Sharing my experience in the classroom as a life skills special ed transition teacher by providing resources and solutions for fellow educators
What I Pack for Community Based Instruction Outings
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My schedule allows me to take my young adults into the community every day of the week. Yes, 5 days a week! Since so much of our time is spent on community based instruction (CBI) outings, we need to be prepared for anything and everything at all times.
With many years of...
How To Teach: Exercise and Fitness Routines
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Importance of Fitness
P.E. or Gym class may have been a time to relax, to work on social skills with peer buddies, or to get in physical therapy or occupational therapy minutes. When a student’s schedule begins to allow autonomy in their fitness routine, then the activity will have new...
How To Teach: Recreation Leisure Skills
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Importance of Recreation Leisure skills
Humans engage in recreation leisure activities because it makes them feel happy, it reduces stress, and it provides a mental break from other thoughts or tasks. Since these are all good things, we must support our students in being able to find the ...
Buying Special Education Classroom Furniture: What To Consider
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My co-teacher and I did some ‘window’ shopping to find new tables/desks for our class. The tables and desks we had in our room were no longer going to meet the needs of our incoming students, so we requested funds to purchase new furniture and were approved!
Whenever...
How To Teach: Internet Safety
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Importance of Digital Citizenship
Regardless of if a student is obsessed with their smartphone and uses all the social media apps or if they have no interest in computers or smartphones, knowing how to handle themselves when they do go online is important to keeping themselves and their money...
Facebook Groups to Join as a Special Education Transition Teacher
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I’m newer to Facebook. I mean, I had a profile when I was in college because back then it was limited to only college students. Since graduating college I let that part of my social media life go and focused on Instagram, mainly because I’m a visual learner and that spoke to my...
How To Teach: Safety Skills
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Importance of Being Safe
The goal is to always be safe and protected from all of life’s disasters. Sadly, that isn’t reality and our students need assistance in knowing how to move forward in different situations.
Helping them to look at a situation and decide what...
Priority #2: Connect Students and Families with Government and Community Benefits
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As a high school life skills special education teacher for juniors and seniors or a transition teacher (or transition coordinator), we all have specific time in our school day for teaching class. Unfortunately, there is never time designated for helping students create opportunities to continue...
How to Teach: Caring For Your Body During a Period (Menstruation)
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Importance of Period and Menstrual Care
Some bodies experience menstruation. Since they do, it’s important to address. While menstruation typically occurs once a month, some students may experience their cycle more or less frequently. Either way, students should know how to care for...
What I Do as a Transition Facilitator: Roles and Responsibilities
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I used to say that as a transition teacher I worked at Disney World because it is notorious for being the happiest place on Earth. While I still work at Disney World, per say, I am now splitting my time between the classroom and serving as a Transition Facilitator for my school district.
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Teaching Life Skills: Nail Care Lesson Plan [Special Education]
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Importance of Nail Care
Nail care can easily be seen as a skill that can be pushed off for another day (or another school year). However, having long, jagged, dirty nails can hinder progress in other personal hygiene goals.
While taking care of your fingernails and toenails isn’t a...
Government and Community Benefits to Consider for Students Graduating or Exiting from Special Ed
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If you teach special education life skills to high school juniors or seniors or transition, then you have probably heard of and/or know the value in connecting your students and families with government and community benefits. However, it can often seem like a foreign language that changes...
How To Teach: Washing Hair and Shaving
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Importance of Washing Hair and Shaving
Squeaky clean is a good thing! Hands are clean, teeth are clean, body is clean, and hair is also clean! Dirty hair can attract lice and absorb the smells around it, so washing your hair on a regular basis will help to keep those locks smelling fresh and...
5 Professional Developments for Special Education Transition Teachers
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There are roughly 34,891 different conferences, professional developments, and training opportunities for special education teachers, but most don’t cover the best niche in special education- transition!
Our young adult students aren’t ‘kiddos,’ we don’t...
How To Teach: Brushing Your Teeth
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Importance of Brushing Teeth
Clean the body, clean the hands, and clean the teeth! There is both a social value in being clean AND a health value in being clean. Therefore, it's important to explicitly teach students how to be clean. Regardless of age, some students will need step-by-step...
Building the Vision: 5 Steps to Prepare for Your Child’s Life After Special Education Services
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Let’s pretend you are a parent of a child with an intellectual or developmental disability, or the like, and are lying in bed worrying about what their life will be like as an adult. It’s likely you are sweating from worry, probably tossing and turning because you don’t know...
How To Teach: Picking and Putting on Clothes
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Importance of Getting Dressed
It is a social norm for humans to put clothes on to keep their body private, to protect it from the weather, to allow it the ability to move as needed, and to serve as a non-verbal cue to others how they can serve you (work uniform). Therefore, knowing WHAT to...
How To Teach: Taking a Shower and Applying Deodorant
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Importance of Showering and Applying Deodorant
I’ve heard that smell is more closely linked to memory than any other sense. Most likely, a good smell is going to trigger happy thoughts and a bad smell will trigger unhappy thoughts. So, let’s help our young adult students be...
5 Things I Don’t Do as a Transition Teacher
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I’ve been teaching transition for the majority of my teaching career and having taught in high school settings prior, there are so many notable differences (all of which are for the best, in my humble opinion).
I’ve listed 5 things I don’t do as a transition...
How to Teach: Using the Bathroom (Toileting) and Handwashing
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Importance of Teaching- Bathroom/Toileting Skills and Washing Hands
The human body needs to relieve itself multiple times throughout the day, thus toileting skills are a necessary part of anyone’s day. Since handwashing occurs most frequently after using the bathroom (as well as before...
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