The purpose of this course blog is to serve as a practice exercise in EDM 510 Microcomputing Systems in Education.
In Special Education, the one thing that I struggle with the most with my students is organization. They come to me with papers shoved in their binders or book bag and want me to help them find an assignment they have completed and need to turn in. I constantly harp on the fact that I made them a binder with different tabs to keep their stuff in but it is just not working. I am reaching out to hopefully get some tips from more experienced teachers. Does anyone have any suggestions or tips on how to help them keep their things organized? I am open to any suggestions.
Hi Summer!
ReplyDeleteThat is a tough one. I am currently struggling with my students in the same area. I have also helped my students set up their binders with dividers and tabs. The only thing that I have found that works for me is by doing a notebook check 1-2 times a week. I use a rubric that assesses how organized their materials are. I would give them a grade for it. My last school used to harp on having so many grades in the grade book per week and this helped me out too. I would also reward students that had organized notebooks. Hope this helps! I'm looking forward to reading other's comments to this post because I need some new ideas as well!
The only problem I would have with a notebook check is that the students I have that need the organization skills are in a co-taught classroom. They do not receive grades from me but from a general education teacher. I guess I could pair with them and see if we could come up with a plan to help keep them a bit more organized. I also will start using the idea of rewarding the ones who do have their things neat and well kept. Thank you for the idea.
ReplyDeleteSummer,
ReplyDeleteAs a special education teacher this too is an area that I have addressed many times. I tried many things to no avail! After realizing that a binder for all subjects was not going to work for my students, I tried a different approach. In my classroom each of my students has a folder for Math and a folder for Reading (each folder is a different color). The folders stay in a box in my class and students are aware of where the box is located. During math, the students are able to retrieve their folder and open it to find the days work in it. If the work is completed, the students place the completed paper in the "finished" box which is located in a central location in the classroom. Students who do not finish their work are to place the paper back in the folder to complete at a later time. In addition to this, for students who really struggle with organization, a color coding system can be implemented. For instance, let's say the students math folder is red. When work is returned to the student, the teacher could use a red pen for grading to match the color of the folder in which the paper was to go into. The same could be done with any other subject. On Fridays, the folders go home to the parents organized by subject and weekly work. The students folders are then cleaned out and the process repeats itself the following week. Working with young students, the use of individual, color coded folders has been more beneficial in helping my students stay organized both in the classroom and at home than any other approach that I have tried.
I have a designated place in my room for my sped students to keep their work for my class. I normally do not give them an assignment that needs to be completed at home so there is no need to take it anywhere outside of my class. When they do need to work with the resource teacher outside of my class, then they have all the things they need in their folder. They take it with them to the resource room and return it when finished.
ReplyDeleteChristina I really like the idea of color coding and the colored folders I will have to try that. Now the only problem I am running into is when my middle schoolers go to 7 different classes a day and are expected to keep their notebooks in order they have no idea how to do this. I then look at their grades and they are receiving zeros on their notebook checks which tends to be a major part of their grade. I am hoping to find a solution to this problem as well. I am most definitely going to try the folders and colored ink with them for my classes. Thank you for the advice.
ReplyDelete