There are several times in the day that are especially difficult for my students on the autism spectrum and these are the times where they are expected to "play" independently or when at an independent center such as listening center or reading center. I ran into two main problems with these parts of the day. First, students had NO idea what to do when presented with an entire shelf full of toys. Second, sometimes students have zero desire to listen to a book on tape especially if they don't know when to turn the page and/or they cannot read. To solve both of these problems I developed choice boards for these parts of the day. A choice board consists of several pictures symbolizing activities and student name cards. When asked to make a choice, a student finds their name card and places it next to the picture symbol of their choice. In my room, I don't have a limit on how many people can pick one particular activity but this could be an option as well. Right......

In my classroom, we are always transitioning between different groups among various areas of the classroom and building. Organizing and storing all of the materials needed for each group was a bit of a challenge until I found this storage system. The TROFAST storage system from IKEA is amazing!! It has a ton of simple, handy features that have made it my all time favorite storage solution in the classroom!  **This post contains affiliate links and I will be compensated if you make a purchase after clicking on my links. I only recommend products that I use and love!** Compact Design :  The shelf I bought does not take up a lot of room at all (only a foot and a half by 1 foot area of floor space).   There are a variety of configurations available based on what would fit best in your classroom. Some rooms prefer lower shelves . This is especially helpful if you have students to like to climb!   Bins :  Each plastic bin can slide out on either side of the shelving u......

A great way to create a physical boundary that is also functional is using white wire shelving for our structured teaching area. On one side of the shelf we store all of our file folders and taskboxes. This side faces the lower-level independent work station were kids are mostly working on these tasks. (Note for several students we use a sheet to cover the shelf while they are working to minimize the distraction). On the other (back) side of the shelf, I attached a large pocket organizer using binder clips which we use to store all of the worksheets needed by the students working at the higher-level independent work station. Everything we need is easily accessible at each work station and the shelf physically separates the two stations as well. ...