Blog 5 (colleagues)

Ashley,

Best of luck to you. Ashley I know you will succeed in your future because of the experiences you’ve had in this field. I think we all have learned important information from all of our colleagues and field experiences that we will be able to apply our own in to our future teaching. I love your expressions you have on Early Childhood and for having such positive feedback to give to us you will be great as an advocate. Take care best of luck!!!

Brittany,

Thank you Brittany for your awesome post and experiences you had in your observation. I learned a lot of insights from your experience. I think it was awesome that you had the opportunity to work with first graders and observe their work. Best of luck in the future, and I know you will be an excellent teacher and advocate for students and families. Take care!

Blog 5

Thank you colleagues for a great semester. I can honestly tell you this was a great experience for me, I learned a lot from all of my classmates and especially the school I had the pleasure to observe and interview. Among these interviews I had the pleasure to interview professionals and families who were more than delighted to share their insights and experiences with me. It was a learning experience that will benefit me in the long run. Thank you Mrs. Sisie and classmates. Happy Holidays!!

Blog 4 / Family Interaction

For this module my observations and interactions were mainly focused on the children and their families.  On November 18, 2011 Round Lake Preschool had a Parent Day Involvement before we went on Thanksgiving break it was a success. I had the opportunity to observe families and their children play and participate together. This helped me further understand were the parents where coming from. In this special Ed classroom there is a child name Hunter (using a different names) he is diagnose with hearing impaired, he uses a hearing headband to help him hear in the classroom and at home.  When his mother arrived to parent involvement she was very happy and ready to help her child and participate in any activity she was able to assist. Her exact words, “I love when the school does these types of activities” Mrs. Hunter (Hunters Mom again different name) says, she enjoys these type of activities this helps her understand more the program  of special ed and allows her to ask questions to the teachers about play. I also explained to her the importance play is for her child. We enjoyed our conversation. New insights I learned from Mrs. Hunters point of view, is that parents appreciate the resources the teachers provide about Special Education, she also says building relationships with your children’s teacher is very important. She said she is very pleased with Hunters teachers and therapists because they are working hard to help Hunter succeed and they try to communicate with her as much as possible.

                In another case, it was the opposite with Mrs. Perez (change name) for her it is difficult because she is a non English speaker and it is harder for her to communicate with the team and teachers.  She told me she is always in need of someone to provide the help she needs sometimes she does not have that options and it makes thinks harder. For example, she mentioned a conference date they had and no one was available to translate, she said, it was the hardest thing ever. The next day she asked her niece to call the teacher and set a date when they can meet again to do the conference but this time with her niece to help her understand. As an advocate for families who have children in special needs it’s very important to meet the parent’s needs, because they need to know their child education.  I also was able to observe Mrs. Perez play with her child; she was more interested in starting conversations with other parents than playing with her son. I knew this parent need it a lot of redirection, she is a great parent because she wants to learn and set goals for her son. Mrs. Walker said that she tried to get involved in all the activities as much as she can. I am an advocate for families and one of my topic led to the conversation me and Mrs. Walker were having, I said the school need it more parent involvement days and more resources for the parents in the school. She completely agreed with what I was saying to her. Mrs. Walker is an awesome teacher she tries to do what’s best for the children and always strikes for the best. I’ve learn so much throughout my observations and interactions in the special education field.

Interacting with Professionals/ Blog 3

For this assignment I had the opportunity to interact with other professionals in the school. All these professionals play an important role in children’s IEP meetings. During these 2 weeks I had the pleasure to interact with the entire professionals and learned what they had to say about IEP and parent involvement. One thing is for sure and which they all agreed to what Ms. Val a speech therapist had to say, “Parent involvement is very important in a child’s education, because there is just so much we can do at school, to be able to see progress there has to be carryover at home”. I have to say I fully agree with what she told me. Most of their learning’s happen at home as they do in school in order for children to succeed we need to work together and build connections from home to school. Mrs. Laura the occupational therapist in special ed feels the same way. In the beginning of the school year Mrs. Laura send letters home to get permission by parent and doctors to start OT (occupational therapist) and she had a hard time getting those sheets sign, she wishes parent were more involve and attentive to their child. For the therapist it’s very important to start therapy as soon as possible, because they all have different goals they need to meet. All the goals are set up by the therapists the time is quarterly or time wise therefore they need to start working to accomplish the goals they have. Miss. Eva is a physical therapist she comes in and works with a child in Special ed, she is 4 years old and has no body movement in her back. When the child sits down, her back goes straight to the floor. Miss. Eva is working hard to help the child in Special Ed.  Miss. Eva says, “She is trying hard to help Emily achieve her goals and makes the activities fun for Emily to enjoy”.  Miss. Eva role in IEP meetings is very important, because she states what is best for Emily, they also asked for the family to help do the same activities at home with her this will help the process of progress.

