Save the Date.

When we ordered our Save the Date magnets two years ago, the company made a mistake on our order and printed them on the wrong kind of magnet. I complained and they credited our account. I called to see if they wanted me to send them back, but they said not to worry about it. I had 300 Save the Date magnets that we weren't going to use...

I saved them. And saved them. They even survived from the move from TX to NJ! Well, I finally found a use for them. You probably know how important I think that literacy skills are, even for kids with significant disabilities. This year, we are using Reading A-Z for our language arts curriculum. It includes everything from high frequency words, to phonics, to the alphabet, to reading comprehension, sequencing, and cause and effect. There are leveled readers in which the kids progress through. They are all printed from the website and copied. The great thing about this is the kids can take the "readers" home with them and keep them at home to practice. So far, so good. We've progressed through the first list of the high frequency words and we are about to start level "aa" of the leveled readers (the first level).

Each reader has "content words" that you preview with the students before reading the book. This is ever-so-important for my guys, because we are ALWAYS looking to improve and increase language skills, both receptive and expressive. I decided that for each book, I would make flash cards of the content words. We can practice them before we read the book, so that they have an edge on knowing what certain things are in the book. This is also important because I have a classroom full of diverse learners. Two students just moved into the country last year and had never spoken English before. Add that to autism and you've got quite a road ahead of you.

I wanted to make the flash cards so that we could display them and refer back to them. Our whiteboard is magnetic. I thought it would be great to make magnetic flash cards so we can make sentences on the whiteboard, match them with other words on the whiteboard, write the words next to the flash cards, you get the picture.

That's where the Save the Date magnets come in. I cut them up into 12 pieces each. I hot glued a small piece to the back of each flash card. Voila! Magnetic flash cards, without having to buy anything!

Magnets, glue gun, flash cards

s

"Winter" content words

"The City" content words

I made all 24 sets of flash cards for the next four weeks. My fingers are a little burned from the glue gun (never fails), but I'm sure it will be worth it.

We'll see how the reading goes. I am hoping the kids will progress through the program at the rate I am planning for. The level "aa" books are a Kindergarten level (DRA A-1, Reading Recovery 1). There are 24 stories and I hope to get through them in four weeks. I just ordered a Hooked on Phonics K level kit from eBay. We will be doing this at the same time, hoping that the phonetic approach to reading will set in with at least a few of the kids. Right now, they are using memorization and picture clues. I'll keep you posted on our progress. In four weeks, I am hoping we will move to level "A". They go in alphabetical order once you get to A. Level D is first grade. That would be a great goal to hit sometime after Christmas.

It surprises me how much literacy is ignored for students with severe disabilities. They are capable, it just takes creativity and patience.

For the list of high frequency words, these are the percentages of where we are with the boys right now:

(For list 1 of sight words from the start of the school year until now)

1- 79% to 100%

2- 67% to 91%

3- 46% to 77% (missed the first two weeks of school!)

4- 0% to 37% (still learning English, but making steady progress!)

Literacy is the key to independence in today's world. We can do it!

"Stand Up."

At my school, we have a "word of the week." Each teacher is required to post this "character education" word in the classroom and talk about it daily. We get a handout of what to say about the word each afternoon. Even though the words are sometime hard, I usually use this as an opportunity to discuss social skills and allow the kids to repeat and say new words.

This week, the word is "kindness." Today's handout about the word talked about kindness meaning to help others when they are in need. I stood at the front of the room and I wrote on the board, "Ways That We Can Help Others." I underlined it. One kid raised his hand and said, "Help." Well, almost there, but not quite. I said, "Yes, how can you help others?" My assistant raised her hand and gave an example to see if that would jump start them. Still nothing. I always try to throw in some role-play so the kids can see it in action, especially when we are working on social skills. This was a perfect opportunity.

I moved from the whiteboard to one of the open areas behind our group table. The kids moved their chairs around so they could see me. I said, "What would you do if THIS happened?" (As I said it, I completed a very dramatic 'trip' onto the floor and landed sprawled out on the ground). The kids just stared at me. My assistant looked at all of them and said, "Guys? What would you say if that happened to your teacher!?"

One boy raised his hand. My assistant called on him. He stood up, walked over, pointed at me on the floor and said, "Stand up!"

One thing I love about these kids is that they are so pure, so real. They have no filter. Of course you would tell your crazy teacher who just did a fake fall onto the middle of the classroom to stand up. I love it.

Here's to helping others.... we'll add that to our learning to-do list.

Emergency in Room 413 - Total Chaos!

