
STRUCTURE
STRUCTURE

Our students tend to struggle with staying in an area independently. At the beginning of the year, my TA’s and I end up being human barriers to teach them that they must stay in the area on their schedule to work until they are finished. Set the boundaries of the area using furniture. It’s a lot easier to monitor the small “entrance/exit” to a center than an open space. See below for some examples – the red arrows indicate where the entrance/exit to the area.




I have several different “independent” centers in our classroom. Even though the tasks will vary, I try to keep the actual student area consistent. Below is a visual to guide you and some examples.





Students are not going to walk in your classroom and know exactly what to do at each center. MODEL EVERYTHING over and over and over and over again… and then some.









Over the past six years, Gabrielle has taught in a variety of special education classroom settings with various age groups and ability levels. She currently teaches in a classroom that serves students with autism in Kindergarten through 2nd grade. She has a passion for providing high quality instruction, as well as a safe and nurturing learning environment that fosters independence and growth for children with special needs. The desire to share her passion led her to develop a website, Teaching Special Thinkers. Gabrielle wants to engage each and every learner in her classroom. She creates engaging and appropriately leveled resources for her own classroom and shares them with other teachers of special thinkers on her TpT store. She loves the challenge of creating classroom resources that can meet the needs of different learning styles and ability levels, and save teachers time!