I am a BCBA and getting my masters in clinical mental health counseling with a focus on narrative therapy. I am working with a teenager who just found out her dad is ill and may not recover. She is fully verbal and I believe understands the majority of what is going on based on how she talks about it. For our next session we are doing an art project together and constructing a social story. Mom and I agreed it is important for her to tell her own story in whatever way makes sense to her rather than just handing her a social story, with facilitation as needed. We are looking for some samples of social stories you may have used that center around this topic, just so we have some reference if needed. Thank you all in advance.

This is my third year as a special education teacher in TN, so I’m not sure if this is normal across the board or not. Our school has heavily pushed for inclusion across the board, except in extreme circumstances. I co-teach 4 classes a day and 1 intervention class. I have 4 kids who have social-emotional check-in times that I have to provide during homeroom everyday within their classrooms. We have one 65 minute plan per day, but I have grade level meetings on Mondays, PLC on Tuesdays, and IEPs on Wednesdays and Thursdays. So essentially, I get ONE 65 minute plan per week to case manage for 25 kids on my caseload. I can’t keep up, and I’m ready to give up teaching for good because of the stress level I’m experiencing. Is this the norm across schools? Can I expect anything different if I decide to move schools, or should I just accept my fate and call it quits?

TL;DR - I have too much on my plate and not enough time to manage it all. I’m ready to leave the field after 2 years.

I work in a self-contained elementary Autism Support classroom. This is my third year teaching. I’m really unhappy in my current situation. I have very aggressive students who bite, kick, or any other form of aggression you could come up with. Admin just gave me another student who has extremely high escalations of kicking adults and throwing things at the their heads. They also all self harm which I find incredibly heartbreaking to watch. A student smacking themselves in the face and crying for mommy is really traumatizing in general.

I spend my entire day managing these behaviors. My paras are great, but do not know how to manage the high behaviors, and it’s all on me. I really want to teach. Like I want to teach kids to read and do math, and something other than how to sit at a table.

My question is, would a Life Skills class fill that desire? Would it be less intense behaviors all around? I also think maybe a switch to Early Intervention might be good? I love preschool, I just couldn’t make money in preschool, but Early Intervention might work? Does anyone have any experience with a switch like this? I really love AS, it’s just that I can’t deal with the stress of this position day in and day out.

I am a special education inclusion teacher, and for various reasons, I am not enjoying co-teaching in the gen ed setting. This is my sixth year, so it's not a decision I'm coming into suddenly. Talk to me about self-contained, please. What are the pros and cons of teaching self-contained?

EDIT: some of the reasons I'm considering changing:

-the pace of the lessons is so fast that my students can't keep up

-pressure to scaffold gen ed content and work on IEP goals too

-gen ed teachers questioning me about the progress of kids 4 years below grade level, as if I will magically have them pass grade-level tests with 15 minute small groups

So I have something like an IEP and it has Both accommodations and modifications. In class I feel stupid in front of my classmates that I get to use my computer for notes during a test or a book during a test to help me cause they notice. I hate it whenever my friends ask me why I get to do less work then them and then have to contemplate whether I tell them why or not. I just feel so embarrassed about it. Or I’m wondering if I should tell them why I have to go to the sped teacher during study hall. Or why I get shorter tests or different tests than them. 😔 I wish I was normal

I’m exploring options into getting a SPED credential + MA in Special Education in California. My two options that offer both and are CSUs are San Diego State University or San Jose State University

SDSU:

• 2 years (1 for credential & 1 for MA)
• Student teaching 4-5 days a week during my first year, both semesters.
• Prerequisite courses needed (would take in summer)

SJSU:

• 3 semesters for credential + MA
• Student teaching begins 2nd semester at 2 days a week. 3rd semester is full time student teaching
• No prerequisites

I’ve attended info sessions for both schools and I’m curious why SJSU is one semester shorter, less classes, and less student teaching? Could SDSU better prepare me? Should I go the shorter route with SJSU? What do you think?

