You all know my slight fixation with efficiency. My day is buuuusy and I try to make the most of every minute. Trying to fit in everything from literacy to life skills and everything in between within one school day can be complicated to say the least.
Last week, when I was posting about making a visual ‘cheat sheet’ for setting up daily picture schedules…
… I had a EUREKA moment. I should be doing this for my independent work station. We call this table time in my class and it’s my claim to fame – most organized and space saving independent work system ever. We can store over 50 work tasks for all of my (wide range ability level) students on two shelves. Okay, I’ll stop bragging.
The only bummer about this system is that it can take a while to set up each day. My classroom and my coworker’s class all use this system each day – so that’s 20 kids. Figuring out which kids can do which tasks and how not to give two kids the same task at the same time – can take a few minutes.
Buuuuuut – problem solved: I made some “cheat sheets” for this too. I made premade schedule for which numbers/letters each student will do.
I made 5 different versions so there is one for each day of the week. That way students won’t be repeating the same activity during the week at all. One of my paraprofessionals sets up the schedule each afternoon and she cannot stop talking about why we haven’t done this years ago. So if it has her seal of approval – it must be good.
Just hang one of the templates next to the schedule, throw up the corresponding numbers/letters and you are done 🙂
timer savers = my best friend
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6 Responses
Hi Sasha,
I’m not sure if you ever blogged about your Table Time work tasks (I am a new follower) but what kind of tasks do you have in the stations? I am looking for stuff for higher academically capable kiddos. We have a new batch of kids on the spectrum this year – mix of inclusion and learning lab pull out – and we are trying to find the best way to deal with the many different levels when they are in the learning lab. Fantastic blog! I have passed it along to many at my school.
Thank,
Dawne
You’re right Dawne! I have mentioned it more briefly in a few posts and in my classroom tour and videos. I think I am going to do an in-depth post on that in the next few days! Thanks for the idea 🙂
Thanks so much for passing along my blog!
Hi Sasha,
I love this system and I’m implementing in my K/1 self contained class for kiddos with autism this school year. I want to keep data on how students so with their tasks. I wondering what the best way is. What have you found works best?
Karen
I love having a data sheet kept right near the work station. Usually I use one that has all of the students names already written in (makes it faster/easier for the para to take data) and the para will pick 3-4 students each day to track (based on how busy we are that day). She will pick two tasks to take data and she tracks the number of prompts the student needs to complete the task. The goal is for the student to work towards needing 0 prompts. This data sheet is in this resource: https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/20-Special-Education-Data-Sheets-278217
Thanks!
Glad it’s helpful!