Keys to Collaboration

Dr Gina Garner, PhD

Teaching Demonstration Lesson
Aquinas College
June 18, 2010
http://groups.google.com/group/garner-special-
educators/web/collaboration-job-talk?hl=en
 Collaboration
• What does this word mean to you?

• How will it play a role in your professional

career?
 Collaboration
• Think (30 Seconds)

• Write (1 minute)

• Pair (2 minutes)

• Share
 Why Collaboration?

• Special Educators are working more in the

general education classroom. Why?
– IDEA 2004
• Greater accountability for Least Restrictive
Environment
• States expected to educate at least 80% of students
with IEPs in general education environment 80% or
more of the school day
• Less $ for school budgets = larger special education
caseloads
 Why Collaboration?
– NCLB
• Greater accountability for ALL student test scores
(including those with IEPs)
• Students with special educational needs held to
same curricular standards
– Educators more open to academic inclusion
(Garner 2009)
 Role of the Special Educator
• Former practice
– Pull-out in Special Education or Resource Room
– Testing, specified instruction in separate env.
• Current practice (moving towards)
– Push-in services in the general education environment
– Less time in separate environment
– Roles in classroom change
• Less consultation-a meeting with an expert in a particular field
to obtain advice
• More collaboration-the act of working together with one or
more people in order to achieve something

Ripley (1997), Pugach & Johnson (1995), Bauwens, Hourcade, & Friend (1989)
 Collaboration (Friend & Cook 1992)
has the following properties…

• Voluntary
• Based on Parity
• Requires a shared goal
• Includes shared responsibility for
– Key decisions
– Key outcomes
• Based on shared resources
• Has emergent properties
 Indicators of Professional Behaviors
Facilitative of Collaborative Partnerships
Friend & Cook, 1992

• Communication
• Commitment
• Equality
• Skills
• Trust
• Respect
 Forms of Collaboration
• Consultation model
• Co-teaching models
– 1 teach/ 1 assist
– Station Teaching (Centers)
– Parallel Teaching (teachers take half of students
for parallel lessons)
– Team Teaching (each teacher responsible for a
portion of the curriculum)
– Secondary Teaming Model (a team of teachers
for a grade-level cohort)
 Barriers to Collaboration
• Organizational
– Outdated SPED models
– Administrative comfort zone with status quo
• Parents/teachers/administrators agree with seclusion
settings
• Special education seen as “specialist”
• “Magical Special Educator Effect”
– Teacher Comfort Zone
• Control concerns-fear of relinquishing control
• “I don’t want to turn my room into a special
education room”
– Parent Resistance/Comfort Zone
 Barriers to Collaboration
• Belief that only special educator can address needs
of students with special education needs. Magic?
• No….
– Specialized knowledge and skills
– Practice
– Hard Work
– Alternative Access
– Multiple modes of expression and presentation
– Consistent learning routines
Collaboration is a two-way street
• General Educators
– Content area knowledge
– Pedagogical Content
Knowledge
– Organizational control of
classroom
• Needs:
– Differentiation options
– Specialized knowledge of
LD interventions
– Assessment strategies for
Response To Intervention
• Special Educators
– Specified PCK
– Assessment and intervention
expertise
– Adaptation and
differentiation expertise
– Options to utilize Universal
Designs for Learning
• Needs:
– Access to students
– Options for Intervention
– Opportunities to plan for
students
 Steps to Collaborative Teaching
Friend & Cook 1992

1. Determine Goals and structures for focus

2. Plan for implementation of
lesson/intervention
– Identify barriers
• Plan for those barriers
– Plan evaluation of lesson/intervention
3. Prepare for implementation
– Supplies
– Preliminary concepts
 Steps to Collaborative Teaching
Friend & Cook 1992

4. Implementation of lesson/intervention !!!

5. Maintenance
Post-intervention/lesson evaluation
Review of intervention/lesson
Reflection
Adjustment for next intervention/lesson plan
 Concrete Steps Towards
Collaboration
• Smile
• How can I help?
• Become familiar with curriculum/standards
– Innate understanding of what students are
required to learn
• Discuss elements of UDL that can be
implemented (multiple modes of)
– Representation
– Action
– Engagement
 Concrete Steps Towards
Collaboration
• Increase planning time/conversations
– Have lunch
– Use co-planning time wisely
– Minimum of weekly meetings
• Gradually increase use of routine
interventions and assessments within the
classroom context
• Begin planning units together
 Collaboration
• Looking at your list you made, what would
you add to it now?
– 1 minute quickwrite

• SHARE for our concept map

Thank you!