After graduating college with a degree in something else, my husband and I moved to Kentucky for his career. Long story short, I ended up getting my masters degree in Learning and Behavioral disorders and have been working as a mild/mod teacher for the last 6 years.

The schools are good in our area but we hate being so far from family. It was fine at first but we just had our second child and feel like they are missing out. We are considering moving to NorthWest Florida or Southern AL within the next 2-5 years. A stumbling block for me is I love my job so much, but special education varies so, so much from state to state.

So, FL & AL teachers, what is special education like there? What's your day to day? Is there any co-teaching? Is it all resource? What are case loads like? Any information that will help me decide where it's best for our family to land will be appreciated!

I'm in my senior year of highschool and I swear special education has only made my mental health worse. I've been going to sped schools basically my entire life, and even one of, if not THE best school for special education, is still an awful place. I'm sick of being treated like I'm incompetent and talked down to, I'm just as human as anyone else, and disabilities aren't supposed to lessen that, but here we are. I felt genuinely happy up until a bit before my 10th birthday, where I got hospitalized and missed it. I developed mental issues the longer I went to special education, and it hasn't helped solve them or keep me in a good mental space in the slightest. The education has been ass too, I want to do more, I know I'm smart, but I'm always getting work that's barely challenging at all, and that's always stayed the same too. I've been BY DEFINITION harassed twice, one time each in two different schools, with definitive evidence both times (I'm talking camera footage and text screenshots of crime accusations), and the school did jack shit. I just want to feel human, not like some object that's broken, and that's all that special education has done for me. Like, look at me, I'm pathetic. Ranting about how much I hate something on reddit. Sorry for bitching so much, I'm just so sick of this system.

I've been a para in self-contained SPED for several years now. I enjoy my job, and I've been preparing to enroll in a teacher prep program next year with the goal of becoming a special education teacher myself. This year my classroom has a new teacher- as in both new to us, and new to teaching, being in her second year. She's doing an excellent job, very involved and organized, and the kids love her, but it's becoming obvious she has zero work-life balance. She comes in early, frequently works through her lunch break, and says she never got to take lunches last year. She speaks of working all day after leaving the building- sometimes so late she barely gets to sleep. In her words, she has no life during the school year. She says this is normal for new teachers and that "they say you'll get it dialed in after three to five years if you stay in the same classroom."

I'm worried her unhealthy workload is going to cause premature burnout. It also makes me fearful for my own future career. I know I wouldn't make it even a full year if I couldn't take a break during the work day or have a few hours to myself at home. Is it really normal for new teachers to devote their entire day to work?

I’m seeking advice from both new and veteran special education teachers and case managers.

I’m in my 2nd year teaching (3rd at this school), and my mental health has deteriorated so much my therapist wrote a letter mandating me to work 4 days a week (on a 2:1:2 schedule). The list is too long, but chalk the work stress up to charter school red flags.

I’m the case manager and teacher for first grade, and am also the lead teacher for pre-k - 1. I am the licensed special education teacher on staff in my academy as the new k sped teacher quit (she had no experience and was on a variance). There is a consultant ECSE teacher at school 2x/week for pre-k. I live with Bipolar Type 1, and have been unable to get myself out of a depressive episode that keeps getting deeper and began in early August.

My principal and sped director were kind, gracious, and understanding with me when I asked for the time. I have an ADA protected mental illness, so legally they had to comply as well. However, until they hire for the k position, now none of the students will be served - they’re thinking compensatory minutes until they can rehire for k, as my principal refused to let me take on that case load as well as my current. We’ve spread out my current case load minutes so that I’m making up the 5th day during the days I’m there (adding 10 min to existing lessons). This all reads positive on paper but I’m worried about the reality of it all.

I am already thinking of where I can apply to teach next year, places with fully built out sped departments so I’m not the lone ranger being top priority. Of course, I am also sitting with the heavier thoughts of whether teaching is right and healthy for me long term.

Has anyone successfully taught and case managed on a 4 day schedule? Did it help to truly minimize stress?

