Schedules for Special Education Classrooms

Schedules, structure and predictably help special education classrooms run smoothly. There are so many different varieties of schedules out there, but it's important to find a schedule that works for each student developmentally. Here are some schedule ideas and tips for figuring out what schedule might be best for some of your students.

Object schedules-

Object schedules should be used with students who aren't effectively communicating with photos or picture symbols yet. If a student can't request an item with a picture symbol or discriminate between picture symbols yet, then his schedule shouldn't be in picture symbols, because might not be making the connection between the object in the picture and the real thing.

Photo schedules-

Once a student can use objects to communicate and to follow a schedule, move on to a photo schedule. Use actual pictures to create the schedule cards.

Source

Picture symbols schedules-
Once a student has mastered using schedules with objects and photos, move on to a picture symbol schedule. These can be made on Boardmaker or any other program for creating picture symbols. Picture symbols are typically line drawings or cartoon type pictures.

Tip: Once each part of the schedule is completed, have students remove the picture symbol from the schedule and place it in a basket that says "all done".

You can make any of these schedules simple by only using 2-3 pictures/objects at a time, or you can use man pictures/objects to create a schedule for the entire day.

Please post pictures of schedules you use in your classroom or other resources in the comments that may be helpful to me or others!