Paraprofessional Series: Working with Experienced Special Education Paraprofessionals as New Teacher

Working with paraprofessionals can be one of the best and hardest things about being a special education teacher. It can be particularly hard when you're a newer teacher and working in a classroom with experienced paraprofessionals. It can feel weird to give a para instructions, directions and guidance if the para has more classroom experience than you or if the para is significantly older than you.

Paraprofessional Series: Training Paraprofessionals

There are SO many things that special education paraprofessionals need to be trained on... behaviors, data collection, AAC and communication, confidentiality, mobility, academic instruction, and SO much more! There literally isn't enough time in the day to train paras on everything that they need to know. It seems that there are two major barriers to training paraprofessionals: time and resources.

Paraprofessional Series: Having difficult conversations with paraprofessionals

Coaching and managing paraprofessionals is one of the hardest and most rewarding parts of being a special education teacher! I have been blessed with some amazing paras over my years in the classroom, but I have also had to have my fair share of difficult conversations with paraprofessionals.

4 Ways to Build Positive Relationships with Paraprofessionals

The relationships between a teacher and paraprofessionals can make or break a classroom. Many teachers literally spend more time with their classroom staff than they do with their family and those relationships directly impact the kiddos, so having positive relationships within the classroom is so important!

4 Tips for running Literacy Groups in a Special Ed Classroom

Literacy is one of my favorite times of the school day! I want to share 4 of my favorite tips that help to make  literacy groups fun, engaging and meaningful in my special education classroom.

Things to Do The First Week Before School

The weeks leading up to the beginning of the school year can be really overwhelming for teachers. I see a lot of teachers worrying SO much about how their classroom looks, that they often don't think about the logistical and organizational items that are much more important than having a perfectly decorated classroom. It's imperative to get some of the logistical tasks done before the first week of school so that you can put all of your attention and time on the students those first few wild weeks of school.

4 Tips for supporting paraprofessionals with teaching academic skills

Unfortunately, paraprofessionals are sometimes only used for supporting with behaviors, but paras can be a HUGE asset when used to work on academic skills and IEP goals. If paras are new to the classroom or haven't been expected to lead small groups in previous classrooms, it can be scary for the teacher and paraprofessional to expect the para to lead academic instruction.

Tips for Ensuring Paraprofessionals Take GOOD Data

Data collection can be hard, so you should take some load off of yourself and utilize your paraprofessionals for taking meaningful data! However, you can't expect to hand a data sheet to a para and get good data... Here are a few tips to ensure that your paras are able to take GOOD data.

3 more tips for effectively working with paraprofessionals

If you work with multiple paraprofessionals, it can be very difficult to make sure you're all on the same page. I work with 3 paras, and it's normal for at least 1 of them to be out of the classroom at a time (either in specials, in general ed, in the bathroom, etc.), so I often find it hard to tell all of my paras something important at the same time. I've written a few posts about working with paras effectively and supporting them so you can be a great classroom team. First, make sure you start the year off right with paras by using these these 3 tips for starting the year off right with paras here. Then, support paras by providing them with visuals (this post has some examples and freebies).

3 Tips for Training Special Education Paraprofessionals

I totally get how stressful it can be to train sped paras... Like I've said before, every year I have taught I have had at least 1 new para, which means training training and more training! This year I have 2 new paras so I really need to step up my training game. Balancing required school trainings/ PDs and making sure you have time to train your paras can be tricky! Check out these three tips to get the most bang for your buck out of your para PD.

3 Tips for Starting the Year Strong with Paraprofessionals

Starting the school year off with paraprofessionals can be tricky... especially if you're working with paras who are new to your classroom (or new to the career all together). It's so important to start the year off by creating a team mentality, promoting collaboration and being clear about expectations and responsibilities. Here a few tips that have helped me to start the year off on a good note with my paras: