Last weekend I got a fabulous email from The Mailbox  with an awesome 40% off deal on their already on clearance theme kits. I was able to get 3 kits for a total of $18 plus shipping! What a great, great deal! Although the deal is no longer good. The theme kits are still available for 50% off so they are $10 each. I definitely recommend these kits for any Preschool-Kinder-1st Grade and/or Elementary SpEd teachers. They come with 2 themes per kit with 4-5 activities per theme. All of the materials are full color, sturdy and LAMINATED! If they came pre-cut I would be in heaven but they don't and I am still pretty darn excited! Check out all of the kits and themes HERE ! ...

Karlie at  We Are ALL Special ! recently wrote a post asking about the roles of paraprofessionals in our classrooms. Originally I was going to just comment on her post but as I started thinking about all the things my wonderful paras do I realized it was too much for one comment! So I decided to sum it up on this week's Think About It Thursday post... I have two paras (Miss J and Miss T) that have been with me for 6 years (which is my entire classroom teaching career!). Since we all started out together and have been together for so long we have really developed an amazing team (if I do say so myself!). I have a hard time envisioning my classroom without them. We each have different strengths and weaknesses and we have learned over the years how to balance each other out and I plan our schedule and assign roles accordingly. For instance, I can be a scatter-brain during the day because I am always thinking about the 22 emails I haven't read yet, which IEP is due next week, ......

I recently had a fellow MD teacher email me to ask about how I organized all of my materials. This is such a tricky part of the special ed classroom because we often have lots of stuff!! Each student has different needs which typically leads to different materials which leads to me making (and storing) a whole bunch of stuff. Plus, once you spend a lot of time making materials you hate to throw them away and end up hanging on to them just in case you get a kiddo with similar needs. Taskboxes: A big part of teaching kids with autism is using taskboxes. Students with autism seem to thrive with taskboxes since there is a clear beginning and end. They are a great, reusable way to assess skills or provide extra practice. In my room I use one of those white wire dividers to hold all of my taskboxes and some file folders that I use for students at the independent (or TEACCH) work center. When we aren't getting materials off of the shelf I cover it with a simple, twin sheet from Wa......

I'm linking up with Karlie at <a href=" http://karlie-johnson.blogspot.com/ ">We are ALL Specials</a> for her Classroom Before and After Pictures Linky Party. As I shared back in May, my district moved us to a new building. My wonderful paras helped me pack about 100 BOXES!! Eeeek! So walking into my classroom looked like this.... I could hardly even get into the room to start unpacking! It was such a disaster. Then, I started getting things organized and then maintenance came in to do a variety of things (paint, install projector, retile bathroom floor, install shelving, etc) and EVERY time they moved a bunch of stuff and didn't put it back. GRRR! After lots of organizing (and reorganizing!), I am almost done! I REALLY hope everything is ready for the kiddos' arrival on Tuesday. I will be sure to share some "after" pics then!...

My paraprofessionals are in charge of planning our thematic cooking and craft activities each week and each week I select two special students to assist my paras. These students are the Head Chef and Head Artist. These two jobs are hands-down the class favorites. I think it is basically because they get to do so many of the "teacher" jobs (passing out supplies, modeling the activity, calling on students) and sit in the coveted "teacher" chair at the kidney table. Each Monday, we go over who gets to do the head jobs. I like talking about it on Monday because it give the kids something to look forward to and for those kids that need the extra behavior motivation it helps also. I place the students' names under these cute signs (click the link below the picture to print!) Head Jobs Signs To make the job even more special I made these adorable aprons for the kids to wear. They love them!  I even had a little guy that didn't really understand that the j......

Last year, the office where my mom works went out of business. They had tons of office supplies to donate and my classroom was luckily one of the luck recipients. The best find in all of the donations were clear, plastic self-adhesive business card holders . **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!** These are an awesome reuseable option for labeling cabinets, shelves, and bins throughout my classroom. I love my classroom labels to be pretty and I hated having to reprint and laminate them every time I reorganized my storage or group bins. With the adhesive card holders all I had to do was print, cut, and slide them in. I was also thrilled to discover that they came off of my cabinets fairly easily when I had to move to my new room and it seems like I will still be able to reuse them! ...

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. Rig......

Download my FREE PECS Phase 1 Cheatsheet! I look forward to connecting with you and sharing SpEd Spot tips and FREEBIES! Download the PECS Cheatsheet Built with ConvertKit Last year, one of my kiddos has a speech evaluation and it was determined that we should try to use PECS  (Picture Exchange Communication System) with him. I am not sure how many readers have used PECS in their classrooms but I find it to be very complicated! PECS training is only provided locally 1-2 times per year and it is expensive. There was no training available until after school was out therefore i n order to get some information on the system, my paras and I used the OCALI (Ohio Center for Autism and Low Inci de nce) Autism Internet Modules . The modules were very informative (I have used them for other topics as well and I really think they are a wonderful resource). In fact, they contained so much information that I started to worry about being able to remember all of the steps to this ver......

Download my FREE IEP Goal Brainstorming Form I look forward to connecting with you and sharing SpEd Spot tips and FREEBIES! Download the FREE IEP Goal Brainstorming Sheet Built with ConvertKit Every SpEd teacher knows that unfortunately, our jobs entail TONS of paperwork! When it came time for writing IEPs or progress reports, I always felt like I was swimming in piles of papers on my desk. I have developed some forms which help me to stay organized and prevent me from being overwhelmed. I have compiled all of these forms to create the  The SpEd Teachers’ Must-Have IEP Organization Kit . Here is what the kit includes: IEP Goal Brainstorming Form : I use this form to gather all of my thoughts when I am brainstorming for an upcoming IEP. It is a great tool to have when meeting with homeroom teachers or related service providers because all of the teams thoughts can be recorded in one spot and you can easily see the big picture all at once rather than flipping through......