Autism Classroom Resources Podcast: A Podcast for Special Educators

Surprise! You thought I was done with the morning meeting series on the podcast. I thought I was done too and said so in the last episode. But I’d forgotten that I hadn’t covered how to get morning meeting right for older students yet. So today, I want to talk about age-respectful activities and walk you through what a morning meeting can look like for middle or high school students. 3:03​ - What...

In the last couple of episodes, I’ve talked about why morning meeting or circle time is important and the skills you can teach in whole group instruction. There are strategies you can really capitalize on during morning meeting/circle time while others might come as a surprise to you as a possibility in a group. So in this episode, I discuss those strategies for teaching skills to students in grou...

Circle time or morning meeting? While what we call it depends on the age of the students, the need to effectively teach skills during this time is still the same. So in this episode, I discuss the importance of targeting both curriculum skills and individual goals for various age groups, as well as the kind of skills to teach. 2:26 - Why circle time/morning meeting is a good time to address curric...

Confession time. Early on in my career, I hated morning meeting. I thought it was a complete waste of time and dreaded when anybody asked me to run it because I didn’t feel confident in my ability to do it well or make it fun. Moving to South Florida changed that. I got to work with educators there who modeled circle and class meetings done right and ones where things didn’t go so well. In this ep...

Rolling staff shortages. Revolving substitute teachers. Understaffed classrooms. These are the problems I hear about from many of you on social media and through the academy. I recorded today’s episode last year in the midst of the pandemic. But as we’ve gone through 2021, the importance of special educators advocating for their needs has become even more apparent. It’s clear that we need to make...

Teachers often ask me about how to handle challenging behavior from their students. It’s one the biggest hurdles in their classroom and a main cause of burnout. I’ve spent a good chunk of my career assessing, addressing, and researching challenging behavior in students. So in this episode, I discuss the research and principles underlying my approach and include some ideas and examples of what does...

People on the outside may think our classrooms have gone back to pre-pandemic normal. But we know that’s not true. Last year may have presented different problems for teachers, but some of those problems still exist. I recorded today’s show last December, hoping that we wouldn’t have to face the same issues a year later. Yet, many of you are still understaffed, tired, feeling compassion fatigue, a...

The things I hear about visual schedules and autism always amaze me. I might hear some myths once or twice while others stick around for years. Some teachers don’t think they need to use them for their autistic students, but even some who do can have implicit biases that cause their visual schedules to not be as effective as they should. So in this episode, I want to set the record straight. If yo...

Many times, a student’s reaction to not getting what they want is a temper tantrum or a meltdown. So you try to avoid that outcome by giving them what they want. But oftentimes, I’ll hear someone say that they can’t reinforce students by giving them what they ask for even if they’re asking nicely. So what if you’re in a situation where you can’t do that? What are you supposed to do then? In this e...

With Thanksgiving fast approaching, so many teachers are still not settled into any type of normalcy. You’re teaching in what I like to call a triage classroom: a bare-bones or revolving door staff. In this episode, I want to discuss how to survive and thrive in the holiday season. I go over some basics that might have fallen by the wayside but need to come back into play as you gear up for the en...

What do you do when you can't honor a student’s attention-seeking replacement behavior? And how do you avoid a resurgence of the negative behaviors or the sabotaging of your behavior support plan in a new environment? In this episode, I talk about Stephan and reveal six techniques to think about when replacements for attention-seeking behaviors aren't being effectively reinforced. 00:42 - A little...

What do you do when you can’t honor the function of the replacement behavior you’ve chosen? What if you run into a situation where it’s just impossible? In this episode, I focus on escape-related behavior with a quick story about a boy named Mica and reveal five things to try if trouble arises due to task demands you’ve given your student. Welcome to episode 100! 00:50 - A quick behavioral story t...

You’ve seen some suggestions for addressing behavioral problems that don’t work when put in a real life context. I know I’ve been in a lot of situations where the theoretical, data-supported response just doesn’t have an effect in my classroom. The context of what inspires challenging behavior is just as important as the science behind the behavior. So in today’s episode, I want to highlight how w...

It’s that time of year when challenging student behavior starts cropping up and behavior plans get put to the test. When coming up with replacement behaviors, you can’t just rush your way through it and hope for the best, though. You need to carefully consider certain characteristics in the ones you choose. These three traits will make the difference in whether your plans work or not. So in this e...

I’m guessing you don’t like to be hit or spit at by your students, right? Due to the time of year and the kind of year (or year and a half) we’ve had so far, we’re in the midst of some challenging classroom behavior. So today, I want to talk about ways we can actually help students avoid committing these problem behaviors in the first place. These won’t solve all the problems you’ll face, but by u...

Now that the new school year is underway, you’re probably dealing with some challenging behaviors. Students are readjusting to being back in the classroom. Some are even dealing with interruptions from quarantines which can increase challenging behaviors to a level you haven’t seen before. So in today’s episode, I want to focus on the three biggest mistakes I see in behavioral support and manageme...

Some problems can arise that indicate an issue with your zoning plan. Luckily, like classroom schedules, zoning plans are one of the easiest things to troubleshoot. In this episode, I won’t speak about obvious issues. Instead, I talk about three subtle problems you and your staff might face that you can address by simply fixing your zoning plan. 1:2​2 - First issue that demonstrates a need to chan...

Are you running into problems with your students that a tweak or two of your classroom schedule can solve? While the schedule is the hardest thing to create in the classroom setup process, it’s also possibly the easiest to fix because it’s pretty clear what the issue is when it occurs. So listen in as I cover five specific problems you could run into in the classroom that indicate a need to fix yo...

Last week, I started talking about behaviors you can address in your classroom with visual support tweaks. I continue that this week with even more common behavioral issues that can be eliminated with visual cues. I know that at this point in the year, you really don’t have time at all. So I also provide a free download to help you implement some of the solutions I discuss in today’s episode. 1:06...

You see visual cues everywhere you look--restroom signs with gender indications, traffic lights and stop signs at intersections and on corners, etc. They’re pretty easy to implement and even though they don’t automatically solve problems, they work more often than not. So they should work in the classroom too, right? In today’s episode, I discuss student behavioral issues that you can address by a...

Last week I discussed a couple of behavior problems you might face with your students in the classroom and how to solve them. Not a chance that those were the only ones, right? Ha! So I’m back this week to talk about even more behavioral issues that indicate a need to fix your classroom’s physical design. Once again, I quickly reveal the problem then give some solutions that should help you reduce...

We’re almost at the end of our journey on classroom setup! We’re in the troubleshooting phase right now, but starting today I’ll be delivering snack-sized episodes that discuss making decisions about what isn’t working and discovering how to know what to change. In this episode, I talk about a couple of warning signs that show a need to fix your physical classroom environment and share solutions t...

For the last few episodes, I've discussed setting up all the elements of the basic CORE you need to run your classroom. Next comes the most critical piece as you start working with your students: troubleshooting. As the school year starts, all of your systems will need some tweaking. So I’m kicking off a series of episodes to walk you through the process. Today, I outline a plan for helping you pr...

You’ve collected some classroom data, so now what? Leaving it sitting in a binder doesn’t help anybody; therefore, it’s critical that you set up systems for regular analysis. We take this data for legal reasons, to show progress, but most importantly, to troubleshoot any learning issues confronting our students. So in this episode, I discuss how to make analysis happen and the three elements to co...

When it comes to a data collection, there’s no one-size-fits-all, and it involves way more than just finding the right data sheet. You have to ensure you build a system with the right data, not more data. So today is all about focusing on data systems. In this episode, I walk you through how to get started and what you need to consider when creating your systems for instructional data collection....