Tucker Ch. 3

As special education teachers, we need to adapt our lesson plans toward the specific needs of our students. The book points out how teachers often use a great deal of verbal/auditory information when teaching. We need to remember to include much more visual and hands on materials/activities. This will make our students, especially students who struggle academically, more involved and learning may actually become exciting to them. Getting students more involved and willing to participate is key. Students who participate in class are probably going to learn more. I know that all through school, even in grad classes, I seem to take in so much more information when we do hands on activities. When a teacher is lecturing I would often drift off and think about just about anything else rathering than taking in the material I was supposed to be learning. Group activities are also a great thing to incorporate into the classroom, especially when you can pair stronger students with weaker students. We need to remember to make learning fun!!

Tucker Chap. 1 & 13

As teachers, we must keep in mind one of the very first things mentioned in this book. We want to incorporate fun activities in the classroom but we must always ask, "What are the pupils learning during the activity?" I am all about using fun activities for learning but we must remember the students need to be learning skills. Hands-on techniques are great for teaching these skills. Something as simple as giving the children play or real money to assist in learning the values of each coin or bill as well as learning to count money out can make learning the skills much easier and memorable for the children. I think that real-world problems are one the most important types of problems we must teach, especially to our students with math disabilities. They must be able to have the skill to tell time, count money to pay for things, measure for cooking, etc. I thought that chapter 13 gave great examples of math activities to incorporate into our classrooms!

Gipe Chap. 8 & 9

Reading and writing go hand in hand. The more you work and improve your students' reading, chances are you may see some improvement in their writing and vice versa. From my experience working with students with learning disabilities (or any student for that matter), as soon as you make learning into something fun, they become very excited to do it. I let my students with a LD in written expression write about topics they choose and that is of interest to them. Suddenly, writing has turned into something they actually enjoy doing. I think that it is important for students to be able to write without judgement at times. Reading and writing are the basic skills students need in order to be successful in their education.