Tips for Special Education

We all have day-to-day issues and believe we may be alone....
You are not alone. Here are some special education tips & ideas.


Education is a jigsaw puzzle. As we grow, our brains are expected to absorb many unrelated facts and instructions. The process usually works well. But, some times, it does not work smoothly. Then we have the child or adult with the label of educationally handicapped. Over nearly 30 years in the regular classrooms and Special Education classrooms, children have been my best teachers.

There are fond memories of 5 children from grade 1 to grade 3 for their part in my education. These children worked hard attempting to learn letters, numbers, phonics skills and reading skills for 6 months. They were not successful, just frustrated. The teacher bought some 24 piece puzzles to help the children fill some class time and improve skills. These puzzles proved to be an excellent teaching tool, unexpectantly. The same children that could not learn the education skills proved not to be able to put these easy puzzles together. Attempts would be made to put the edge pieces in the middle, etc. For some of the students, it took some days for them to get the concept of looking for shapes and colors.

We decided to leave a portion of the class time to solve these puzzles. Finally, by the end of the school year, every student learned to put a puzzle together with in a 25 minute time limit. By that time, we found they were also remembering their letters and numbers. Wow! Words and problem solving was beginning to make sense to them. The following school year, most of these 5 students reached their grade level, or close to it, by the end of the next school year.