Autism Classroom Resources Podcast: A Podcast for Special Educators – Details, episodes & analysis

What can you do in the first few weeks of school to help create a more smoothly operating classroom for teaching special needs students? I often talk about the importance of implementing strategies and systems to ensure your classroom runs efficiently and implementing some very basic strategies in the first weeks of school can help set you, your staff, and your students up for success.

The first few weeks of school are crucial for getting students used to your classroom and how things work. In this episode, I share why you should focus on building relationships with students and staff, the importance of using visuals, how to prioritize tasks for each day, and why you should reflect at the end of the school day.

03:41 - How to build relationships with your students in the first few weeks of school

08:50 - Ways you can build relationships with your staff even with limited time alone with them

10:36 - Why you should be using more visuals than you actually need

12:08 - The importance of making a prioritized list of tasks for each day

16:12 - Why reflecting on what is working and what is not working is crucial in the first few weeks

Show Notes: http://autismclassroomresources.com/episode175

Resources:

• Paraprofessional Schedules and Team Building Kit
• Free Classroom Reflection Form
• Join the Autism Classroom Resources' Free Resource Library
• Get more information about the Special Educator Academy
• Join the Free Facebook Group

If you're enjoying this podcast, could you please take a quick moment to leave your review on Apple Podcasts? It would mean the world to me and will help spread the word to other special educators. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Teachers struggle a LOT with building and leading their classroom teams. I want to structure this month’s podcasts around helping you do both because even if you’re just out of school and surrounded by paraprofessionals with three times as much experience, you need to take the lead. So today, I start with a discussion of the nuts and bolts of building the structure with a classroom staff so they can work as a team.

01:48​ - Why leadership isn’t some big, scary thing

03:55 - An overview of the first part of the structure you’ll need: the classroom zoning plan

06:20 - What a zoning plan doesn’t include and the key to making it work

08:00 - The purpose of the lesson plan and setting up the vision for your classroom

10:50 - What to keep in mind as you build the classroom structure with your staff

Show Notes: http://autismclassroomresources.com/episode131

Resources:

• Join the Autism Classroom Resources' Free Resource Library
• Get more information about the Special Educator Academy
• Join the Free Facebook Group

If you're enjoying this podcast, could you please take a quick moment to leave your review on Apple Podcasts? It would mean the world to me and will help spread the word to other special educators. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

For many of our students, high school graduation is not the end of their educational journey. We certainly have a lot more students who are recognized with autism now who are academically able to go on to secondary education. But how can we begin to help our students prepare for college, and what skills should we focus on? Today, our guest, Dr. Marc Ellison, shares some insight into this and more!

Dr. Marc Ellison is the executive director of the West Virginia Autism Training Center, located at Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia. Dr. Ellison has worked for almost 40 years to provide support to individuals diagnosed with autism, their families, educators, and caregivers. Dr. Ellison came to Marshall University full-time to lead the college support program, which was the first of its kind in the nation.

In this episode, Dr. Marc Ellison shares when to start preparing for college, the challenges students with ASD face in the college setting, what helps students succeed in college, and the importance of community.

04:41 - When to begin planning for the college transition

07:50 - What challenges students with ASD face in the college setting

15:00 - The skills and factors that have helped students with ASD succeed at Marshall University

18:42 - How he has created a community for students with autism on campus and the benefits of creating this community

23:59 - The importance of teachers anticipating student needs and having difficult conversations when needed

Show Notes: http://autismclassroomresources.com/episode217

Resources:

• Benchmarks of Successful College Supports
• Academic and Campus Accommodations That Foster Success
• Join the Autism Classroom Resources' Free Resource Library
• Get more information about the Special Educator Academy
• Join the Free Facebook Group

If you're enjoying this podcast, could you please take a quick moment to leave your review on Apple Podcasts? It would mean the world to me and will help spread the word to other special educators. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Teachers struggle a LOT with building and leading their classroom team. I want to structure this month’s podcasts around helping you do both because even if you’re just out of school and surrounded by paraprofessionals with three times as much experience, you need to take the lead. So today, I start with a discussion of the nuts and bolts of building the structure with a classroom staff so they can work as a team.

1:48​ - Why leadership isn’t some big, scary thing

3:55 - An overview of the first part of the structure you’ll need: the classroom zoning plan

6:20 - What a zoning plan doesn’t include and the key to making it work

8:00 - The purpose of the lesson plan and setting up the vision for your classroom

10:50 - What to keep in mind as you build the classroom structure with your staff

Grab the transcript, freebie and resource links at http://autismclassroomresources.com/episode131

Autism Classroom Resources' Free Resource Library... http://library.autismclassroomresources.com

Want more information about the Special Educator Academy? SpecialEducatorAcademy.com

Join the Free Facebook Group specialeducatorsconnection.com

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Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/autismclassroomresources/message

You want your students to have the best chance for successful inclusion, no matter the teaching environment. But students with autism, intellectual disabilities, or behavioral issues can sometimes find being in a larger educational setting difficult. So in this episode, I continue my discussion from last week and include four more tips on how to plan and organize for students with ASD entering a general education atmosphere so they can be set up for success.

