Effective Relationship Building - Special Educators and Families
Hours: 2.25
A unique aspect of the field of special education is the strong emphasis on teachers and families working together to provide students with an appropriate education. The primary rationale is that students with disabilities have more success when teachers and families partner to provide an appropriate education to them. A major barrier, however, is that many teachers have not received appropriate professional development related to how to be a partner and what they can do to gain families’ trust. This course will overcome that barrier. You will first build a foundation involving key definitions, legal requirements, goals, needs, and benefits. Upon this foundation, you will gain insight into how parent roles have evolved over the last 75 years to get us to today’s expectation for trusting partnerships. Next, you will learn research-based principles and actions you can take pertaining to trusting practices. Lastly, you will review practical evaluation tools that you can use to assess satisfaction with trusting partnerships—your own satisfaction and the satisfaction of the families you serve. Throughout this course, the word “teacher” is used as a broad term to include special education teachers, general education teachers, and paraprofessionals.
A unique aspect of the field of special education is the strong emphasis on teachers and families working together to provide students with an appropriate education. The primary rationale is that students with disabilities have more success when teachers and families partner to provide an appropriate education to them. A major barrier, however, is that many teachers have not received appropriate professional development related to how to be a partner and what they can do to gain families’ trust. This course will overcome that barrier. You will first build a foundation involving key definitions, legal requirements, goals, needs, and benefits. Upon this foundation, you will gain insight into how parent roles have evolved over the last 75 years to get us to today’s expectation for trusting partnerships. Next, you will learn research-based principles and actions you can take pertaining to trusting practices. Lastly, you will review practical evaluation tools that you can use to assess satisfaction with trusting partnerships—your own satisfaction and the satisfaction of the families you serve. Throughout this course, the word “teacher” is used as a broad term to include special education teachers, general education teachers, and paraprofessionals.
