What to Store by your Door??

As we all know, being a Special Education teacher is different than a typical classroom.  For one, you are constantly juggling all of your students' and assistants' schedules.  And on top of that, lesson planning looks a whole lot different when you are creating and running a different curriculum for each student.  Luckily, my principal is very supportive and has let me come up with my own templates for both schedules and lesson plans.  I keep copies of my schedules (see my earlier post on creating these), my general lesson plan, as well as my evacuation plans posted by my door for easy access for administrators, classroom visitors, and parents to see.  I store them in top loading sheets which I velcro to the wall.  

Here is a screenshot of what part of my lesson plan looks like.  My lesson plan template is very simple and just gives a brief overview of the different types of topics covered under each subject, how they are assessed, etc.   Click here to access and edit my lesson plan template

When submitting my lesson plans to my principal, I also attach a list of each student's IEP goals as well as a spreadsheet showing in which classroom activities I am meeting those goals.  (These spreadsheets are also very helpful in figuring out minutes for my IEPs as well as explaining to parents what their child is doing each day!). 

For my evacuation plans, I use a template given to me by my district.  Click here to access and edit the template to fit your school. These evacuation plans are helpful in making sure there is always an assistant assigned to a student.  However, we rarely look at them, as our schedules say who each of us is assigned to at all times (so we know who to accompany out during fire-drills/evacuations).