How to Work in the Classroom with Students with Special Needs

Welcome to our online course. Our purpose is to provide some ideas, based on what we have found out over a number of years, to help with teaching students with special needs. The course is designed in a linear fashion and we have found concepts covered within this package to be most beneficial to the user if they move through the package sequentially. You will find little tasks along the way which, if you do them, will help you to have an understanding of the concepts within.

We are classroom teachers who have worked in an education support centre for many years with all sorts of students and who have implemented the practices contained within this package to help our ever-changing, unique and individualised students. We have found that the ideas and theory we outline in the following sections is really important to know about if you want to have more fun and less stress with your special needs students. You might be surprised how well some things work and how they can change your situation.

Each area within this package has been scaffolded, giving you a basis of information first then moving into specific content. There are a lot of areas which are inter-related and overlap. We hope you find it useful. You will need a printer attached to print out some resources.

Kaylene Allen and Julie Spargo (Teachers, MHESC)

Funded by a Grant from More Support for Students with Disabilities National Partnerships (MSSD)

Julie and Kaylene spent a considerable time constructing this short course. It has been tried out on various primary school teachers in our area with success. I hope it can be useful for you.

Alison Harman (Principal, MHESC)

The Sections to be covered are as follows and we do think they should be looked at in the following order. Click on each green title below to go to that section.