DaIly 5 - Special Needs Classroom

by Amanda
(Queensland, Australia)

My teaching partner and I wanted to find an easy and structured Literacy program that would suit our class of 16 students with special needs (varying abilities - intellectual impairment and autistic spectrum disorder predominantly).

Our students were struggling with literacy - they had been often set up for failure and really didn't see the point, as they didn't see themselves as readers.

Once we introduced the Daily 5 - specifically the Read to Self component - it was absolutely incredible to see the attitudes change of all the students!

We taught and modeled the 3 ways to read a book, and you could see the light bulbs come on!

Suddenly students who have difficulty reading any word were able to participate and engage with the text (we did lots of reading the pictures for that reason alone). The pressure was off!

Our students are up to 5 minutes of Read to Self, and it an absolute joy when we say that it's Daily 5 time to see them smile and come straight to the carpet!

Thank you so much to the Sisters for this wonderful inclusive program, and I'm looking forward to continuing it right through the year!