Thank You!

I appreciate the feedback that I received during this course. It was very helpful in terms of developing and presenting my action plan. I learned so much from you all through the blogs and discussions. This action plan was defiantly something that I will never forget. It was challenging but we did it. I wish everyone that best as we move forward to better lives that we touch on a daily basis. I would like to thank all you for your support and will see you all at graduation!

Enisting and Providing Support: Blog 4

• Questions you have with which your colleagues may be able to provide help and support

  What is the best way to present my Action Plan to my group?

• Resources and information you are seeking

   I am seeking information about where can parents go to get resources about least restricted environments in Chicago besides the three downtown?

• Resources and/or information you have found helpful and insightful

  The website that was useful was http://www.ounceofprevention.org, the Look What I Can Do folder connected with the Illinois Board of Education, http://www.isbe.state.il.us/spec-ed/html/lre.htm, communicating with parents and co-workers that deal with children with disabilities/special needs.

Blog 3-Personal Advocacy Journey

"Never worry about numbers. Help one person at a time and always start with the person nearest you" Mother Teresa

The main thing that inspires me is how children and parents will benefit from my advocacy plan. My action plan consist of helping special needs children and their families with better resources for least restricted environments. I feel good knowing that the parents will have a better idea of what to expect and meaningful ways of helping their children. The one challenge, I feel about this topic would be the words special needs. This is a touchy topic and some people or families want their children to be on the same developmental level as other children.

I believe, by providing enough evidence to parents about how each child develop and learn differently would help me overcome this challenge. Another effective method to overcome my challenge would be making it realistic. This also can help others with their plans. Anyone that have pointers and recommendations for my action plan I will greatly accept them.

Edu 455

This blog will continue my with my advocacy for Edu 455. I will be using this blog to add and compile all the feedback and advice that I receive to help me in my action plan.

Thank You!

I would like to thank you for the support you have given me throughout the course. I really appreciate all the positive feedback that you given me on the discussion board , my blog, and the student lounge. I had many obstacles to jump over this course because of the research paper. I believe I overcame most of them in the last three weeks or so. Again, I thank you and hope you continue to be an advocate for children.
                                                                             Thank you,
                                                                          Sandra Bowman

Module 4 Blog

During this module, I was able to interact with two people that helped guide my research for my paper. The first person I interacted with was an observer from the state. She came into one of the classrooms to observe and we begin discussing how the children have change over time. She stated how children are faced with more problems today than ten years ago. She said," our children are not getting what they need early so it is having an affect on their learning." This statement alone gave me something to think about.

The next person I observed was a five year old boy. This child was able to complete tasks around the classroom but have problem with making friends or building relationships. He did not want the children to sit next to him at the table or on the rug. When the teacher tried to talk to him he never gave eye contact or a verbal reaction. I did observe him talking during his play time so his communications skills is fine.

The one thing that I was surprised about is the lack of time the teachers was giving him. He have been in the program for seven months so I think he should be interacting a little better now. The teachers should be modeling or providing activities to him him become engaged with others. I even thought about maybe he is having hearing issues but that was not the case. As a teacher and an observer this was mind bottling.

Module Three Blog

In the last week or so, I have learned two things that is beneficial to the topic I am researching. I was talking to the director of the center and found out that she was a Special Education Teacher Assistant in the Chicago Public Schools some years ago. This is the first piece of information that is good for my paper. She stated how she did face challenges as an assistant. One of them was not having the collaboration and cooperation of the administrative staff to help meet the needs of the students.

The second thing that I learned, was the lack of preparation as an assistant. She stated that she felt that she needed more training to help children with special needs. She talked about how she became stressed because she was helpless to the students. This was her guide to open her own center. This information was useful and knowledgeable to the topic I am researching, which is inclusion.