I am the general education teacher in a fourth grade inclusion classroom, in the poorest county in the United States of America. My students, this year, are going to be a hard-working, albeit struggling bunch of learners.
Half of my class is designated as students with disabilities and the other half are English Language Learners.
Over ninety percent of the students at my school qualify for free and reduced lunch. In developing this coming year's classes, my principal thought it might benefit the ELL population to fill out the inclusion class so the children would have the services of three teachers for at least two periods per day.
Our school is a school in its infancy; we are growing to our highest grade, fifth, next year. It is exciting to be involved in the development of a new school community, but it is also a challenge.
My Project
One of the greatest challenges we face at my school is the acquisition of materials that are appropriate for our students. I got a lovely brand-new library last school year, but it is aligned to the Common Core Forth Grade Standards. In a classroom with students with disabilities and ELLs these reading materials are simply not appropriate, not yet. Hopefully by the end of the year my students will be reading on or near grade level, but in September that is not realistic.
I am requesting leveled books for our classroom library so that reading is accessible for all of my students. This past year I had to borrow many books from the third and second grade teachers for my readers and it was demoralizing for the kids. I want my students to feel comfortable and confident when they peruse our classroom library looking for books to read. I do not want to have a single child come up to me and tell me that there is nothing for them to read in our library.
Please make reading a pleasure for my varied readers.
Let them feel like our classroom library is their's from day one! Reading is exceptionally hard for the students I have in my classroom, please give them something to look forward to.
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