This is the last day of the school year! We are super excited about the summer, but will be spending a lot of time planning for the next school year. We are working to continue to build our website and blog and create an inclusive PE and Health Curriculum. This will definitely take some time, but we know it will be worth it to everyone within the Physical Education and Special Education worlds. We are also planning to add informational links and forms for contact information so that we can help other educators as a community work to make Inclusion the Norm and expected. Thank you for following us and please continue to check back as we work to make this site even more helpful.
This has been a first for us. As a final product for our grant, we wanted to create/build something that was innovative, 21st century, but also something that would continue to grow and be an infinite resource. While this is definitely a work in progress and we are continuing to become more tech-savvy and adding to our site, we also embrace the learning opportunity and the unfinished as inclusion and special education are forever changing too. We want to grown and change with the times and remain relevant in all we do. As educators, we continuously search for guidance, ideas, and support, and we hope that this web page and blog (our final product) will be those things for other educators.
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Coach G came up with a great idea for his students' final exam. While some of the students were exempt from exams as seniors, the other students were to research Traumatic Brain Injury, Intellectual Disability, and Autism, come up with an activity for PE, and how they can adapt the activity for individuals with the different disabilities. The students did an amazing job with their projects and the presentations were even better. As they explained how this experience has impacted them, it was such an incredible feeling knowing that they will carry on this knowledge and impact others around them.
Hello everyone!!!
Today was an awesome experience with the students in our gym class. The title of this blog is called pumping iron. Our students did not actually use iron weights but we used weighted bars, neoprene weights, flexible stretch bands, and medicine balls. All varying in size and weight. We did stations and paired a group of our students with Coach G and Coach W's students. The students would move to the next station after 10 minutes of doing each activity. Coach G and Coach W's students encouraged our students to push themselves and work hard. Their students also had to adapt and find different ways for our students to grip and hold the bands. Everyone was excited and were actively involved with the activities. To say the least our students were tired at the end of the day. It was a great experience for everyone. Today was a great day for Raider Fitness
We teamed up with Coach G and went outside to play a fun game of Kickball. The weather was gorgeous and the students were super excited to get out on one of the few nice days we had. At first the students in Coach G's gym class were a little apprehensive on what they should do but once the first ball was kicked they fell right into it. We used the big therapy ball, which was very hard to catch and throw. We used large therapy ball so that students in wheelchairs could "kick" the ball, it also allowed the General ed students to be able to get out of their comfort zone and struggle a little to experience how students with disabilities have to adjust to overcome challenges. The gen ed students were buddies to the students with disabilities and everyone got to "kick". We played 6 outs instead of three because it as because it was very hard to catch the big ball in the air. One student came up afterwards and said he could not believe how much the students in wheelchairs were laughing while they were struggling to push the chairs through the grass. He said it was was great to get to know the students and their personalities. Students in both classes had such a fun time and were happy. Our goal of this activity was to get the students in both functional academics class and gen ed gym classes more comfortable with one another. This was our first activity all together and it went well. We enjoyed the activity because it encouraged students to get out of their comfort zone and ask questions. We think the day went very well and are excited to continue with more activities. We just met with the PE class earlier today and it was a little awkward. Some of the students were interested, but most of them seemed either not interested or confused. Maybe it's the unknown. We probably talked to much and about too much serious stuff, so hopefully the activities will make things a little more fun and interesting for them.
There were some really great questions about the types of disabilities and even some of the students knew our students names, or at least their descriptions. That made us smile. When working on trying to make inclusion an every day thing in your school, it can be frustrating. But when a general education student calls out to one of our students by their name, it is reassuring that our efforts are not wasted. For the first activity, we will need to plan something where everyone will be able to have fun, encourage some competitiveness (for the general education students and adult staff), and did I say have fun? We are so excited to begin a trial run of the inclusive PE class. We have been planning Coach G and Coach W to get things set for activities. We will be meeting with the class next week to talk a little about this project, the students with disabilities participating, and answer any questions. This is so amazing for our students.
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AuthorWe are special education teachers working to make a difference in our students' lives and an impact on our educational system and the community. ArchivesCategories |