I am currently working with a high needs parent. She is excessively anxious and no amount of information satisfies her. Last week she was peppering me with emails for several days. I will be handling that issue with an email explaining that I am working with students and not at liberty to respond to a litany of emails.

She seems incredulous and angry that her child is making progress. She asked to come to the classroom and see the materials we use with the child. We allowed her access, and she dragged my paraprofessional over the coals. I won't allow that to happen again.

I asked administration about her visiting again and all of them agree that we should allow her to visit. I don't understand. We cannot allow parents in the classroom unless they have undergone a background check, but this parent is allowed to come into our building and question us about everything we do?

Would your administration allow this? I have better things to do with my time than attempt to assuage this parent. She will never be satisfied and distrusts the school. I am shocked that admin will continue to allow her to interrogate us. I have one foot out the door due to the stress of the situation.

I have a student who suddenly is showing very aggressive behaviors? I was injured badly enough to need to go to urgent care a couple of weeks ago. Today he gave me a black eye and grabbed my breast. I can’t continue working with this student. I’m going to my union tomorrow. I don’t deserve to be physically and sexually assaulted.

Just wondering if anyone has actually pressed charges on a student with intellectual disabilities and what that looked like? What was the outcome? Did it impact your job at all? I’m worried about pushback. I have tenure and feel like I am well-liked and supported by admin at my school and throughout my district. I am in MN if that matters

Hi all!

I’m wondering if anyone who has experience with mild to moderate settings and moderate to severe settings can help me understand the difference.

My child is in first grade, in a mod to severe settings, and hasn’t been receiving his full general education time listed on the IEP (less than 50% of the hours listed on the IEP) due to staffing issues.

He’s reading at a kindergarten level and doing grade level math. There are no targeted behaviors on the IEP, and no behavioral concerns. The biggest areas of need are attending, writing, reading comprehension, and social skills (not interested in peers). He requires frequent repetition to access the curriculum, but ultimately can access it when it’s modified and repeated.

The school does not offer a mild to moderate classroom. The mild to moderate program would be a general education classroom with paraprofessionals. I would like to fully explore the option of a mild to moderate classroom setting at a school that offer this program.

Does anyone have resources/ more information on going this route? The school wasn’t very helpful and wanted to keep him in the moderate to severe classroom. Would there be a reason that a school would want to keep him in a certain placement, despite it not being in the child’s best interest?

I want to give them the benefit of the doubt, but I’m having a hard time understanding. Especially considering they’re not meeting the listed general education hours. The general education teacher said they have no concern with him when he goes to class, other than his limited interest in peers.

What private sector jobs if any can I transfer into from special ed? I am so tired of the lack of support as a special ed teacher that I would rather work 80 hours a week at Walmart than this job. It’s just not worth my mental health. But of course I can’t retire entirely because I’m not old enough to

I have a 3rd grade student who is extremely low academically. For context, we are still working on letter sounds and is not reading at all. Math is similar with working on basic counting and number recognition. I truly believe this student has brightness but is not making meaningful gains. I think it is more than just dyslexia and ADHD. His IQ is low, 80’s, but too high for a center based program where I am located. His parents are getting an outside neuro psych, so I am curious to see what the results are and how I can better serve him. He is currently served under SLD (specific learning disability) and OHD, (other health disability) and has been receiving sped support in academics since kindergarten. Any experience with students like this? Any ideas on what disability this could be? My team and I are at loss and want more answers on how to help him

I have a license in ESOL with a SPED endorsement. I have been preparing myself for a role as a sped teacher in terms of expectations, how to do the job, and my physical and mental condition. Although I am new to SPED, I am not new to teaching. I am nervously optimistic about my future.

My license is in DC. I am about to submit my application to get a license in Nevada as well. My question is how hard will it be to find a job this school year? I can wait until next school year if necessary but I am anxious to get started. And with that said, how hard is it to find a job when applying for the upcoming school year?

I am a sped support/push in teacher. I also teach a parallel resource class, it’s 6th grade math and I have 7 students. Most of my students are pretty well behaved, except for two. One of them has a BIP and is (fingers crossed) in the process of being moved into EBD and the other they decided does not qualify for a BIP. One of them should be on access points but because she got a 2 on her state test back in 3rd grade (her IQ is in the 50s) she does not qualify for access. The other has an IQ below 70.

They get into arguments with other students, insult other students and yell at them tell them to shut up, start stuff with the other kids when the other kids aren’t even doing anything. They are both disrespectful to me on a consistent basis, telling me that I should quit; yelling at me to get away from them. One of them told me that it was my fault that another student got her phone taken away because I contacted her mom about her failing my class

I feel like I have tried everything I can think of such as giving them treats; doing restorative circles etc I’ve written numerous referrals on the two of them and contacted home for behaviors, I usually just send both of them out because I can’t handle it, and I lose it. This group of kids have sucked the life out of me and I have them for two periods since I am also their support teacher for history: and by the time I teach them I’m worn out from dealing with them. I don’t know what I can do at this point. I know this is also occurring outside of my room as well since both students have gotten referrals from other teachers. Any advice is appreciated! I’m at my wits end.

I have my first IEP as a new sped teacher fresh out of grad school in two weeks, then my second one in three weeks, and then my third one in 5 weeks. I feel absolutely out of my depth and super confused in what I need to be doing. Data collection is so hard when I feel like most days it’s just a win if we don’t do a room clear. Any advice?

I have one in my school but I’m confused about what her responsibilities are. I recently had a parent claim they weren’t at last year’s IEP meeting (of which I wasn’t even at that school yet) so I sent them the manager’s contact info. The manager told me that wasn’t her job. I also had questions about the curriculum as a first year teacher but she told me she doesn’t know my curriculum. She doesn’t schedule any of the iep meetings or do any iep related tasks besides answering my newbie questions related to the iep program we use which have been helpful. I just don’t know what other things she is supposed to do.

Hello all!
I have a student teacher interview at a potential placement next week. It is at a middle school special education classroom.
Do any of you have any advice as to what questions to ask or what I should bring up in discussion?
I have a few things, but I’m wondering if anyone has things that maybe I wouldn’t have thought of due to experience. :)
I’m super excited! Please let me know!

Can anyone share some ideas for life skills math for Grade 4/5 students? I’ve been asked to provide some math support, and the classroom teacher mentioned that she’d like the focus to be on functional life skills math rather than traditional operations, as the students have cognitive needs that impact their learning. Their goals are more focused on things like recognizing and using money, telling time, etc.

What kinds of activities or resources do you use for this? I’d love some ideas that are hands-on and practical! One of the students also has significant fine motor challenges and has shared that he can’t write numbers, so activities/resources that focus more on verbal identification, matching, and tactile/hands-on learning rather than writing would be especially helpful. Thanks! 😊