Teaching Strategies in Special Education

Video Transcript

"Basically what we do is we teach the standard course of study because that is what all these kids are held to and then we modify and simplify it down and so we are always working under the same principle that the regular classroom teachers are but we are equipped with strategies on helping these kids remember and things like that so for example with reading we use a lot of research based instructional programs and so it is very systematic. It is very direct and it teaches from like a phonetic based program instead of whole language and so we teach them the letter name and then the sound and then a word that associates with it. So we do a of drill and practice because then it kind of gets in their head this is the letter, this is the sound it makes and then here is a word and so I see my kids all the time when they are writing they'll go b ba ba oh it's a b and so then they'll write b and so it's a good way to kind of drill it. We drill and practice pretty much every day. For some of our kids who show a significant amount of regression over long breaks if we can, if we have documentation that they regressed a lot and then take a long time to recoup what they lose then they are qualified for what is called extended school year. So we did it last year with three kids and it was just a lot of fun and we just reviewed basic skills. We're not allowed to teach anything new but we just continued to review alphabet, writing, basic math skills in order to keep those skills kind of fresh."