Apologies for the long post. Thanks so much for your thoughts.

CONFERENCES:

you have a concerned parent about progress. And you have data to show progress has been made, just slow in comparison to his sister in the same room

For example didn’t know any sight words last year, knows 6 now. His progress reports shows progress on subtraction 1-10 with 10/10 in 4/5 weeks.

He doesn’t do well with phonetic based instruction but does better with memorization. I still work on letter sound phonetics supplementally

He’s a third grader. Grandma is comparing him to typical peers and his sister who progresses quicker.

How do you delicately have that covo with that parent that progress is made but it’s just at a slower rate. How to I make it positive and encouraging? I know a huge problem is his mind goes 10000 miles an hour so redirecting is needed, but progress is there!

Also learned that Monaco and Indonesia have similar flags, and that made us very confused lmao

So, I work as a para in California, under CSEA. Conditions where I work are extremely bad, including but not limited to massive under staffing, more kids in classes than is reasonable or I believe even legal, facilities constantly broken and highly under maintained, etc. Some of the other workers and I were wanting to organize a strike, but our contract gives the district the right to fire us if we do. I was told by another worker that we could write letters of concern for safety and there are legal processes they have to abide by in regards to it (specifically they have to fix it within 5 days, which I already know won't happen).

I was wondering if anybody who knows more about CSEA and california districts could help me out a bit here. Looking it up online I see that there are ways to report an unsafe environment, but I don't know who to report it to, or which specific standards to address in my letter. It also says you can report to OSHA to have them inspect, which I would love to do if I can, but don't know how to go about it. I was told to give the letter to our union rep, but part of the problem is said rep ignoring our calls and refusing to put in our work orders and generally discriminating against sped.

I live in a very small town, where they already cant hire people with their piss poor pay, so if all of us struck, they likely wouldn't be able to replace us within a year or two. I'm also curious about what yall think possible results of this could be. Would this being on my record ruin my intended career as a teacher? What would happen if they couldn't replace us quickly? Would they have to increase wages and safety standards? Or would they just scrap the program (which I know is illegal, but seems the most likely result)?

Hello fellow sped people,

I’m a first-year school psychologist and encountering an interesting case that I’d like to think SLPs and fellow psyches would find interesting and hopefully can give me some pointers. I’ll keep the details brief for privacy of the student, but the student is completely deaf and is in the adult transition setting in high school. They were born deaf, and didn’t receive any form of language until they were taught ASL in 6th grade when they moved to the U.S. (Their deafness was not identified until approximately 4 years old and lived in a country where they received no interventions for language in school it would seem).

Historically, the student has performed very low in non-verbal cognitive assessments. Similarly, they have performed low in adaptive assessments too, leading to their secondary eligibility for special education (behind deafness) as Intellectual Disability. HOWEVER, Im currently sitting with this case and wondering if there’s any possibility this student might not be intellectually disabled based on the idea that their overall lack of exposure to language has deprived them of a great deal of life experience to develop knowledge and reasoning skills and that they are still delayed as a result.

Any people have thoughts on this?

Yesterday, I would have told you I am the worst teacher ever. None of my students were listening. I spent an hour trying to get an eloper to calm down and get back on track. It was like I couldn't do anything right.

Today, my student made progress on their letter sounds from a month ago, we got through the morning without any big behaviors, and I even have one of my students asking for breaks when they were feeling disregulated. It was nirvana.

It's funny to me how this job can have really low lows, and really high highs. Days like today I couldn't imagine having any other job. Days like yesterday, I was a nano second away from giving up on my career.

Just erasing this post just for privacy reasons. You never know who will see this stuff. Thank you everyone who gave advice.

I just had a second round interview for a special education teacher aide position in a fairly nice district in the northeast US. The first interview (a month ago) was with the director of special education in the district, and the second (today) was with the principal of the school I could be working at. The first interview went great; it lasted about 30 minutes, and the interviewer was friendly, and I felt like I had it in the bag.

