Seven Steps for Setting Up a Stellar Autism Room

Hi, I'm Sasha from theautismhelper.com, and today I want to share my 7 steps for setting up a stellar autism room in my own classroom. So the first step is organization and planning. Now, I didn't just come in this room and throw centers all over the place. I really spent a lot of time thinking about where I want everything to go. So the main center in my class is this table right here, and this is where I, I do all of my direct instruction. So when I'm planning and looking at my kids' IEPs, I really made sure that I had centers for all of my students to work with paraprofessionals and independently. So I really urge you to look through your IEPs and think about which kids you can group together and what your paras can be doing. This is another station that a para runs over here, and then I have another station a para runs in the back. So there's plenty of space for the paras to work individually with kids or in small groups and then need independent work because not all your kids are going to be with you at the same time. So that's something I really urge teachers to think about and plan for. Planning. This is my independent workstation right in the middle. So when I'm thinking of the layout of my class, I'm starting to figure out where I want to put all of the different stations. I have one student who's one-on-one, so he has a table he can work on. I know I need a break area, so I, I break off a part of my classroom for the break area. Make sure technology has a special space that's not right in the middle of the room, that's going to be distracting all the kids. So really, when you're setting up your furniture before you even move anything around, start to think about why you're putting something where it is. If you have a runner, don't put them next to the door. You're gonna make life way harder on yourself. Also, the structure of the classroom is really important. Physically, the classroom is very divided. Someone came in my classroom recently and said, oh, it's like you have 4 mini classes in here. That's exactly what I'm going for. I love using furniture to divide the room because then it's built-in storage. So this shelf breaks off my break area, but it also stores all of our sensory toys and our balls and our everything that they're going to use in the break area. The dividers in the middle of the classroom give a perfect opportunity for storing all of the academic and data needs of that center. So the reading station right next to it, there's all of our data binders, all the student work, but it also breaks up the station from the other, from the other center over there. So it's just a nice way to kind of have a double duty. So scrounger on your schools. I always heard people be a hoarder, keep things, go to garage sales. Grab whatever you can need to physically divide the classroom. Our kids are— can be very easily distracted, so if you're asking them to work on something over here while a bunch of stuff is going on in the other end of the room, you really need to make sure there are those divisions so they're not getting distracted and they can focus on their work. The next step is schedules, and this is a huge thing and something that will take you hours and hours, but it's going to really be the method to the madness. Where is everyone? What are they doing and who are they working with. So there's two kinds of schedules for— you're gonna need— you're gonna need staff schedules and you need your student schedules. So our staff schedules are put up on the board. I have them on a clipboard so they're available to me all day so I can check them out whenever I need them. That's going to show me where each kid is at every point of the day. I make also schedules for my staff. My staff member had hers out all day because she was checking it, so she knows exactly what she's supposed to be doing at all points of the day. The next big part is the kids' schedules. My kids who need visual schedules have these ones in here on their— in their binders. Some of my higher kids have it written out so they know what's expected of them, so they know exactly where they're going, what they're doing. They can see when gym is, when reading is. They know when their breaks are coming up. That's really the key. And if you don't have a schedule for each student, you're really going to be lost. Think about how much we look at our iPhones and our calendars. Our kids really, really need that. So the next step is visuals. Visuals ties right in with schedules because we need visuals in our class. Our students really struggle with receptive language. So like our visual schedules, we need to be putting visuals around the room where we use them. I always urge teachers to set up a lot of visuals by the door because if you need water, you're gonna run out the doorway. When you go to a fire drill, you're not gonna go find your fire drill social story in your binder. You're running out the door. Having a place where you use it. If you use timeout outside the room, put your timeout visuals by the door. Just makes sense where you're going to be using them. One issue we have a lot of behavior problems is our computer, so I put a lot of visuals over there so my kids can be utilizing these at the computer station. So we have kind of our computer rules, different communication requests for the computer, all nearby here so there's not an issue. The next big things are data and the academic work. So those really hand— or go hand in hand in my mind. Step 5 and Step 6. We want to know what the kids are doing and we want to see our progress. You need data, the data systems where you're going to be using them. So this is a paraprofessional station. Her reading binder has all of her data sheets right here. My student who has a one-on-one aid, his data binder right on the board. So when she's working with him, she's not running to go grab his data binder. It's right in the spot she needs it. We have a bunch of data in our fluency station. That's something that's running all throughout our morning. So every student has a data binder that the aide takes data on their fluency flashcards. It's right next to her table. There's no running around. I keep all my data in the front of the room as well as behavior data clipboard so we can all be grabbing those and using them around the room when we work them. And in the same way, I'm going to sound redundant, academic work built in to each center all the students' different IEP goals. If students have similar IEP goals— hey, these 3 guys have language arts goals that are really similar— put them in a group. Have a para work on that IEP goal. Set up the program for them. Write out exactly what you want them to do. Give them the data sheet. Set up the materials. Have your para run it and just check in. So they're getting their academic needs met all over the class, whether they're with you in a group or doing independent work or in one of the aid stations, they're always working on their IEP goals in the different centers of the room. So it's really built into this structure. Here's our reading centers, here's our language binders. Those are all targeting different IEP goals in different parts of the room. A lot of the instruction might be done with you at direct instruction, but be keeping in mind of ways to utilize those times students away from you in a productive way. Because there's a lot of ways to do that. The last step that ties everything together is communication. It's not just your speech therapist's job to teach your kids how to communicate. Kids with autism will always struggle with communication. It's part of the diagnostic criteria. So be building in those communication systems within your classroom. My student's Dynavox is out by the schedule so he has easy access to it all the time. Embed the communication opportunities in the room so they have ways to ask for things if your students have less verbal abilities. A lot of things that we like to utilize are up here in the morning so we can grab them easily. Any visual greetings so students can say hi to their friends if they're non-verbal. Ways to talk about the weather, ways to ask their friends questions. Have those be part of your day, part of your routine. They're in your schedule. They're something that your students can utilize every day and they'll be able to get better at it. That routine is really key. So those are my 7 steps, 7 steps for setting up a stellar autism room. You have any questions? Questions, please contact autismhelper.com. Thanks for watching.