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Effective Co-Planning in Special and General Education

• Jennifer Hofferber - Special Education Teacher and Coach • Episode 165

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Today's guest  is Kristen Andujar from the Special Education Clubhouse and is here to discuss the importance of collaboration between special education teachers and general education teachers. 

When both educators work together, they can share insights, resources, and strategies to meet the diverse needs of all students. Effective teamwork not only enhances the educational experience, but it also ensures that all students (Not just those with IEPs) receive the consistency and support they need to thrive.

And a collaborative relationship is just as important for the adults. Building strong professional relationships and working collaboratively can reduce stress, increase job satisfaction, and lead to personal and professional growth. 

In this episode, Kristen and I discuss the common challenges that special education teachers face in building these partnerships, and we share strategies for successful co-planning and co-teaching to help bridge the gap between special education and general education. 

Listen in as we discuss:

  • Common Challenges in Collaboration:
    • Lack of common planning time
    • Limited resources and support for general education teachers
    • Need for additional training on special education strategies
  • Strategies for Effective Co-Planning and Co-Teaching:
    • Utilize any available duty-free time for planning
    • Maintain open lines of communication
    • Share tips and strategies to support students’ IEP goals
  • Impact of Effective Communication:
    • Consistency and support for students
    • Improved student outcomes and goal achievement
    • Enhanced inclusion and positive classroom environment
  • Resources to Support Collaboration:
  • Tracking and Sharing Student Progress:
    • Use simple data sheets that transition between classrooms
    • Ensure the process is quick and effective for both teachers
  • Advice for New Special Educators:
    • Prioritize open communication
    • Be proactive in collaborating with general education teachers
    • Focus on the shared goal of student success

This episode underscores the impact of effective communication on student outcomes, and gives examples of how consistent collaboration can lead to success for everyone involved.

To learn more from Kristen, listeners can visit her website at specialeducationclubhouse.com
or follow her on Instagram at

Writing individual impact statements based on a student’s unique disability  and needs can be a big struggle AND a big time suck.! And in case you haven't noticed...extra time is not something you have a lot of.

My IEP Impact Statements Growing Bundle will give you  the resources you need to make writing impact statements a breeze.  





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Speaker 1:

Hey there and welcome back to another episode. We have a special guest on the show today. Kristen Andujar from the Special Education Clubhouse is here to discuss the importance of collaboration between special education teachers and general education teachers. When educators work together, they can share insights, resources and strategies to meet the diverse needs of all students. Effective teamwork not only enhances the educational experience, but it also ensures that students with IEPs receive the consistency and support they need to thrive, and it's important for us adults as well. Building strong professional relationships and working collaboratively can reduce stress, increase job satisfaction and lead to personal and professional growth. In this episode, kristen and I discuss the common challenges that special education teachers face in building these partnerships and we share strategies for successful co-planning and co-teaching. We also highlight how effective communication can significantly impact student outcomes and share practical resources to help bridge the gap between special education and general education. So let's get to it. Special education and general education.

Speaker 2:

So let's get to it. You're listening to the Sped Prep Academy podcast. Your host, jennifer Hoferberg, is an award-winning veteran special educator who shares her experience, knowledge and passion to help other special educators survive and thrive in this profession. Join her and other guests as they share tips and tricks of the trade for the ever-crazy, completely overwhelming, laugh-so-you-don't-cry profession of being a special education teacher.

Speaker 1:

Well, hello Kristen. Thank you so much for being here and welcome to the show Hi, thank you for having me, Jennifer.

Speaker 3:

It's really nice to be on your show today.

Speaker 1:

Well, before we begin, would you give us a little bit of background about who you are and your journey within special education Sure.

Speaker 3:

So my name is Kristen and I run the Special Education Clubhouse. I've been an educator for 19 years in a variety of settings, serving both special education students and general education students, anywhere from self-contained to inclusion. I've done the resource pullout. I was also an autism coach where I served all students in pre-K through fifth grade that were on the spectrum, both in self-contained classes and in general ed, and I've also been a special education specialist, which some districts call a case manager. So I served again pre-K to fifth grade and now I am an inclusion specialist within my district, serving 17 schools.

Speaker 1:

Wow. So you've seen both sides of the coin and you've been a part of both the general education side and the special education side. So with your extensive experience you must have some really unique perspectives on the dynamics between these two roles. So what are some common challenges that you see that special education teachers might face when trying to collaborate with general education teachers and trying to please everybody and make the students be successful and just have that camaraderie, I guess?

