Special Education Meeting Reflection

? I was very excited about this colloquium because I knew that co-teaching was rising all over the country, however, I did not know what my role was going to be as a general education educator. I was a bit perplexed on why there was a panel at this colloquium, but the audience did not really get to ask the panel members any questions. I guess I expected more talking from the panel members, and less introductions and questions from one member of the SOE. Nevertheless, I would say that the Venn diagram activity that we did near the end of this “meeting” was quite insightful and sadly answered more of my questions than the panel was able to answer. With that being said, I would say that this activity also lead me to having more questions, which …show more content…
Unfortunately, I feel like this presentation was more teacher focused than learner focused, due to the fact that an SOE member was the one asking the panel questions, and not the audience. Even though, the presentation was not set up how I thought it should be, I liked how the Venn diagram helped to visually explain the role of the general education and the special education teachers in a co-teaching environment.
So What? One aspect of this meeting that I fond very helpful was the fact that each member of the panel had had different experiences with co-teaching and that each experience helped them become more professional co-teachers. It was wonderful to have three people who represented the three different educational facilities (elementary, middle, and …show more content…
I have all of these plans of including my special education teacher in every activity, however, what would I do if the special education teacher did not want to work with “my” students but only wanted to work with “her” students? How would I approach this situation in a respectful and professional manner? This question was not ever brought up in the panel discussion, however, I believe that one of the panel members would have responded in this way: If you have a special education teacher who does not want to help teach the whole class, you make your whole class more welcoming and inviting, letting this co-worker know that you respect their credentials and that you want to help them support their students. They may also have replied by saying that acting like you run the show is only going to make your special education teacher want to retreat, but if you kindly push them to present a mini lesson, or just work with a small group of mixed students, that they will slowly become more comfortable working with you and all of your