyawkwardsocialskillsteacher
My name is Adrian. I’m a certified Special Education teacher, but I didn’t start out that way. I started out General Education Certified and listening to all the voices around me who told me not to teach Special Education. And then, my states budget for education tanked. It tanked hard. The largest districts started laying…
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