Speaker 3:

So there are definitely a couple of challenges, but of course we can overcome them, one challenge being that special educators and their general ed partners may not have the same common planning time especially, you know, with special education teachers you're often not teaching just one grade level, so it would be nearly impossible to have the same common planning as every grade level that you're teaching. So, you know, oftentimes grade levels will have common planning. They'll be able to meet together, plan together and as a special ed teacher, you might be able to attend here and there, but you're certainly not going to be able to attend every meeting for every grade level that you teach. So that is a huge challenge. Another challenge is, you know, if you have students let's say you are a self-contained teacher and you have students that go out to inclusion for part of the day, either for math, reading, whatever subjects they go for a challenge that you might see is that the classroom that your students are going to may not their teacher may not be as well-versed or as trained in the strategies as you are for teaching your students, and they might feel a little bit as if they may need additional support in that area.

Speaker 3:

Not all schools are, you know as lucky as the ones I've worked at, to have the autism coaches, the special education specialists. You know people that come in and are able to work together with everyone, provide trainings, provide hands on support. But if you are at a school that's lucky enough to have that, that is one way around that challenge as well. So there's definitely ways around these challenges, but those are the most common ones that I see.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I agree with that not having the same plan time. But I feel like, even though, even if you do have the same plan time, because there would be years, like you said, you might not go with every grade level. So some years I would go with fifth grade, some years I'd go with first grade, it just depended on our schedule. But even when we had those common plan times, we didn't always take advantage of that time and use it to the best of our time. We didn't put it to use, and so it's difficult to intentionally make those co-planning times happen. So what strategies have you found to make the time that you do have productive? So the strategies.

Speaker 3:

Some of them that I would use are you always will have some time where it is duty-free time, whether it's the beginning of your day, the end of your day, and you're not necessarily going to have to meet with every single teacher on that grade level. It's only going to be the ones who necessarily that your students would go to for whatever subjects. So you can arrange with that particular teacher whatever day and time you know you both have in common that works for you in both of your schedules and you can meet and say you know these are the things we're working on and these are the goals we're working on and how can we collaborate to meet the needs of our students the best. So it's important that you know you find whatever time you have and you intentionally plan on discussing whatever it is that you need to discuss that day to make sure that your students are successful.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and I feel like just making sure those lines of communication are open and being taken advantage of, because if we're not communicating, Absolutely.

Speaker 3:

I mean, open lines of communication are huge. If you aren't communicating, then nobody is really going to be on the same page, and that doesn't really benefit translation. So, in your opinion, how does this effective?

Speaker 1:

communication between special education and general education. Teachers impact student outcomes.

Speaker 3:

So another big thing, too, if you're communicating.

Speaker 3:

It kind of goes back to where I said, that general ed teachers may not feel that they have the strategies or support to implement the way you're implementing in your special education classroom.

Speaker 3:

So if you make time during those meetings to teach them some tips and tricks of working with your students, that will be beneficial as well. One thing that I like to set up that not everybody you know is able to, but you could try would be I would have like little data sheets that would transition back and forth between the general ed and the special ed classroom so that the general ed teacher could make notes on that, so that when the students come back to your classroom you can kind of see, you know, okay, maybe they were successful with this, maybe this strategy worked or didn't work, or whatever it is that you need to communicate quickly can just be jotted down. I found that to be really helpful too. So then, even the next time that I was able to meet with the gen ed teachers, that they we already had something we needed to discuss, yeah, I think that's a great idea.

Speaker 1:

We, you know, I had the opportunity to co-teach with my sister one year and when two teachers intentionally make a plan and they can have each other's backs and they are kind of working with each other and playing off of each other, I think that that experience can really transform the learning for students and I feel like our students, both general education and our kids with IEPs I feel like they're all benefiting. And you know, kids who aren't on an IEP can learn from a special education teacher. You know we have all those different tips and tricks, like you mentioned, sharing those with the teacher, but when you're providing those to the students in person yourself, I think there is a huge opportunity for growth in all students. And so can you give us an example of a time that you were in this kind of situation where you had the opportunity to make a big impact on kids, and what do you think that it was that made it successful?

Speaker 3:

So there's been a lot of opportunities over the last 19 years to make big impacts, but I think that what makes it the most successful is, like we've discussed, the open communication. I mean, in the different roles I've played, I always make sure to train my teachers both the special education and general education teachers with those tips and tricks because ultimately, that's what's going to benefit our students. I've seen so many successful transitions from students who are full-time and self-contained classrooms that are able to make it into full-time general education classrooms just by successfully communicating and implementing all these strategies together, because it really goes hand in hand and when you get to see that transition, that progress that they're making, it's just an amazing thing to see.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and that collaboration piece is so important. I've even had teachers who come to me and they don't have any of my kids in their class, but they're asking for those strategies and they're asking for that support because they know that special educators they just have different tools in their toolbox and different strategies to provide. So I think it's important that we are supporting, through collaboration, all teachers. And do you have any specific resources that you use to support general education teachers and help bridge that gap between the two use?

