Social Studies for Special Education

Social Studies Interactive Notebooks designed specifically for Special Education classrooms!

Social Studies has always been a difficult subject to integrate into my K-3 special education classroom because the topics are over their head, and quite frankly, the topics don't hold their interest. So finally, a Social Studies curriculum with topics and hands-on activities that not only interest them, but at a level that they can relate to. 

If you're having the same struggles, read on to see how this curriculum can work for your students. 

Students will have fun being a bucket filler, learning about maps and making a map of their own, learning fun facts about their state and the U.S. as well as traditions around the world. Almost every activity is cut and paste, with a dab of writing here and there, which can easily be modified.

There are a total of eight units covered. Here's a look at units 1 - 3. These are designed to be used as interactive notebooks in a composition book or spiral notebook. All cutting lines are straight, so easy for little hands, and all cutting and pasting tasks have visual guides.

In units 1 - 3, students will learn about good citizenship, their community, and get to create their own map. 

Units 4 and 5.

In units 4-5, students get to do a fun state study to learn all about the state they live in and learn about U.S. geography.

Units 6 and 7.

In units 6-7, students will learn about the past and the present and learn about popular traditions around the world.

Unit 8. Each unit begins with a "Vocabulary Globe" with cut-n-paste definitions. 

I've included a template for all 50 states for the Unit 4 State Study. In this unit, students will study their own state. You'll only use the state that you live in and disregard the others. However, you can certainly study other states too if you choose. 

Want to use these Social Studies Interactive Notebooks in your classroom? You can find them HERE.

SPED Interactive Notebooks are Here!!! {A Year-long Reading Curriculum}

Finally!!! An Interactive Notebook designed specifically for special education classrooms and just in time for BTS!!!! And, a year-long reading curriculum my friends, designed to build fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension!!! Yes, a year-long, with 36 weeks of daily activities!

I'm so excited to finally launch this and be able to share it with you for the upcoming school year! This is a collaborative resource I've worked on for over a year with Susan from "School Bells N' Whistles." So it is a true "Labor of Love!"

Each Monday, students are introduced to 5 new vocabulary words and a new reading passage. Passages are low readability and seasonal. Here's a peek at Week 2, and how the program works.

Students read the passage every day for 5 days as research shows that repeated readings increase and build fluency! They can time themselves or one another (kids love using the timers) and try to beat their time each day. Kids also love this challenge. Each time they read the story, they can color in a book. They also get to make a "Pocket Full of Words" to make daily practicing fun and easy.

On Tuesday, students complete WH questions about their story.

On Wednesday, they get to make a fun flipbook that focuses on comprehension and targets main idea, setting, characters, details, and vocabulary.

Thursday is sentence writing. Students have the option of writing the correct words in the boxes or cutting and pasting the words. 

Friday is a quiz that can easily be used for a weekly grade. The quizzes give students practice with multiple choice, true/false, and short answer items, and also targets skills such as antonyms, synonyms, and rhyming words.

I've tried Interactive Notebooks in my class before, but the cutting was just too daunting for my students! I love that my students will be able to manage the cutting with this set, as the cutting is very minimal and requires only simple straight cuts!

I love the ending results of IN's, and being able to showcase their year-long work in one book. It also makes such a great keepsake and allows everything to remain organized and easy to refer back to for review. They're really nice to show at conferences too or even IEP meetings!

If you're not a fan of IN's, this set can easily be used without them too! You could simply staple each week together, or possibly even spiral bind them.

You can check it out here, and be sure to download the preview to get a free weekly sample to try out in your classroom! You'll get everything you see above!

It's also currently discounted, so snag it up while you can and have your reading lesson plans all planned out for you when you head back to school soon!!

I plan to use my "Spelling for a Year" along with this set as it compliments this set nicely and includes a weekly phonics sheet designed for IN's that you could easily incorporate!

What reading program are you currently using in your classroom??

Interactive Notebooks Just Got Easier!

Do you use IN's in your classroom? I just started them this year and have somewhat of a love hate relationship for them! I absolutely love the interactive part of it and I love that my students are putting together a nice portfolio of their work that they can refer back to later. I also love how much it has cut down on my paperwork and grading. However, the hate part of it is the cutting, the pasting, pieces glued in the wrong place, and the little pieces that keep coming up missing or that I find everywhere! Some of my sped students struggle with the cutting and the motor planning required. I'm also finding that with having to purchase IN materials for 3 different levels in my classroom, I'm spending a pretty penny on INs.

On another note, I also knew that I missed using Annie Moffat's No Prep worksheets in my classroom, because my INs had taken the place of that block of time. Knowing how engaging and interactive her No Prep packs are, I came up with the perfect solution!!! 

Sorry about this pic! It flipped after I uploaded it, but you get the jist. 

  I scaled down Annie Moffat's packets before I printed them to an 80%. 

After your print window like this comes up, choose custom scale. The box will state 100, just change it to 80. 
You can even make it smaller, but I found that 80% fits perfectly on the composition book page. 
All Problems Solved!!! 

*Now students have only four simple, straight cuts and they're done! No more wasted time on cutting or pieces chopped in half :) .

*No more missing pieces!

*No more pieces glued in the wrong places!

*I'm saving money!

*I can go back to using the activities that my kids loved last year!

This has been such a great solution in my classroom and my students are now engaged in learning, not cutting! 

I'm in love with Interactive Notebooks again!!!

And if you haven't heard....I'm giving away a year of MobyMax! You can read all about it and enter {here}. Good luck....tell your friends!