Intro to the classroom/students I teach!!

Just a little background about my myself and my teaching position...



First of all, I have my degree in Psychology, and which is how I started off with Tehama County Department of Education. I had recently moved from Connecticut (where I went to college), and applied and got a job as a Behavior Interventionist with TCDE. Since I had quite a bit of previous experience working with a wide range of ages of children, and had taken a ton of classes regarding Applied Behavior Analysis, Development of Children, Psychological Assessment, etc., etc., I thought I would come into the job with some knowledge....I was WRONG!



For the first few months, I was able to observe a wide range of students with disabliltes and of all ages, 3-22. Some who were primarily mainstreamed, some who were never mainstreamed. Some with aggressive, negative behaviors, some who needed to learn daily living skills for the future. The observations really made me think, and realize just how exact the term IEP was!



So, after numerous observations and trainings on Discrete Trial Teaching, PRT, Reinforcement, etc., I was put into a classroom full of Autistic preschool students for a summer session. This is where my love of working with these kids started! After just four weeks of extended school year, I was amazed at each and every one of the kids I was able to work with. I was introduced to the idea of applying to a internship teaching program at Chico State...the Autism preschool teacher was moving, and her position was open...



Needless to say, the following school year (just 2 months after my first hands-on experience with the preschool kids), I found myself going through the requirements to get apply for the Education Specialist Internship Program at Chico State!

This is the 3rd year I have taught in the very Special Education Preschool classroom that I started in! I have had the opportunity to work with over 30 children over the past 3 years, and have enjoyed every one of them!

My classroom is an early intervention classroom, primarily for students with Autism. I do have some students who have OHI, MR, and Speech and Language Impairments as well. My classroom is very structured, very visual, very hands-on, very positive, very busy, yet, every student is different and every day is different. All of my students are taught using Discrete Trial Teaching and PRT. 80% of them are on a picture schedule, 100% of them are on a reinforcement system (i.e token boards), 100% of them are able to communicate, just not in the same way (i.e. using pictures, pointing and gesturing, single word labeling, or muliple word utterances with the ability to ask and answer questions!), and 100% of them are unique and wonderful to work with!!

The student to teacher ratio is fairly equal...Most days we have 1:1, and at the very most we have 2:1. This allows for more progress in many areas. We work on everything from communication, to academics, to gross and fine motor, to behaviors/transitioning, to social skills, to toilet training, to self-feeding. You name it, if it's a need, we will find a way to help that kiddo become more independent!

Throughout the 3 years, I have met many wonderful families, and I truely enjoy getting to know each family, and working with their wonderful children!