A Trip to Claywell Elementary

  It is September 10, 2013 and I have just arrived at Claywell Elementary to see special education teachers interacting with special need students for my practicum class at USF. We were able to meet with Tara Schwartz who works as the ESE (Exceptional Student Education) specialist and has been for 9 years. Along with the introduction was the Assistant Principle (A.P.), Renee Best and the Principle, Mr. Jones. Through the introduction, Mrs. Schwartz proclaims that Claywell is a full inclusion school. What does it mean being an inclusion school? That means Claywell  is a school that takes a disabled student, placing them with students in a regular class within the school. About 465 students (give or take) attend Claywell Elementary and only 10% of the students are ESE.  

     It seems a special education class looks like a regular class. A special education classroom is set up with books, calendars, decorated walls representing sight words, children's progress in work posted, and to my surprise - color coordinated. A special education classroom is surrounded by learning centers that help students with specific needs such as reading and writing. In these classrooms a special educator provides constant and consistent provisions for the students needs in a curriculum. Take Mrs. Ruiz for example who teaches 5th grade. Mrs. Ruiz has 4 groups in her class. One group works on a reading assignment as another group reads in a learning center. The other two groups get extra attention between Mrs. Ruiz and Mrs. Matos ( an ESE teacher or paraprofessional). They work with them for 15-20 minutes on the same topic, but with more elaboration. Then the group switches. This is great, because it made it difficult to tell which student is labeled with special needs.
     I found it comforting to know that each child will get the extra attention needed, making the students with special needs not feel excluded from the other students. This is what an inclusion school looks like.