About three to four weeks later, I receive another interview request (over Zoom) from the principal of the elementary school I could be working at. I prepared myself a day or so before with potential questions he would ask and did a short mock interview with my dad. I log into the interview, and he is polite enough and jumped right in. The format of the questions threw me off quite a bit, as these were hypothetical questions on behavior (I do work with young students in my current role as a tutor, and they have all different types of behaviors and its my job to keep them on task and focused on their work), since the student the position is for requires support with their behavior. While at first I answered the questions fairly okay, then my responses became a bit more jumbled and nervous sounding. After a while, he asked me if I had any questions, and after he answered them, he told me what would happen next in the hiring process—that they had others they had to interview and if I was selected I would hear back “in the near future." and fill out an application/paperwork/ and give a list of references.

The interview started at 2:30. By the time I looked up, it was 2:45. 

Is this a bad sign? I asked my mom (who works in a school) if this was normal. She said the 15 minutes could be explained by the fact that it was headed towards the end of the school day, and maybe he wanted to wrap it up ASAP. But the “in the near future” gave her pause because she didn’t know if it was good or bad. Am I overthinking this? I don’t have much experience in the education field, other than my job as a tutor in a tutoring center (I have been working there for almost 3 years now).

Hello everyone, I’m just here asking for advice for my mom and sister. We’re really stressed out as it is from other problems and today has made it much worse

My(23f) little sister(7f) has autism(is nonverbal) and has been recently getting seizures since last year. She’s been getting medication for it, but this medicine’s side effect is personality changes and we’ve been noticing how she’s been getting more defiant while on this medicine. She doesn’t listen to me and will continue to do what she wants. She tends to only listen to my mother and her teachers, but now she’s starting to be defiant even at school. Shes been coming home with bad notes this week saying how she doesn’t take well to being told no, will scream and cry and even try to leave the classroom. And yesterday we were informed that she bit her new case worker, and it broke the skin. So this isn’t the first time she’s bitten a staff at her school, but the first time was at a different school(summer school) and wasn’t this serious considering the staff member didn’t even want to report it to the nurse because she didn’t want her getting in trouble.

So today, my mom gets a call from both her new and old case worker, informing us that they believe she should go to a different school, one for children with behavioral issues and is thirty minutes away. All the other schools are not accepting new students, and they said that they don’t believe that my sister is getting the help she needs from her current school. My mom doesn’t know what to do, and I feel really worried for my sister. Does anyone have experience with this? Advice? Or know what we should do?

also the medicine my sister is on is keppra

edit: sorry if I don’t reply to everything! If you asked a question, I didn’t reply either because I am not sure myself, or I’m just busy. I may end up deleting this point in 24 hours, but I still appreciate everyone giving me advice or asking questions that I can ask my mom to help guide her on what to do next.

I've been going over my School records and I came across this letter about me in grade 8. I am interested in finding out what could have been done in case I ever have children. I have redacted the school names and replaced my name with student

I am have sigifcant learning disability in terms of anything visual (Very superior verbal board line everything else) was diagiosed as ADHD and ODD at 9 and with written communication and reading communication as an adult.

The Student  has been attending high school ince September 1997. His last school was Elementary school.

In January of 1997 the student's I.E.P.. was suspended indefinitely because of continued "out of control " behaviour which included kicking, screaming, destroying school property threatened and actual assaults on students and staff. 

‘Shortly after that  parents withdraw the student  from school. In a letter to the Superintendent  the parents accused a staff member from Elementary School of using undue force while he was, trying to restrain student  The accusation was based on student 's account of the situation and they stated their son did not lie. ( Numerous documentation from student's permanent file contradict this).

The student returned to school in September at High School . He was placed in the Practical Academics class. This is a class for students who display behavioural or emotional responses so different from the appropriate age,culture or ethnic norms that his or her educational learning and the learning of other students in “regular" classroom situations would be adversely affected. There is a low enrolment plus a full-time teacher and Educational Assistant assigned to the room.