I learned new experiences with the professionals in this field of Special Ed. I was able to see what is inside the IEP and the construction of it. I was able to see teachers, therapist, parents, and administrators point of view in a sitting of an IEP. Everyone contributes but they are all advocates for the children. Mrs. Phillis the coordinator of Elementary support services agrees with me when I talked to her about many parents not understanding Special Ed, especially Hispanic families sadly but true. I enjoyed observing and interacting these two weeks it was an experience.

Observing and Interacting

 

My observation location is in Round Lake; the school is called Round Lake Preschool Program District #116. I am observing and interacting with staff in a special ed classroom with children ages 3-5 years old. The teachers name is Stephanie Walker (Mrs. Walker) and the speech therapist is Ms. Val. During these two weeks I had the pleasure to interact with the teacher and the therapist in the classroom. I also enjoyed all the children in the classroom. The classroom consists of 10 children, the days that I went to observe there were only 6 to 8 children present. It was a fun experience, mostly all children in the classroom have a language barrier with the teacher, because she only speaks English and they speak Spanish. It worked out well, because I am fluently in Spanish it was fun starting conversations with my little friends.

            “Do parents feel intimidated to make decisions when the team of supporters is present in the IEP meeting? This is one of my focus questions I have for our future research paper assignment we have for EDU 411. I was able to collect information from Mrs. Walker. During a conversation we had before class we were talking about IEP meetings, she repeatedly told me most of her students all came from Hispanic families, she also mentioned all parents were not aware what IEP documents were. Some challenges that Mrs. Walker has to faced daily is her language barrier she wishes she can do more for her students families but there is just so much you can do. My time there was meaningful to me, I was able to see that these children have a lot to learn and accomplish, I also know that these children need all the help they can get. According to the therapist Mrs. Walker has the lowest function children in speech and other concepts. 

            I was able to observe Ms. Val work with a whole group during speech. It was a great experience to see the positive effects she gave all students. The activities consist of repetition, which this is the best method to help young children.

        I am able to make connections with one of my topics title parent involvement. I am able to see that most of these parents do not tend to work cooperatively with their children. I say this because out in the hallway of the school, they have a board title “family project” the two classrooms in special ed have all their projects in, as for Mrs. Walkers classroom none of the children have there project.I had a great time participating in her classroom during those hours. Mrs. Walker favorite phrase is, " hands-on experiences help children learn and explore" that is one of my biggest belief as well, that's how I absolutely love to learn.

Blog 1/Interview

After interviewing two amazing teachers in two different fields, I decided to be an advocate for Special Education. Special Education is a very serious topic there is a lot involve and I'm very excited to learn and prosper with this topic. I interview two different teachers, one was  at-risk preschool teacher and  the other special ed teacher, in which I enjoyed learning their different roles.

The three areas I will focus in will be the following, helping families  with information about  the development of their child's IEP, as well as support and encourage their decision so they do not have to feel intimidated when it comes to IEP meetings.  Secondly, helping families know their rights of their child’s education laws, and lastly, I will focus on parent involvement.

Questions for my colleagues, what other topics do you think will be interesting for becoming an advocate special ed teacher? The topics I chose do you find them to be interesting? For those who are parents, do you think this will be a topic of interest?

First Time

Hello colleagues, 

This is my first time working with blogs. Hopefully I did this correctly,I am new to this so hopefully we can all help each other. For the record I am excited to learn from my peers this quater.