Advanced Curriculum Adaptation

As I have said I recently have been asked to attended a number of professional development opportunities for Instructional Assistants who are wanting to become teachers. As a result I have been asked to attend a number of conferences and participate in some advanced training sessions with the San Diego County Office of Education. One of the classes in which I took part was the Advanced Curriculum Adaptation course taught at the San Diego County Office of Education's North County Regional Education Center in San Marcos by Linda Dinkle on behalf of the North Coastal Consortium for Special Education. in this lecture Linda explains how general education instructors can modify their curriculum to meet the needs of their special education students. it is said that 10 out of 30 students in each regular education class has some form of documented learning disability requiring modifications to curriculum. This can be as simple as having a student pulled out of class for individual assistants in speech and language or occupational therapy, or as simple as having that student sit in front of the class so they can see the board and teacher, to having a full time Instructional Assistant or behavior specialist sit with that student in the classroom and work with them one on one throughout the day. The point that Linda stresses the most in her lecture is one of flexibility. Teachers must be flexible when they are making decisions about lesson plans, "the one thing that must be lingering in the front of your mind before you sit down to do your lesson plans is 'how can I modify these plans for my special needs students?'" Teachers must also be flexible in the way they deal with these students. She does not suggest lightening up your expectations or consequences on these particular students, but for the teacher to think about how they present classroom consequences in a way that these students can understand what went wrong. This may include something as simple as stickers on a piece of paper taped to their desk to private conferences with the student after class to discuss their behavior to collaborating with the special education team in your school to come up with innovative ways to deal with students behavior. the point she makes is that neither you nor the student are alone in this situation, and for general education teachers to make use of the special education teams within their schools so that both parties are successful and satisfied.