Speaker 3:

to support general education teachers and help bridge that gap between the two. I do, and I want to say too that, like you mentioned, that it can benefit all students in their classroom. You know, in general education teachers are going to have students who are not just students with IEPs. They're going to have students learning English as a second language. They're going to have students going through the response to intervention process and any student that you just see is not getting exactly what they need from the way that you know the material is being presented, or whatever the case may be. These strategies will help with all of those learners. So it's so important that you know we implement any strategies we can to help students be successful.

Speaker 3:

So, like you asked about resources that I might have, and I think visuals are the most important. It is something that you can use in both the general education and the special education setting. They can be used for a variety of things academics, independent functioning, behavior, communication. You can use such a wide range of visuals and it really makes a big difference. And I have a freebie I have these visual cue cards that are color-coded so you can flip to them quickly. They hang from your lanyard and they can go with you wherever you need to go, and I give them out to both of my special education and general education teachers who have students in their room that would benefit from them, because they're convenient, they are right there and you can use them any way you need. So those are available for free on my website.

Speaker 1:

Those sound amazing. I've seen them and I've seen different special education teachers with them. I honestly don't know that I've seen a general education teacher with them on their lanyards. So that's great that you are providing that support to the teachers and I will link you have a link for me and I can put that in the show notes so that they can get those for free. Yes, yes, so switching gears just a minute. You did talk a little bit earlier about the data going back and forth and sharing that information. So when a student is receiving inclusion services and there isn't a para in the room and there isn't or there isn't a special education teacher in the room, that the child is just in there with the general education teacher there becomes sometimes it becomes necessary for that gen ed teacher to track data. So how do you think can both the special education teacher and the general education teacher track and share that student progress responsibilities effectively?

Speaker 3:

I would usually just send it on either a clipboard or in a folder that they're already bringing to that classroom, so that it just goes back and forth automatically. And you know it doesn't have to be this long, lengthy thing that the general education teacher is writing. It may not even be something they need to communicate, you know every single time, but it's important, I know. You know teachers have a lot to do, so it has to be something quick and effective. So I think that just something that can go back and forth with the student that doesn't. It's not anything that has to be then transferred between the two teachers. The student is carrying it back and forth, so I think that is really helpful as well.

Speaker 1:

Have you ever experienced any pushback from general education teachers when they were just like no, I'm not taking that data for you, I don't have the time.

Speaker 3:

You know, sometimes there's pushback, but ultimately when you give them the training, you often see that it's the buy-in that they need. If they're not sure how to use it or what to do or how long it's going to take, then that's when you'll see. The pushback is with that uncertainty. But if you're able to work with them and communicate effectively with them and they see that it truly is making a difference with the students in their classroom, I think that that's when you'll notice that shift, that change in their thinking.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it all goes back to that communication. An administrator told me one time and it's the best piece of advice that I've ever been given is clearly communicate your expectations. And if you're not communicating, if you're not having that back and forth relationship, yeah, you're going to start seeing some, some issues. So what do you think? What would you say is the number one piece of advice that you would give a new special educator to have successful partnerships with their general education teachers?

Speaker 3:

So my number one piece of advice is to communicate, of course, but make yourself open to communication. Especially, you know, if you're a new special education teacher. It's really important that you let the teachers know that you are available and open to communicate and that you want to collaborate to do what's best for your students, because, ultimately, the reason we're all there in that school building is for the students, so it's important that we're all on the same page to do what's best for the students in our classrooms, right?

Speaker 1:

I completely agree Communication is the key. Well, kristen, thank you so much for sharing your insights and your experiences with us. This topic impacts the majority of special education teachers. Like you said, even if you have a self-contained classroom, there might be times when you're having to collaborate and communicate with gen ed teachers, and so your expertise and your dedication to supporting those teachers is truly inspiring. So if we wanted to learn more from you, where can we find you?

Speaker 3:

You can find me at specialeducationclubhousecom, where you can find information about all things special education, and you can also find me on social media. On Instagram, I'm at specialeducationclubhouse, and it was so nice to speak with you today as well, jennifer, thank you.

Speaker 1:

Thank you so much. I'll get all of those links put into the show notes and have a great day, you too.