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You Can Do It

Mon, 20 Feb 2012 12:15:36 +0000

Several things have come together to put me on notice that I needed to feature a comprehensive classroom management plan on my landing page. We had a couple of special education department meetings: we are at the breaking point with behavior problems at my school, in large part because students have been transferred to our building from schools were they were removed for behavior problems. Behavior improvement plans are either poorly written or non-existent.

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More Words

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 21:52:23 +0000

I've been busy trying to keep up with the challenges of my job, while still trying to create new resources for all of you. I did get new Dolch High Frequency Cloze Worksheets for Primer Words up this week. It takes longer than you might think: I want to be sure that students can do them independently, though unlike the pre-primer worksheets, I didn't use any rebuses. I also put a place for students to write the words: I figure by the time students are mastering the primer words, they should have strong enough handwriting to choose and write a single word.

Whazzup?

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 18:33:34 +0000

That seems to be one of the hippest ways to engage a peer now a days, but certainly not a good way to address a police officer or your grandmother. You and I know this, but a student with autism or Asperger's Syndrome may have figured, since he (or sometimes she) heard it on her favorite television show, it must be okay. So many students with Autism Spectrum Disorders or other cognitive disabilities don't understand the "unwritten curriculum" at their middle school or high school.

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Writing Power

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 22:18:55 +0000

I don't know about your students, but my guys really struggle with writing. Sometimes it's short term memory challenges with spelling. Often it's fine motor challenges that either make their writing unreadable, or leave their hands sore and stressed out. I decided I needed some support.

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Happy Valentines Day

Sun, 05 Feb 2012 17:39:17 +0000

It's hard to keep ahead of all of the needs I see among my colleagues. I know that this is the time of the year when behavior is becoming a real challenge Where I'm teaching, here in Las Vegas, I don't have to deal with the gray, wet and cold weather of the North East, North West and Midwest, but our kids still can give us a run for the money. No question that we really need something to celebrate.

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Behavior Challenge Time

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 23:32:04 +0000

Watching traffic to Specialed.about.com and listening to my colleagues, it seems halfway though the year is about the time when things start getting crazy.

We are starting to get students moved to our Middle School after they've been chucked out of another school and sent to a behavioral program. Dread is rising. Some of the classrooms in our building send out regular calls for assistance from the hall monitors, and I can only imagine, with the noise I hear from neighboring classrooms, that they represent only the tip of the iceberg.

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Dolch Revisited

Sat, 28 Jan 2012 21:06:36 +0000

There are several high frequency word lists, including the Fry and Dolch Lists. The Fry list includes over a thousand words. The Dolch list is far more manageable, and includes only 220 words. Many of these words are not decodable using the rules of English phonics, and have to be learned through rote or context.

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Light and Heat

Fri, 27 Jan 2012 22:33:07 +0000

The work I did on addressing the behavioral and emotional disabilities lead me to post a blog last weekend which dealt with the subject of Oppositional Defiance Disorder. I questioned if it was real or a "social construct" created to shuffle kids off to the side. I have to fess up: in part I did it to get the conversation rolling, and it certainly did.

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Is Oppositional Defiant Disorder Real?

Sun, 22 Jan 2012 21:30:11 +0000

This past week I began my first class for my BCBA (Board Certified Behavior Analyist,) Management and Modification of Children with Special Needs. My instructor, Nancy Brown, comes from a career of teaching the emotionally challenged population in self contained programs. I look forward to hearing and sharing the strategies my classmates, many of them special educators or teacher preparing to be counselors, have to share.

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Autism and the DSM V

Sat, 21 Jan 2012 22:00:10 +0000

The New York Times published a front page article "New Definition of Autism Will Exclude Many, Study Suggests" Thursday (January 19, 2012,) ABC News picked it up and it's been splashed all across the media. Ironic, since I addressed the proposed changes in February of 2010, and our former Autism Guide, Lisa Jo Rudy, wrote an article about the changes last July.

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