3/21/2024
Topic:
Students with Disabilities
Courtney Holcombe
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I know this says one student, but we have so many SWD, I'm going to use a whole experience I had one year. Several years ago, our school added an ASD unit with our EB/D units. They were the k-2 and we were going to get older students the following year. After the first year, with lots of struggles and NO training, I started to ask questions. The following year, our special-subject teachers all had a large gap in our schedules one day out of the week. My admin told us that we had to push in with a teacher of our choice. I immediately asked the ASD teacher and she was so open and willing. Plus, she had another adult in the classroom that could help. I learned so much that year. I learned to keep it simple, don't dwell on anything. I learned to offer items for stemming in my room (before that became the norm). I learned an alternative item in case an instrument or object was too loud or overwhelming. Such as, for my drumming. I had a class set of lollipop drums. Super cute, but busy in color/design and can be quite loud, so I passed out extra soft mallets to hit the drums and offered sound-restricted drums to my students who thought they were too loud. I also purchased 10 sound-cancelling headsets in case they needed it. It helped so much. The ASD teacher said I was the 1st Music teacher in her experience to ever do this. |
3/22/2024
Topic:
Tools and Strategies
Courtney Holcombe
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I have a student with ASD and my room & lessons are just overwhelmingly stimulating for him. So, I have him use a school chromebook and do a similar lesson via internet. Such as: We learn form, I have him watch a music map while listening to a simple music recording and he can draw out each new symbol on his paper, which hands me at the end of class. He is also encouraged to give his opinions of the music, but has to tell me why and what about the music makes him feel that way. |
3/22/2024
Topic:
Assessment of Learning
Courtney Holcombe
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I had a student with Autism who couldn't write on paper. The teacher told me that they adapted their lessons to be more hands-on/interactive. Such as cut outs and match to a picture, or with a question highlighted in a color and answer written in the same color. When trying these systems, I discovered that he COULD write if I gave him a boogie board (LCD digital writing pad). His teacher was ecstatic, and I gave her one of the boogie boards to use in her classroom, until she purchased one later. I still used color systems and cut outs for other activities. |