Well, today was the first day that I officially left the kids alone with a sub. This is something that is hard for any special education teacher to do, especially in the beginning. It's actually more work for me to write down every single detail so that the sub knows what the routine is, than it is for me to just be there and complete the routine myself. People always wonder why I don't take a sick day if my throat is hurting. Or go on vacation a day early. The reason is the time it takes to prepare a sub for the day-long journey they are about to embark on... is just not worth it.

I didn't have a choice this time. It was a state-mandated training for APA (alternate proficiency assessment) for all of the NJ special ed teachers who serve "the most significantly cognitively disabled students." I qualified! I have to admit, it was kind of exciting to think about a day of watching powerpoints and playing on my iPhone. I was also excited at the prospect of leaving the training right when it ended and heading home. It's always a hard thing to leave on time when I am at school. I sat through the morning portion of the training. I was not excited to find out that the training actually consisted of someone clicking "play" on various powerpoints on a computer screen: my overachiever self already downloaded all of the powerpoints and watched them this weekend. Any time someone had a question about something, I would say, "Oh, they tell you in the next slide!" Haha. Maybe that's why I have trouble making teacher friends. The administrator loved me, though!

"Sarah, would you please come see me?" I wondered what I had done to deserve the personal invitation to the front of the Board of Ed office. I walked up front to a very frazzled special ed coordinator. She said, "There has been an 'incident' at school. Would you be willing to leave the training to return to school?" Hmm. An incident? What kind of incident could it be? She told me that one of my students had bit someone and that "nobody knew what to do." This is coming from an administration that has never dealt with children with autism. But, with all of the hullabaloo I figured it must be pretty serious. I gathered my things, just as you do when you get sent to the principal's office in secondary school. I headed out of the district office. It was a great three hours while it lasted!

My boys were doing a puzzle on the ground. One of them said, "Mrs. Smith, we missed you!" I told him, "I knew you missed me, so I decided to come back today!" He grinned from ear to ear. Meanwhile, my "biter" was separated from the group, on a mat, playfully looking at her favorite magazine, Modern Bride, while four adults hovered around her. Honestly, kids with autism bite. If you couldn't talk and tell me what was frustrating you, don't you think you'd bite me? I can only imagine how frustrating it would be to live in a life of silence. People automatically think that kids with autism are crazy because they resort to these types of behaviors. This is definitely not the case. Not being able to communicate would be tough.

My assistant told me that the principal came in the room and said, "I want to see her in my office. Right now. She needs to explain exactly what happened this morning." I thought to myself, man, if my non-verbal student could explain exactly what happened, I think we'd be in business!

My boys were a little frazzled from all of the hustle and bustle in the classroom. They weren't quite sure what to make of their broken routine and the extra chaotic adults. They pick up on attitudes and they definitely knew something was wrong. One boy said, "I want to go home. Something is wrong, I need to go home." I told him it was alright. He has NEVER said this before. I mean, who wants to go home from Mrs. Smith's class?

In the end, everyone calmed down and I tried to assure everyone it would be okay. This kind of thing happens. No need to call the police, have five adults in the room, seek additional placements, etc. The whole "biting" thing definitely didn't help our cause for trying to "fit in" to the school. But that's okay. We're different, we know it, and we embrace it. I still love them just the same!

We still achieved success today. We did a little impromptu autism awareness training for those who needed it. And hey, let's look on the bright side. Tomorrow is baking soda and vinegar volcano day in science.

He's on Fire!

Kids with autism have a hard time understanding idioms. We had a great example of this in class today. One of my students, who typically takes a while to get going in the morning, was answering every question correctly and raising his hand for every answer. I was so impressed with him! I turned to my assistant and I said, "Man, he's on fire today!" My one student immediately put his hands to his cheeks (in sheer terror) and said, "Oh no!" Haha. I explained that when someone is doing a good job, getting all of their work done, or answering lots of questions you can say they are "on fire." He listened patiently, but kept glancing over at the other boy to be sure he was okay.

We made some friends at lunch today! After a "mean girl" episode, we did have some luck with the other students. As soon as we sat down, a little girl immediately got up and moved to the table to the right. She turned to her friends and said, "Ew! I am NOT sitting with THEM. Sick." I stood up and asked if there was a problem. She said, "No." I asked why she moved tables. She said, "Because I wanted to sit over here." I told her that I heard what she said that type of thing would NOT be tolerated at _ Middle School. She said she was sorry. I said that everyone has feelings that can be hurt. We got back to business at our table though. I let my boys eat while I worked my middle school magic. I made friends with the girls at our table. They all went around and said their names, then I prompted my guys to introduce themselves. Then, one of my boys asked the little girl across from him for help with his salad. She politely helped out and handed it back! As we were leaving, they all said goodbye, and my guys said goodbye back! We've got a few friends, score! Later, we saw one of the girls in the hallway and she was surprised to get a very cheerful "HELLO VICTORIA" as we were walking by. She smiled and said hello back. We'll get there!

