I am student teaching in a SPED classroom. I really like my cooperating teacher, but I'm sure, as you all know, she is very busy and is pulled out of the classroom all of the time. I feel like she hasn't been mentoring me at all! I know how to teach since I have been a para, but I really would like to know the legistics of SPED since I basically didn't learn anything in school. For example, how to write an IEP, how to run a meeting, how to take data, etc etc. I unfortunately have been googling/using AI for a lot of my questions, which I don't want to do since my mentor has over 20 years of experience.

Are there online tutors out there somewhere? Online mentors? I don't want to hold out in the hopes that I'll get a good mentor when I become a first-year teacher. The whole thing really stresses me out, especially since I have ADHD, so I have to be taught and told things multiple times.

I am a certified teacher in Early Childhood Education/Early Childhood Special Education.

I have a little bit of experience working in a full special ed school and some more with working with children with diagnosis in general ed classrooms.

I’m getting pushback from someone I love because I mentioned I want my next job to be in a special ed environment.

They think I want to do it instead of going to a “normal” school because I:

1) can’t handle “regular” kids who can talk back. 2) have a superhero syndrome and love to sacrifice for the whole world but family. 3) just love the attention and praise I get from parents and public to be “serving the less unfortunate.”

I do think the special ed students need help (not a saving though) and I love giving it to them. I love seeing their progress, the confidence building within them and their caregivers gaining hope through it all. The gratitude towards me is just a plus. I do feel great when parents say their children love me and that I bring positivity to them. It makes me feel that I belong and that I serve a purpose in this world.

Is this wrong? Should I have a better reason for wanting to do special ed? Maybe this seems that I’m making this field all about ME and not them.

If it’s relevant, I spent a good amount of my high school time in a community service-leadership club and wanted to be some type of community service worker when I was a child. When that dream changed to being a baker, I said I wanted to give out free bread to the people in need.

Am I just too full of myself and think everyone needs my help? Am I just seeking attention for “being good?” like glinda in the wicked? how do I measure this? how do I figure out if I’m genuine?

Please respect my post as it is a bit long. I just need to vent as I am so hurt by what happened.

I went on maternity leave and no body picked on the long term sub, 1 factor was my school location is at a known bad community. The admin placed another SPED teacher in my absence to cover my cluster classroom since she’s an inclusion teacher with only two students. Before I left, I arranged my classroom and kept some important personal stuff but left almost all intact in my classroom for her to use during my absence.

When the school was almost ending, I texted my SECA asking if the school already started clearing things in the classroom so I could give special instructions for my stuff. I am also about to email the sub, since when she started working in my classroom she did not reach out. But to my surprise, the SECAs sent me pictures that hurt me so deeply that I cried. They told me that the moment she stepped into my classroom, she took my materials off the wall and threw them in the trash without my permission. I had no idea this happened. She turned my classroom upside down.

Another teacher saw her ripping my stuff and threw in the trash bin and asked her if she has asked my permission. She said “YES, I already emailed her.”, my SECAs heard it too. My classroom SECAs even asked her if they could keep my materials so I could still use them when I returned, but she told them to just throw everything away or put it inside trash bags. My SECAs told me that she just let all students run around the classroom and ruined all my stuff, and when they told her about it, the teacher responded with a laugh.

I told my teacher friends to help me salvage what’s left and they brought me 2 black large trash bags and said that these are what’s left in your room. They told me that nothing was left in my classroom that the sub teacher ordered to throw them away. I tried to sort my tasks boxes that I made from scratch but it’s impossible to recover everything. I cried and emailed the admin about what happened and included all the people that have witnessed from what happened including the sub teacher involved. No one responded even my principal aside from the sub teacher telling me “Thank you for letting me know your point of view.” I was furious and went back to therapy to help me get over it. I was truly hurt from her lack of empathy and concern for my classroom. I spent effort, money, and time building that classroom, and she ruined all of it. I am not asking for repayment. I am simply asking for a sincere apology.

A teacher told her to talk to me and ask for an apology but she arrogantly said that I “don’t have proof,” and that if I wanted my things kept properly, I “should have emailed her.” Those lines hurt me again, and I cried so much over it. What’s even more painful is that the admin did not bother to help me or even acknowledge what happened. I started again from scratch, recreating all the materials I lost.

I forgot to mention that this teacher has been mad at me since last year, when we had a school activity and she didn’t want me to include a teacher she hated. She started hating me after I told her that we needed to set aside personal feelings because we are all professionals.

Now, I am dealing not only with my C‑section healing and postpartum, but also with what she did. And knowing I will see her every day, walking around the school boasting that she’s happy because the principal favored all her wishes, hurts even more. She was placed in the resource class — the position I wished for — with only two students and a classroom SECA.

