I have been an L.D. resource teacher for several years. At the last minute, I have been re-assigned to an eighth grade L.D. self contained classroom with 14 students and an aide. Can anyone recommend a book or other resource which might help me set up my classroom and effectively organize everything? I will be teaching these kids language arts, science, math and social studies. They will be in my classroom for 2 1/2 hours in the morning, and 2 1/2 hours in the afternoon. Also, I would love to have some suggestions for classroom procedures/rules which would help an L.D. class run smoothly. Students come back in just one week…HELP!
Me Too!
I’m going to be teaching LD self-contained this year too. Middle School. All my students are apparently on 3rd grade level…and I dont want to teach 3rd grade material. I am trying to read up on strategies for adapting their grade level material but it’s sometimes hard to do it all at once. Let me know how it goes for you..hopefully we can learn from eachother!!!
Good Luck.
middle school
They are on third grade level because no one has taught them to read!! So, start with an effective reading program. Then since they have been through this time after time find ways for them to access grade level curriculum. What novels are being read by their friends in regular classses - read them to them, use the audio tape or even watch the movie - so they feel they are learning the same information as their friends. What does their grade level learn about in science and social studies? Teach organizational skills, real life skills, have high expectations.
Re: Me Too!
[quote=”amyn73”]I’m going to be teaching LD self-contained this year too. Middle School. All my students are apparently on 3rd grade level…and I dont want to teach 3rd grade material.
Check out Looking Glass Spelling at www.gwhizresources.com. It is a spelling series that improves decoding and vocabulary for grades 4-12. It is designed for LD students (tons of reinforcement, multi-sensory lessons, exercises for carry-over, careful spacing and page lay-out), but the vocab. and format are age appropriate. My school uses it for our 5th-8th graders. It is extremely easy to use, and kids can work independently or in pairs on most of the pages. Hope it helps.
Fern
There isn’t a cookie cutter manual for this one as the kids all have their own needs and it seems to be a daunting task before you. Is there a mentor that you can hook up with in the district who may have something you can look at?
What about starting with their Goals and Objectives and then tying it into the curriculum. I think if you see where they are and where they need to be then you can find ways to tie it into the curriculum. Also have a looks at the textbooks that will be used in the curriculum and find ways to simplify the language, use books on tape if they are available and some of the textbooks come with interactive CD’s and websites.
In regards to teaching reading you can implement Reading Reflex or Writing Road to Reading for that, for spelling AVKO has a user friendly program,
For Writing I like Writing Express by Spivey but there are other programs that are available to use…
for Math, you can check out LMB’s On Cloud Nine or Math U See.
For Social Studies there are some good paperback consumable boks by Steck-Vaughn, and you can make it more interactive and hands on through projects, movies and artwork.
Science would be fun as it is more hands on and you can find lots of books for that in any teachers supply store.
Good luck!