So instead of working on my lesson plans, planning for the first day back from break, I'm sitting on my couch writing a blog post. Why? I really don't know. I've been having thoughts about different things, and one of the main ones is how to integrate more communication into my classroom day. This is one of those things that took me a little while to understand as a teacher of students with significant cognitive disabilities.
In college I learned all about teaching reading to all students, theories, how to do so many things, but they never really touched on how important communication was to all of it. I can teach 10 students to recognize letters, but how will they use it if they can't communicate? This kind of realization is something that took my years to understand. I just hope that our new batch of special education teachers is able to grasp it much more quickly than I. Communication is everything to our students!
Patrick
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My question is, how are you going to facilitate communication with your students? Are you going to use Boardmaker materials including communication boards, templates, and sentence strips? Are you going to use any devices such as a BIGmack, Step by Step, GoTalk?
ReplyDeleteYour Speech-Language Pathologist might have some good ideas about how to facilitate communication, using the various means above. It would be a good collaboration for you both. She could model some tools with you and your class. A little co-teaching is all you need.
I currently use BIGmacks, Step by Step's, and some other single switches. I'm looking to use the PODD system with at least 1 of my students. And I use Boardmaker for everything!
ReplyDeleteI have a wonderful relationship with my SLP, and we do co-teach. I guess one of the reasons I wrote the post was to help other see how important communication is. I don't want it to take others as long as it took me to get the concept, get it out there. Thanks for your comments Eric!