Author: TCR Staff

Lesson Plans, Teaching Tips

Working with Students with Special Needs: Part VI – Activities for Gifted and High-Achieving Students

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Teachers with gifted children in their classrooms need to pay particular attention to developing the upper three levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy: (1) Synthesis, (2) Evaluation, and (3) Analysis.

Below are several creative-writing topics that emphasize the use of the upper levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy. Again, it is not only gifted students who will benefit from activities like these. They are enjoyable activities that stimulate higher-order thinking skills in everyone.

Story Starters

  • Tell how to make a paper airplane (or anything else that is relatively simple to do).
  • Describe an object without naming it.
  • Write down all the actions of someone or something in the room.
  • Pretend you are a tetherball (or anything else). Describe your feelings during the day.
  • Describe a day in the life of a pencil. (Other nouns can be used.)
  • Write a fairy tale in modern or futuristic terms.
  • Invent a new machine; describe it.
  • What would you put in a time capsule, and why?
  • Invent a new holiday and tell how it came to be and how it will be celebrated.
  • Write an advertisement for a make-believe product.
  • Imagine the history of a discarded item in the junk pile.
  • Invent a new vitamin.
  • Re-design a piece of clothing you’re wearing and describe it.
  • Rewrite your favorite nursery rhyme and substitute slang words.
  • Analyze the qualities of a superhero.
  • Classify yourself as a car (or any object) and describe your parts accordingly.
  • Analyze what you would do if you were lost in the woods with nothing but the clothes you’re wearing, a pocket knife, and a match.
  • Write down a conversation between a cat and a dog (or any two people or animals).
  • How are your parents the same as and different from you?
  • Discuss the differences between cars and oranges (any two items can be substituted).
  • Analyze the construction of a chair.
  • Describe the special abilities that a ballet dancer needs. (Other nouns can be substituted.)
  • Describe the actions of an ant you are observing. (Other animals can be substituted.)
  • How does it feel to look down from a high place (or from any precarious position)?
  • Describe a meeting between your teacher and Superman (or any unlikely combination of two people).
  • Critique your favorite TV show.
  • Recommend three things that will be essential for those living 25 years from now.
  • Debate an issue (handguns, smoking in public places, etc.) by writing the pros and cons.
  • Write a note to put in a satellite to tell how good or bad Earth is.
  • Is it a good idea to tell a secret? Why or why not?
  • What is the most perfect place to be?
  • What is the “good life”?
  • What does generosity mean?
  • Defend the idea that Earth is round.
  • Describe your house from a visitor’s point of view.
Teaching Tips

Working with Students with Special Needs: Part V – Classroom Strategies for ADHD

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Environmental Interventions

1. Make sure this student knows what is expected.
2. Sit this student near the teacher.
3. Try using a carousel or separate seating.
4. Surround the child with others who know how to do the work.
5. Divide the workload into small, manageable “chunks.”
6. Be very structured and consistent.
7. Allow for extra time when needed.

Interpersonal Interventions

1. Understand what this child is capable of doing.
2. Connect briefly with the child during the day.
3. Give constant feedback.
4. Meet with the child one-on-one during the school year.
5. Give immediate rewards.
6. Give a lot of encouragement and praise.
7. Keep a log on this student’s behavior, good and bad.
8. Help student to expand his or her attention span.
9. Teach the student to ask for help when confused.
10. Recognize the child’s strengths and successes.
11. Look at the student often during the lesson.
12. Remember to use different modalities during your lesson.
13. Ask the student to repeat the instructions.
14. Make a plan for organizing the student.
15. Allow the student to stretch or take a break when needed.
16. Let the child know when a transition is coming.
17. Enforce rules and consequences immediately.
18. Redirect privately.

Teaching Tips

Working with Students with Special Needs: Part IV – Classroom Modifications for Special Needs Students

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Teacher Checklist

The following are some ways to modify the classroom environment for students with special needs:

  • Reduce the number of assignments.
  • Decrease the amount of writing in an assignment.
  • Modify tests (e.g., read math problems to student).
  • Extend time for assignment completion.
  • Participation at homework center.
  • Use a timer to determine the amount of time to be spent on a particular assignment.
  • Use visual aids when giving instruction.
  • Use short, concise directions.
  • Have a buddy repeat the directions to the student.
  • Student uses a personal chalkboard/whiteboard.
  • Provide a special study area.
  • Provide a special learning partner.
  • Have the student use a notebook/contract for organization.
  • Demand an organized desk area and notebook.
  • Timeout to another classroom.
  • Provide “activity breaks.”
  • Have the student dictate thought or story to an aide. Aide writes it down and student copies it.
  • Encourage student to use a marker while reading.
  • Change seating.
  • Put fewer problems on each page.
  • Assign short period of concentrated effort.
  • Shorten assignments.
  • Provide student with the opportunity to take the assignment home or to the homework center.
  • Provide written directions.
  • Encourage student to repeat your question before answering it.
  • Teacher lists assignment on board and student copies it.
  • Break complex directions into one- or two-step tasks.
  • Change class assignments.
  • Allow student to use earphones to screen out distractions while involved in a paper and pencil task.
  • Vary test format.
  • Deploy the student within classroom.
  • Have the student work with an aide or cross-age tutor.
  • Have the student use a computer for writing assignments.
Teaching Tips

Working with Students with Special Needs: Part III – 13 Major Diagnostic Signs of ADHD/ADD

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If a child exhibits eight (8) or more of these signs, it is likely that attention disorder is related to the observed behaviors.

1. Often moves his or her feet or hands, or squirms in seat.
2. Has a real need to get up and move.
3. Anything seems to distract this student.
4. Has a very hard time waiting for his or her turn.
5. Wants to give answers or comments immediately without thinking them through.
6. Has trouble doing what others tell him or her to do.
7. Has difficulty sustaining attention in tasks or play activities.
8. Often goes to other tasks even before the first one is finished.
9. Talks a lot.
10. Interrupts others or takes things from other children.
11. Doesn’t seem to hear you or pay attention when you talk to him or her.
12. Often loses things needed for school.
13. Often engages in dangerous activities without considering the consequences.

Modifying the Classroom Environment

The following are some key ways to modify the classroom environment for ADHD/ADD students. (See next post for a full checklist.)

  • Learn to realize what this student can and should be expected to do.
  • Change teaching strategies during the lesson.
  • Create contracts with specific behaviors.
  • Reward often and be able to change rewards every few weeks.
  • Give this person a place to work apart from others.
  • Allow this person some latitude in his or her responses.
  • Use specific consequences.
  • Give as much structure and consistency as possible.