Today was Day 1 of the EARTH unit. The kids had a blast! First, we talked about the core, mantle, and crust of the Earth. We did this by cutting open a peach.

The "core" was the pit. The "mantle" was the "peach" of the peach. The "crust" was the skin of the peach.

Then, we got our own Earth "models" to paint. The kids painted the core and the mantle, and the remainder was the crust.

We used yellow for the mantle, red for the core. The white outside was the crust.

We also had vocabulary cards that we practiced. In my classroom, it is all about exposure. Some of the kids have articulation goals and this is a great time to practice repeating words correctly. MMMMMMMMantle. What letter does it start with? M. So, even though learning about the Earth may not be a functional skill, I am able to incorporate sensory, art, music, and IEP goals into my science lessons. The kids love it! They deserve to learn about the same things the other sixth graders are learning about!

Another successful day! Let's just hope I don't get any concerned parents calling about a "student on fire."

It's Raining Flashcards.

Well, today was an extra interesting one. I had spent quite a few hours this weekend creating flash cards, worksheets, and data sheets for one of my more involved students who hasn't started yet. I was determined that if she showed up today, I would be ready for her. I spent a good amount of the weekend hours cutting out flash cards and laminating them. I had several little decks of cards (alphabet, shapes, letters, colors, numbers, sight words) that were ready to take to school today. I created several worksheets in Boardmaker and printed them out to copy at school. I was ready!

Well, you know when you're getting ready to go somewhere and you have a thousand things in your hand, and for some reason it seems like a good idea to put one of those things on top of your car? Yes, you know where this story is going. The bin of flash cards was put on top of my car. I was just about on Route 1 when I heard a funny sound and looked into my rearview mirror. It was raining flash cards. My beautiful alphabet cards, number cards, and sensory toys were blanketing the access road to the highway. Awesome. I pulled to the side of the road, and was frantically trying to recover them, as cars were speeding by and driving over them. It was sure a pitiful sight. I will admit, I had tears coming out of my eyes at the thought of all my work being run over. A couple school buses and a few staring cars later, I was able to gather mostly everything up and put it in my car.

I hoped and prayed that my student would not be there today, because now my nice little stacks of flash cards and brand new sensory toys were all in one big ruffled pile with tire marks all over them. Rats. When I got to school, I told my assistant the whole story. She, being the wonderful person that she is, stayed in while I went to go get the kids off the bus. When we got back, she had all of the sensory toys under water and was cleaning them at the sink. She had re-stacked all of the flash cards into their appropriate piles with rubber bands. She had re-laminated the cards that had seen better days. She is so wonderful. Teachers can only dream for paraprofessionals like her. She's a self-starter. She does everything I ask, and everything I don't ask! I don't have to even say stuff and she reads my mind. She tells me it's not fair for me to have to stay late at night, so she asks what she can do to help me. I brought her cookies today. She is part of the reason the experience has been so wonderful so far.

Because we can't have a blog entry without a kid story, I'll throw a quick one in. I was flustered this morning. I was getting over the fact that I had driven nearly a half mile with my teacher supplies on the roof of my car. I was pretty much over it, but I guess my hair was a little "ruffled" from the whole experience. One of my boys sat down at the table and looked straight at me. "Mrs. Smith? You didn't brush your hair today." Haha. Oh, but yes I did. I told him it had been a long morning and sometimes hair gets crazy. He laughed. So did I.

Today was a great day. The kids were good, I still only have three kids, the science coordinator brought all of our supplies for our Earth unit, we can open our lockers by ourselves, it was quesadilla day in the cafeteria, life was good. Until I came out from my grad class tonight.

I was standing in one of the Rutgers parking lots talking to some grad school friends. We got out of class an hour early, so that was exciting. We were saying goodbye to each other, and I opened up my car door. That's funny, I thought. I'm sure I didn't leave the window open? I am also sure that I didn't leave shattered glass on my seat. Oh, the car had been broken into. Some awesome somebody thought it was a grand idea to bash the window in so they could steal my GPS! Now, the 4-Runner has shards of glass ALL over the seat, floor, back seat, even the driver seat, I have no window, and no GPS. After filing a police report and getting on my way, I realized I couldn't figure out how to get home without the GPS. Downtown New Brunswick is no place to be lost late at night. I guess that's what I get for relying on my GPS to get me everywhere. My mom said, "At least you're okay, honey." Thanks, Mom! I'm okay. It's true. My job is so great that I can't even really let this upset me. What can I say? I must have forgotten to brush my hair today. Tomorrow is a new day.

