Students with special needs

Accommodations and strategies for students with special needs

Teaching strategies

1. Organize lessons around big ideas or themes to help students see connections between concepts and processes.
2. Post an outline for each day's lesson and activity.
3. Review previously learned concepts prior to starting an activity.
4. State learning objectives clearly for the activity.
5. Teach new vocabulary prior to assigning reading or as students engage in an activity.
6. Read activity instructions aloud or re-write them in shorter sentences using simpler vocabulary.
7. Use structured questioning techniques to help students make inferences and construct knowledge.
8. As a wrap-up to each investigation or activity, review with students the concepts covered and the processes used. Encourage students to share their thinking out loud.

Cooperative learning strategies

Divide students into groups with assigned roles:

1. The reader reads all print instructions.
2. The recorder records data, observations, measurements and conclusions.
3. The materials handler gets and assembles all of the necessary materials and returns them to their proper place.
4. The coordinator oversees the procedure and ensures that all members of the group have equal opportunity at using the materials, taking measurements, gathering data, making observations etc.

Students with special needs should be assigned the role with which they will have the most success.