The Student  experienced little success in this class. The same type of behaviour witnessed in Elementary school continued to escalate. This included screaming, both in the classroom and the halls, kicking and trying to destroy school property in other means, taunting and threatening other students and actual physical assaults on other students and his teacher. In three months there were twenty incident reports filed. These were times when the student was so out of control he had to be isolated.

The student  was suspended from school until an I.E.P review and a full time E.A. for him was hired.

The student  returned to school in January. A full time E.A. was hired and a new schedule with an attempt at integration. The following is a daily log of progress to this date.

RECOMMENDATIONS

There has been no improvement in the students s behaviour since he made the transition from Elementary School to Secondary School. There has also been no change since his transfer from the school-based resource room to integration in the regular class.

This is despite the fact he has a full time Educational Assistant and is not attending

school for a full day. If anything his attacks are becoming more violent and of longer

duration as he becomes older and physically stronger. He is able to chose when he has a tantrum and has told the staff if he doesn't get his own way he will scream and make sure he disturbs the other students.

The school cannot offer the student the theraputic setting he needs. The continued stress on both students and staff following his outbursts are reaching a critical level.

I would reccomend that parents  investigate alternate educational programming for student  such as home schooling, or a theraputic setting that will be able to address not only his needs but also give some stability to their life. As has been documented student  continues to physically abuse his parents when they come to pick him up. He hits and kicks his father regardless who is around. They need toaddress these concerns for their own well being as well as students. 

I don't remember too much of this but I had to be regularly restrained I refused to leave the room to work I refused to work .

The final straw as I threw a tantrum and when the EA restrained me from damaging school property I bit him.

I am trying to unpack it but I can't believe what it means that I was able to choose when I had a tantrum. I guess I was a bratty child with bad parents (The school recogizned that my parents needed to be much firmer in my perminent record).

I was ultimately continued to have tantrums until grade 12 often around being required to leave to get stuff scriped or having to type when everyone else was handwriting I did have friends and always like hanging out but really didn't outside of school hours.

I am just look at what some pros might think on this. I find that being able to talk about iy even on line is help with my healing.

I'm a college freshman and sped is the only thing I'm actually passionate about. I don't think I have any other skills really. I've tried hard to think about other careers, but I'm terrible academically. All I want to do is help people but any career like that is just going to have worse and worse conditions.

Even though I'm a woc, the reason I sobbed after the election was because the potential effects on education, and special education in particular. I genuinely don't think I have anything else of value. I live in Mississippi but for financial reasons will have to teach my first couple years in either Mississippi or Tennessee. Y'all know which state is better for sped?

If sped is a sinking ship, what else can I even do?

Hi!

Does anyone receive a stipend in your contract for being in a special education teacher or liaison position (specifically in Massachusetts, but other locations are welcome to add)? We're negotiating our next contract right now, and I'd like to propose a stipend but need some examples.

Thanks in advance!

When i decided to quit my architecture degree a year and a half ago, my family was so concerned that i was making a big mistake. But being here, watching then grow, seeing how much i can do to help...that's what i was born to do. He just needed someone to look at him, and now everyone is seeing how bright he can be. This 100% goes to moments that changed my brain chemistry lmao

If Trump follows through with his plan to dismantle the department of education, IDEA is one of the first things to go. I don’t see how districts could then fund special education.

When the kids are in school, we get a 10 min paid lunch break with an option for an unpaid 30 min break. After the kids leave, we get another 10 min. I chose to have two 10s because I need money and we don’t get paid well. But this doesn’t feel right though, like my timer starts right when they say I can have my break and I have to be back right at 10 min mark. I have to run to get my bag (my bag is a short walk away from where they begin my break), microwave my lunch (in the same kitchen that the kids are using at the same time which is chaotic and sometimes there are no microwave available right away), then I have to eat my lunch super fast and nearly burn my mouth half the time. Is this even legal?? Like this just seems unethical to me.

