Ending the Program

As this program comes to an end, I have been reflecting on where this will take me in my career. I feel that this was a very timely step in my career. This next school year, our department will be changing considerably. Even though I feel that I have always been a leader within my department, even though I wasn't the voice, I see next year being a lot different. The teacher that would normally speak for our department will be switching to a different department. We also will be getting two new teachers within our department. I feel that between myself and the other teacher, we will have to become more vocal leaders. I am excited for this opportunity and I feel that I am now ready to step out of my box and lead. I feel that this program has helped me become ready for this unexpected change. I feel that I am ready to take this on and to continue growing as a leader.

I have also been asked to co-facilitate our special education department PLC for next school year. We were going to try to implement this PLC this school but it was determined to wait a year. I am happy that I have been through this master's program because I feel much more prepared to take on this role. I feel that I have a better understanding of learning in a community and being a leader. This summer I will be attending a three day training on PLC's. I am excited to learn more and to be to take this back to my school and implement it. Again, I feel this will be a great way for me to step outside of my comfort zone and continue to grow as teacher.

By taking more time to reflect on my teaching, I have been able to come up with new ways to document student progress. I have also learned more about the value of goal setting. I am excited to have a plan in mind for my PDP. I plan to continue to find tools to use to document student progress but I also plan to involve my students more in the process. I feel that it can be very valuable to have students aware of what is written in their IEP's and why were work on certain things. At this point, I have not involved my students with the goal setting process on a regular basis. We talk about it at the IEP and then I haven't involved them much more from there. I think it could be used as a great motivator for my students and I think they may take more pride in the work they are doing.

I am very proud of myself for taking this step in my career. I am proud of the growth that I have made but I am even more excited about my future and the challenges that are ahead of me. I am very pleased that I had this opportunity.

Math Class

This last week I decided to have my Topics 1 math class set individual goals for the unit we are on. I wanted them to set a goal for daily work and quiz/test scores. I felt like some of the students were blowing the class off or starting to shut down. I thought by having them set a goal it would help bring their focus back. It has only been 3 class periods since we set goals, and all of the students have completed their work on time. I am very happy with this because it was coming to the point that 3-4 students would not use class time and would also turn in assignments late or not at all. When I asked them to set goals, some of them complained about having to do it, others asked why, and some were very excited about it. I explained to them that I wanted them to take more ownership for their grades. I am hoping this will help with the dynamics of this class. Most of them will need to move on to the next level of math so it is important they are grasping the concepts we are covering on.

Grant award

I applied for our PTA mini grant this year. Our department is in need of some classroom supplies, educational games, and calculators. I was informed this week that I am one of the recipients of this grant. I am very excited that I have been awarded this grant. I will be taking a group of students to the store to help pick out the items that we are in need of. I am looking forward to taking the students shopping. I think it should be a fun experience.

documentation

This year I have been implementing some new ways to document student progress. One of the first documents that I created is where I monitor the activity that we do in class each day and how the student did with the activity. I also give up to 5 points daily for participation. I also have the student IEP goals pasted on the folder where the documenation takes place. This has been very beneficial because it is a constent reminder of goals and allows to me glance at the student progress. I am then able to send these sheets home to parents so they can see progress made as well.

I also have been keeping track of sight words for one of my beginning readers. I have a list of mastered words and a list of words that the students knows but may not have mastered. We do flashcards every day as warm up using these words. I have the student do the words that he/she has mastered once a week. We do the other set of words every day. I have the person doing the words with him write down the words that he gets incorrect. I then use this list as a guide to know when to add words to the mastered list and when to add more words to need to master list. This has been working great to keep track of the student's progress.

I have also had a student that is working out of a direct instruction reading book monitor his/her reading progress. In the past, I would skip this part of the lesson. We would do the reading checks but I would not have students keep track of their progress. This has been working very well with this student. It has been a great motivator for the student and it has helped me with being able to see the students progress. I am glad that I started doing this. I think that it has been very beneficial.

It has been very beneficial to have more ways to document student progress. It has helped me with writing progress reports and IEP goals. I belief these tools will help me throughout my career.

Compass Training

Tonight I went to a training on Compass. I found that this computer program could be very valuable in my classroom. I like that you can adjust the lessons based upon the level of your students. I also like that it is tied back to the student's MAP test scores.

With this program, I was able to create lessons for every level of student that I am working with. I am excited to start the program with some of my students that function at a much lower level. There are times that I would like to switch things up but run out of options. I think this program will be able to provide that. I also like that you recieve instant notification of the results. You also are able to look over the assessments to see where the student may be going wrong.

I was very thrilled about the capabilities of this program. I think it is a tool that I will implement in the futur.

Math Class

This year I have been teaching an upper math class for students with special needs. This class is the last math course the students will take before entering the regular education setting. We just took the semester final and a significant number of the students failed. This is a course that I co-teach with another special education teacher. After seeing the results of the test, we decided to change a few things. We have implemented a seating chart, as it appears that students are distracted by students they were sitting with. We also explained to the students that the material that they are learning will carry over into the next level. We talked about the importance of taking this course seriously otherwise they would not be prepared for next year. We gave the students a review packet of all the material that was covered on the exam. They were told that they needed to complete one section at a time and get it approved by one of us before they could move on. After they complete the review packet they will have to take the exam again. We are hoping that with the changes we have made, the students will be more focused and their scores will increase. We also are hoping that they will take the class more seriously if they have hopes of going on to the next level. This class can be frustrating as the students have exhibited that they have the skills but they did not perform on the exam.

Trainings

A few weeks ago, I attended a training on using a LiveScribe pen. This pen is capable of recording teacher lectures, podcasts, and other important features. This training gave me a brief overview of the capabilities that this pen has. I really learned a lot from this training and I am excited to try and put it to use in my classroom.

Next week I will be attending a training Cloud Live@EDU. I am looking forward to this training because often times I would like to access work documents at home that I am not able to get to because they are on the school network. With this training I am hoping to learn a lot of valuable information on how to access materials from home.