3:00​ - How to be proactive with providing behavioral support for successful inclusion

6:43 - Why you don’t want to wait to provide support for a behavioral problem until after it occurs

8:13 - What you need to consider about reinforcements in the new, larger environment

10:57 - An important inclusion step educators often forget about

14:18 - How to make sure you prepare your staff

Grab the transcript, freebie and resource links at http://autismclassroomresources.com/episode130

Autism Classroom Resources' Free Resource Library... http://library.autismclassroomresources.com

Want more information about the Special Educator Academy? SpecialEducatorAcademy.com

Join the Free Facebook Group specialeducatorsconnection.com

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Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/autismclassroomresources/message

How can autistic students be successful and make the most progress in a general education setting? Whether they’re spending time in a specialist class like music or art or a full day in general education, there are some core things you can do to make sure the core program still works for them. In the first episode of this two-part series, I reveal some of the structure and support you can provide for students with ASD in larger environments.

3:45​ - The first step in planning successful inclusion for a special needs student

4:53 - An example of how the first step can play out with a student

7:33 - Effectively communicate your goals to the staff

8:58 - A really good strategy for identifying primary goals and sharing them with others

10:14 - Don’t forget about these (I’ve seen so many general ed classrooms that don’t have them)

Grab the transcript, freebie and resource links at http://autismclassroomresources.com/episode129

Autism Classroom Resources' Free Resource Library... http://library.autismclassroomresources.com

Want more information about the Special Educator Academy? SpecialEducatorAcademy.com

Join the Free Facebook Group specialeducatorsconnection.com

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Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/autismclassroomresources/message

If you’ve been listening for a while, you’ve heard me talk about student engagement. I’ve talked about the need to keep them engaged and things to do to keep them engaged. But this time, I want to talk about it very explicitly in terms of why it’s the key to everything for students with ASD and other disabilities.

2:29​ - What engagement means and what it looks like

4:36 - Why engagement is so important for your students

8:20 - The trick about engaging students you need to be aware of

9:04 - How to keep engagement on track during transitions

11:51 - How to schedule engaging activities when you have less staff on hand to help

14:52 - How to plan for unexpected breaks that can wreak havoc in your engagement scheduling

Grab the transcript, freebie and resource links at http://autismclassroomresources.com/episode128

Autism Classroom Resources' Free Resource Library... http://library.autismclassroomresources.com

Want more information about the Special Educator Academy? SpecialEducatorAcademy.com

Join the Free Facebook Group specialeducatorsconnection.com

How was the Special Educator Academy born? One of my biggest dreams has always been to create a place where special educators could come together and learn from each other. And Facebook, while great for connecting, wasn’t going to cut it. In this episode, I reveal how I came up with the idea for the academy, what if offers to educators like you, commonly asked questions about it, and how you can make use of it (even if you think you don’t have time).

00:56​ - What it was like to work as a school consultant pre-Internet

4:38 - How the academy has changed over time to make it easier to find answers to your questions

7:00 - An area the academy covers that I know is always in need

9:03 - How the academy is designed to used in very small doses of time and still be worth it

12:09 - What the academy is intended to be

Grab the transcript, freebie and resource links at http://autismclassroomresources.com/episode127

Autism Classroom Resources' Free Resource Library... http://library.autismclassroomresources.com

Want more information about the Special Educator Academy? SpecialEducatorAcademy.com

Join the Free Facebook Group specialeducatorsconnection.com

July’s here! It’s an interesting month for us teachers. Everyone tends to slow down this time of year, go on vacation, and just relax and chill. But those of us in the teaching world take some time out of our summer to gear up for the new school year. So to move you forward in that direction, today I want to give you some idea of materials I’d prioritize as you sit by the pool and think about how you want to set up your classroom.

1:30​ - How I used to spend my summers prepping for the classroom

5:12 - Ways to set up your visual schedules

6:33 - Making the use of visual schedules much easier (attention newer teachers!)

8:43 - What kind of picture schedule should you use?

12:29 - Ways to create materials for independent task work

14:09 - Why work tasks are important and the kinds of tasks you want to include

Grab the transcript, freebie and resource links at http://autismclassroomresources.com/episode126

Autism Classroom Resources' Free Resource Library... http://library.autismclassroomresources.com

Want more information about the Special Educator Academy? SpecialEducatorAcademy.com

Join the Free Facebook Group specialeducatorsconnection.com

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Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/autismclassroomresources/message

Students (and not just autistic ones) can get stuck on specific topics or items that they just can’t seem to let go. But these obsessions serve a purpose for the student. It’s your job to figure out what that is and how to handle it. In this episode, I take a look at perseverations, functions they can serve, and some strategies you can use to address them in your classroom.

2:06​ - How to know when you have a student who perseverates

3:54 - Figuring out what function perseveration serves for the student

10:37 - Ways to handle obsession-based perseveration

14:13 - My favorite concrete way to set limits on perseveration

17:09 - How to handle object-based perseveration

Grab the transcript, freebie and resource links at http://autismclassroomresources.com/episode21

Autism Classroom Resources' Free Resource Library... http://library.autismclassroomresources.com

Want more information about the Special Educator Academy? SpecialEducatorAcademy.com

Join the Free Facebook Group specialeducatorsconnection.com