Teachers just know.

I love my new job. The kids are so great. They say the funniest things! The week has been long and tiring, but I'm so glad I am in the position I am in. We're still stomping on vocabulary words and playing all kinds of games to learn new things. The color coding system and all of the time that I put into setting it up has been 100% worth it. I could leave the room and the kids would follow their schedules and know exactly where to go and what to do. They are completely independent in following their routines and that is the ultimate goal of every autism teacher.

Today, we got our locker combinations. My one little guy has been talking about putting his backpack in his locker all week. I opened it for him and he said, "it's my turn to try." I tried to explain turning right, then counting the lines on the lock to find the number, and then turning it past the second number once (who came up with that anyway?), but it was a bit much for him. He was pretty disappointed that he couldn't open the locker. I thought about it all morning and I knew I could come up with a way that the kids could open the lockers without us having to do the combination each morning...

Kids with autism are visual learners. They need visuals to make sense of the world. I came up with a solution to the locker dilemma, and it was a success. They still need a little practice with it, but it's a definite opportunity for them to be completely independent, yet again.

I put small strips of colored tape on the right parts of the combination lock. I rigged it so that the "turn left to blue" and "turn left to red" includes the crazy lock step of going past the second number. The final step of "turn right to green" lands them with an open locker!

I felt good about coming up with the color combinations for the lockers. I'm pretty certain some of the regular ed kids could probably benefit from my solution. That was just the start to a great Friday!

I think that I could write a book called, "101 Autism Quotes" - and it would be pretty funny. We were reading a short story this morning that used the repeated line, "I see a ___." The blanks were filled in with various community helper careers. The purpose of the book was to work on sight words, but I always fill their little brains with extra information as we work on various things. We were talking about what each job was. I said, "What does a pilot do?" They answered, "drive the airplane." I said, "What does a doctor do?" One answered, "He gives a check up with the cold tool." I thought that was a pretty good description. Then comes the fun answer. I said, "What does a teacher do?" One of my kids said, "Teachers just know." It's true! They do, they just know!

On to the next great thing. I finished lesson plans for the next two weeks. The only thing that is somewhat hard to plan for is our social studies/science period. I don't really have a curriculum to follow and we don't even have textbooks. So, I just have to look at the state standards and see what I need to come up with for the lessons. One of the topics for sixth grade is "Earth." I found a great set of lesson plans from the Core Knowledge website... and it is a first grade lesson plan called "Exploring the Earth: A 10 day Journey from the Inside Out." Although it's first grade, it does cover a lot of the more advanced topics that you learn about in middle school (plate tectonics, volcanoes, kinds of rocks, etc.) So, that's what we'll be doing for the next two weeks! I had plans to hit the hardware store this weekend to get a few of the things we'll need for the experiments. I'm so used to spending my own money, I figured if I shopped carefully, I could get the items fairly cheap. Well, we were standing in the hallway looking at the rain this afternoon (we finished all of our work so fast today!) -- and a very nice lady walked up and said hello to us (this is big for a school that has never had kids with autism before). My kids turned around and said hi, waved, and then went back to looking at the rain. The woman had talked to me during the first day of school training and I had vaguely remembered her, but she introduced herself again and told me that she was the science department coordinator. I took that opportunity to seize the moment and ask her if she had materials available for us to use. She said, "definitely!" She told me to send her a list and she'd have all of the supplies in my room Monday morning! Wow!

As if THAT wasn't enough, at the end of the day today one of the 6th grade teachers came into my room to tell us that all of the sixth graders were meeting in the room next door and having a "sing along" with the school counselor. He brings his guitar and sings to the kids and they love it. She came to get us! She sought us out! She invited us! We came and my kids had a blast. He even asked a few questions at the end, one of them being, "What is one great thing that has happened this week?" One of my boys raised his hand and said, "I'm in middle school!" (He's been saying that all week.) The kids all laughed (in a good way) and the counselor told him that was a wonderful thing. Pretty great experience for everyone.

Last but not least, as we were walking out to buses, one of my boys said, "Mrs. Smith, no school tomorrow. I will miss you." Very impressive for a student with autism to develop a relationship like that, AND know how to express it. I told him I'd miss him too.

