This was a good class for me. I felt good about the alignment to the regular ed English 9 class and the teachers in my PLC (Professional Learning Community), and I had a lot of fun with the kids. It was a really good experience! Check out the folders below to see what we did.
This is an SDC English 9 class that I taught for one year. By SDC this refers to a "Special Day Class" or a self-contained class. The pace is a little slower, and the content does not delve as deep as the regular education English class, but it goes through the standards pretty well. The SDC classes in California are designed to work with students who are not at the level to be in a regular education class, with support (a.k.a. Resource Students), but students who are not low enough to work on basic skills. These Special Day Class (SDC) students are in the middle of this spectrum; they can master many of the academic standards, but need more time and more support. Where I have taught, the focus is on teaching the content that all the other students are learning, but to do it on a slower pace, and reduced standards; focusing more on key standards. Although I have a Special Education credential and only had to pass the CSET (California Subject Examinations for Teachers) Mulitple Subjects test. In order to be "highly qualified" to teach English or Social Sciences according to No Child Left Behind (NCLB), I had to take the CSET for English and Social Sciences. I passed the English and Social Sciences tests, (but not the science). Therefore I feel that my level of knowledge of the curriculum in those areas is adequate, and improving.
When I was working in Los Angeles the district (LAUSD) had huge curriculum binders with accompanying materials to teach the students in their English classes. Ninth and 10th grade both focused on three units, but in different ways. These units were: Literary Analysis, Exposition, and Persuasion. Since I was teaching the Special Day Class (SDC / Self-contained) English 9 class, I was part of the department and part of a Professional Learning Community (PLC) with all general education teachers. All this is to say that I was teaching the same standards and content, (and gave the same summative assessments), but I taught things at a slower pace, focused more on the key standards, etc.
Main Focus
While there are a ton of files, I think the main focus are the three units of “Expo”, “Persuasion”, and for "Literary Analysis" I did more of it through “Animal Farm”. In addition to those folders, the files that are called “Semester Plan”, and “Day by Day Plan (or steezy)”, have the day by day plans. . . my warm-ups, what I said to the kids, HW assignments, etc. I hope that I didn’t write anything wild in there, but I'm not going to edit it ;)
Grammar
Lastly, the “Grammar” folder has many files for different areas of grammar that we covered. Each file has the “day by day” plan that is quite detailed. There is also one assessment, but surely there is a need for more formative and summative assessments….there always is!
Map Project folder
The “MAP PROJECT” was something a little outside of the bounds. It was an attempt to do a cross-curricular project with the Math SDC (Self-contained class) teacher. A project that took English skills and Math skills, and combined those to focus on the area of “Transition”. Since "Transition" is an important part of the IEP, and makes up the ITP (Individual Transition Plan), we thought it would be really good to do this. We didn’t get it too far off the ground due to “scheduling conflicts” (I’m not going to talk trash), but I have a good foundation of which to go on.
Other Teachers Work
I have two folders that have not only another SDC (Self-contained class) teacher’s work for the same class, but also some general education folders and files. There are an abundance of lesson plans, rubrics, graphic organizers and other goodies that relate to the three main units that we covered (Lit Analysis, Expo, and persuasion!).