Eastern Pulaski Elementary School’s special education teachers are working on ways to integrate students into their regular classrooms, while making sure they get the help they need.
The school board got an update from teachers Kari Combs, Amanda Kistler, and Bethany Podell during last week’s meeting. Kistler said that when it comes to the almost 60 students served by the school’s special education program, their individual needs vary greatly. “Some of them have chronic cognitive needs, where we’re working on potty training and social skills, and some have health needs, where they have epilepsy and we’re working with identifying seizures and keeping our assistants aware of what to look for and how to handle those situations,” she explained. “Some students have ADHD, dyslexia, different learning disabilities. Some of them have behavioral needs.”
She said that over the past nine years, the school has increased its direct services to special education students. But now, efforts are underway to make sure they have the chance to be with their grade-level classmates, as much as possible. “Throughout the years, we increased those [direct] services,” Kistler said. “We had a larger population that was receiving more direct services in the resource room, rather than in the general education classroom. And now, we’re trying to get back to more services in the general education classroom and having those supports within that classroom.”
Podell added that over the past year, the school has seen a significant increase in the number of special education students who spend most of their time in a regular classroom.
Kistler also oversees a developmental preschool program funded by the JESSE Cooperative, which currently serves seven students.