I am the head teacher in a social emotional behavior focused self contained classroom. I am working with a student this year who is incredibly academically gifted. He is incredibly well read, has an amazing vocabulary and gets concepts quickly. He is very self reflective and caring and has very impressive insight for an 8 year old. His behavior can be erratic, but it is mostly under control. it is speculated that his mom was using amphetamines while he was in utero. He needs to stay busy to stay regulated and right now he colors a lot.

I would love to provide him with something that is stimulating to him academically, not too challenging because he is easily frustrated and that he can do on the side- during downtime or whole group lessons where he needs his hands to be busy.

I am not used to working with kids who need extra academic tasks. To be fair, he is sometimes disregulated by academic work but when he gets going he is above and beyond. and he’s well above benchmark in reading.

Any ideas of things I could provide for him? I’m willing to pay a little bit, like through Teachers Pay Teachers or something along those lines. TY!

Has anyone used generative AI to create program books for DTI? I hate pointing and clicking and it would be easier for me to just tell the computer to create what I want related to goals and objectives. Example: I want the presented material to have three different shapes (field of 3) and then the field is randomized on the 10 slides (10 trials). Any suggestions would help. Because point click copy and paste, randomized order etc. takes too much time.

Grade 4. Formally diagnosed with autism. Functions on grade level.

Here’s what the student needs: to complete small group work on pace with the teacher. He picks the part of the page he finds more interesting and does that first despite directions and redirecting.

We have had multiple incidents with a female student who (we believe) has some kind of vaginal infection. She consistently itches , especially when menstruating, and does it in class to the point of distracting other students. We asked the mom for permission to take her over to our on-site clinic (different from our school clinic, it is staffed with a nurse practitioner or doctor). Mom flipped the whole thing on us and is claiming that we are not cleaning her properly and that’s why she’s itchy. We do not clean her, but we do keep an eye on her in the bathroom as she tends to play in her feces if left unattended. The parent demanded a meeting with all teachers and all paras who are involved with her child. I looked through our job description and parent contact is not mentioned anywhere. My fellow paras and I all find it highly inappropriate that this parent is being allowed access to us as paras. We attempted to have a union rep there but it was rejected due to a student being the topic of the meeting. Am I wrong in thinking we should not be required to attend this meeting?

I'm looking to see if I have any options here for my kiddos. I have 2 sons, 5 yr old twins both with ASD. They had IEPs developed at age 3 but we decided against doing preschool at the time in favor for other therapies (speech, OT, PT etc.)

Background: I enrolled one of them in K starting August of 2024. Obv his IEP was out of date and they wanted to reevaluate over 2 months to make a new one for him. At this follow up meeting I was advised that he no longer qualifies for his IEP because he tested too high on such and such evals and what have you. I never had any questions re his intelligence. He's a very smart kid. It doesn't change the fact that he is still autistic and requires other accommodations. But I figured if he's succeeding then that's what counts and if that changes I'll have to push back a little. So this means he is no longer supported by the Special Ed team, which also means he will be removed from his bus that he's been taking because the door-door transportation was part of his IEP I guess and now without the developmental delay the ASD alone doesn't qualify him for this route.

Now: I started the process of enrolling my other son now and while they both have the same ASD diagnosis, it looks very different on both of them and son #2 has always required more support and had more struggles when it comes to...basically everything. He's very smart and all that but requires more time to process, more routine, etc. They're going to start him out the same way they started out son #1 and I expect the outcome to be different in that son #2 won't "test out." Because of this, they would qualify son #2 to take the bus door-door from our house like son #1 was doing.

Question: What I'm wondering is if there's any way to get an exception or appeal the removal of my other son from the bus route since both reside at the same residence and attend the same school? So far what I have found is no, but I would much prefer to put both sons on the same Special Ed bus rather than both on the Gen Ed bus since only 1 son "qualifies" on paper even tho both have the same diagnosis etc. Is there anything I might be able to do? It's not the end of the world either way but this is my first experience with this sort of thing and I'm just wondering if there's anything to do. (I'm in Colorado, if that makes any difference.)

Thanks in advance!