What can I say? I think we're Achieving Success. Daily.

The first day of school-SUCCESS.

Well, today was the day we've all been waiting for. The day I've been working all summer for. I really couldn't have asked for a better first day. Two of my five students were absent because they were not up to date on their shots. So, it made it a nice little ratio of adults to kids, with only three students there. It also made it so much easier to show them the new routines, the rules of the classroom, where to go, etc. with just the three of them. The three kids that came today were absolutely adorable. Very compliant, talkative, happy to be there and just plain excited about middle school. One of them kept saying, "I'm in middle school!" all day. I kept telling him, "You sure are!" He was so psyched to have a locker and his own desk.

Their little color coded schedules (see earlier blog posts) worked like a charm. They knew exactly what to do. They sat nicely and did everything I said! I rewarded them with plentiful amounts of stickers, but I think they would have been happy without them as well. We did a "certificate ceremony" after each time they filled up their sticker charts. They got a kick out of that. One student told me that his teacher last year never did certificate ceremonies.

I used all of the tricks in my bag to keep them busy and excited today. For starters, we played "Louder and Louder" during language arts. Kids always love this. I showed them a sight word card, I said it, they repeated it. Then, I told them that we were going to start real soft, and get louder and louder. So we said, "the, the, the, the, the" from a whisper until we were screaming the word "the." I'll never be able to figure out why kids love that so much, but it's fine with me because they learn the words! Later, we learned about weather during science. After our main lesson, we played "stomp that weather." I put picture cards of different weather (Sunny, Cloudy, Windy, Rainy, Snowy) on the floor, and they had to jump from card to card when I called out the weather. One kid was just stomping on all of the cards, so we'll have to work on that... but the others really picked it up! I even let one of them be the weather man and call out the "forecast." Another teacher peered into the room as we were all shouting weather words and jumping around the room. I bet she was jealous!

It's going to be so much fun to teach these kids. Let's hope this first day momentum keeps going! We definitely achieved success today. Here's to another great day tomorrow.

Everyone needs a shot

Today was our district convocation. We all met in the high school auditorium and listened to various people speak. The final presentation was presented by the superintendent. He showed the video of Jason "J Mac" McElwain, a student with autism, and his final basketball game of high school. Click here to see the video, if you are not familiar with it. It will really warm your heart! It was a great, inspirational story to play at the conclusion of the convocation. I thought, "Wow, this will be great! Everyone just saw that kids with autism can contribute so much!"

This will be the first year that my school will have kids with autism attend. They told me that I would have a lot to overcome, with "unaccepting" teachers and other various hurdles to jump. I figured I'd have to educate people about autism, provide supports in the classroom, and other typical duties of an autism teacher.

Boy, was I wrong. I had no idea what I'm up against. I am determined to prove to my fellow teachers that EVERY child deserves to be in school. EVERY child deserves to take elective classes, and EVERY child deserves to have friends without disabilities. We had a meeting today. Some of the supervisors of the ASD team created a powerpoint to share with the electives teachers. The purpose of the powerpoint and of the meeting was to give a brief overview of autism and some of the behaviors and challenges they might face. We hadn't even turned the lights down to start the powerpoint and someone stood up and said, "THOSE kids aren't going to be in OUR classes, are they?" The SPED supervisors calmly assured them that we would answer questions at the end. The lights turned down. "They'll come with paras, right? They better not send THOSE kids into my classroom without a para." More snickering and rolling of the eyes. I kid you not. These people are completely adamant that "THOSE" kids don't belong in their classes. Well, these are MY kids. And nobody will talk about them that way.

Someone raised their hand and politely suggested, "Wouldn't it be nice if we could just have electives classes devoted to these special students? That way, we could make it real easy so that they would get something out of it." A good idea in theory, but not when you're complying with the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. "What would they get out of being in my class anyway?" "I've got 25 other kids, I'm not doing something special for ONE student." "If they can't follow along, they don't need to be in my class." My jaw dropped. I am so excited about this job, this class, this program, this opportunity. But, I have never in my life heard such JUDGMENTAL statements. The supervisors tried to ease their fears, reassure them that they'd be provided with support, but everyone left the "town hall meeting" (that's what it seemed like) in such a huff.

I've got work to do. It is my goal to show them what a joy these kids are. It's my job to show them. I'll give up my prep periods to accompany them to electives classes to be sure that they're being treated fairly and they're enjoying themselves. It takes work, but it's worth it. I bet these teachers wouldn't say the same things if these were their kids.