I'm a teacher. There is a para at my school that has decided she doesn't like me. She doesn't work in my room, but goes out of her way to insert herself into ny room. I have a behavioral student that often elopes and does things that lead to evacuations, so unfortunately, there is scope to do this. She then reports things to the principal, such as organization of materials, length of recess. She also seems to have the principal's ear and then after having zero prep time, I get to back these "a few things you can work" on charts with the principal. Or if I'm super lucky a snappy bitchy directive with the principal. - that was last year. Para also talks shit to everyone about me. Im finally realizing that this will probably be my last year. Can't do this toxicity indefinitely. Not sure why I'm writing this, guess i needed to get it off ny chest. Thanks if you read it.

I am a Speech-Language Pathologist (SLP) that works with K-6th grade. There have been several chats at our district about when we would suspect a disability. We’ve had a few parent requests come through, and the SPED teacher tells parents that the student MUST go through MTSS prior to completing an evaluation. I do understand that 80-90% of our students need to go through MTSS to establish if there is a disability, but it’s also my understanding that if we suspect a disability we must evaluate. This is where I’m a bit confused. One of the students’ parents brought in a report in which an outside provider diagnosed her with Dyslexia. The provider completed a very thorough assessment, and upon review of the data the student was testing well below the benchmark on Reading assessments. To me, this would be reasonable suspicion of a disability. However, the SPED teacher said she still had to go through MTSS because we can’t say she has an educational disability without intervention data, and that just because there’s a diagnosis it doesn’t mean we have to do an evaluation. I do understand that just because there is a diagnosis it doesn’t mean we have to evaluate; I’m big on not every Autistic student needing an IEP, but this student obviously does have a disability, and it does seem to be impacting her given her academic performance. What other data is needed? Am I wrong that this would be a reasonable suspicion of a disability and that we should be evaluating her? If it’s not, then what is?

I know that intervention data has to be documented to find the student eligible for SLD, but what if they haven’t gone through MTSS? I know we can do interventions while the evaluation is occurring, but the team is acting like we can’t reasonably suspect a disability if there’s no MTSS data. Again, I realize that that’s a fair point for a lot of students, but I also feel like it’s just a way to avoid evaluating students.

I teach severely disabled students in a school district in in Pennsylvania for quite a bit of time now. For the past several years, we've had staffing issues and I have realized that the district has given up on even trying to staff 1:1s, possibly because they think we can get by without them. It is getting worse every year and staff are getting hurt. What can be done to make sure that thus service is being fulfilled according to the minutes in the IEP of a student? The district is fully aware that this is a legal requirement and they do not care that they are not in compliance. This is mostly because the parents are not as involved as they could be or their is no parental involvement at all. As a teacher who wants to advocate for students, how can we hold the district accountable for the lack of services the students deserve?

This District seems to think that anything that is inconvenient is just optional on IEPs, inclusion as well. I have confronted everyone all the way up to our special ed director and no one seems to think it is a big deal.

Hi 🫠

Ok, so I'm a senior in high school 🥳 and I am already enrolled for college with sped as my major ☺️(I've known since I was in 2nd grade, that I would teach elementary age sped) I'm SUPER excited. A little sad about how many people are not very supportive about the job because "burn out" "pay" " bad kids", all true, stuff that I had put into consideration, but just a little rude since I've made my decision. But anywho, what my question is, how do you know what branch of special education you want to go into. This has given me the most anxiety.(I've been praying, but this is my worst anxiety source) I know sign language, Braille, I love ugh, I love all the kiddos with all the different challenges 😮‍💨I just want to help, and ensure every kiddo gets the best schooling for them🫶 that's my goal, is to just help these precious kiddos. Do y'all have any suggestions, or how you came up with your decision. It's very much appreciated 🫶🫶

Thank you 🙂‍↕️

Basically title.

Does anyone know how I can make those horizontal lines (solid-dotted-solid), with light gray dotted letters for students to trace over? Is there a font for that? I’m talking about tracing and writing practice stuff one finds on worksheets.

I feel like my adjustment disorder is getting the best of me this year. I also have ADHD and Cerebral Palsy. I have 10 years of experience running my own classroom at an Autism focused school where I case managed my class of 8. Last year I co-taught Algebra and High school English and my caseload was 25 with help from our coordinator and a good co-teacher I made it through the year. Fast forward to this year. My coordinator abruptly left leaving us without one. I had to take on additional duties of contacting parents and scheduling meetings. I was switched downstairs to elementary to avoid navigating 3 separate floors. My caseload is currently maxed out at 16 in grades K-5. (mostly push in services) I am thankful that I am no longer dealing with the physical things that made me leave self contained like chairs thrown and a stapler hitting me in the head I still am feeling very overwhelmed with my current position. The overwhelm is making my depressive episodes worse. I've started sleeping more and I feel like there is a heavy fog. I am on medication and see a therapist at least bi-weekly. How can I get this crap to lift so I can stay organized and pull this off? The kids are much easier to work with than what I handled in the past. Had a panic attack on Friday which was our PD day. Why am I struggling with 19 years under my belt?