Interview with Taylor and Me
Jen: Okay, so I'm here today with Taylor, who is a special ed teacher, and she will begin by introducing herself.
Taylor: Hi, I'm Taylor. I am a, my title officially is elementary education specialist, but I work with fourth and fifth graders, this year.
Jen: Okay, is there any specific subject that you work with your students on?
Taylor: I primarily work with It's it depends on their individual goals that are in their IEPs, but right now it's mostly like math goals and writing and reading goals. So primarily helping them with that. And then there's some social emotional like behavioral stuff that I work with them on. That's like my duty and not the school psychologist. So there will be some types of lessons like that, but like, not that I couldn't help them with science or social studies, but primarily just trying to get them at grade level for, yeah, like reading, writing, yeah. ELA stuff. And then yeah. Oh my gosh.Reading, writing, ELA stuff and math.
Jen: That makes sense. You teach, you teach in San Diego, right?
Taylor: Yes, I do.
Jen: Okay. How long have you been teaching?
Taylor: This is my first year as a special ed teacher. Okay. And I'm actually in progress of my teaching credential. They have that opportunity for special ed teachers and they do have it for math and science teachers. It's essentially like intern teacher programs for quite hard to fill positions, which I don't know. I've always liked special ed the best. So I mean, to me, that's like the, I don't know, that's not to me. That's not hard to fill. I'm excited that I have a job. They knew they wanted me.
Jen: Oh, that's good. What are their range of learning disabilities that you work with?
Taylor: so I have a, I'm in. Okay. Progress of a mild to moderate credential. So that is anywhere from just, they call them specific learning disabilities or other health impairments. Those usually are like ADD or ADHD types. But I'm not the one that diagnoses those kids. It's like a school psychologist and usually I don't think they diagnose that stuff. , and then also autism typically, like I have a few children with autism or who are autistic depending on what, phrasing you like.
Jen: What else was I going to ask? Do you, I know that sometimes a special ed teacher will interact with the general ed. students. Is that true for you?
Taylor: Oh yeah, definitely. Cause I, at this moment, I'm mostly doing push in services. So I go into the general ed classroom where I have the students. So to try not to make it obvious about why I am working with a certain student, cause you don't want to embarrass them in any way or point out, yeah, this kid is the one that is having trouble with reading. That's why I'm here. So I kind of introduced myself to each class, like in general. So then a lot of. general ed kids are gonna say, Hi, Miss Spencer. You know, I want to come work with you. And I'm like, Oh, sorry. Like, you know, it's just this kid or, you know, I'll be in your class. You'll see me later. You know, cute. Yeah.
Jen: What did you do before you were a special ed teacher? Did you still work with, in the same area or?
Taylor: Yes, a little bit. I've kind of been all over the place. To put in context, I graduated college in 2019. So I had like six months in the workforce before COVID pandemic. I found the school that I'm working at because I got hired as a roving special ed sub. So they had extra COVID funding where they had a substitute that would go in and sub for the general teachers so they could attend IEP meetings. Or for, I would sub for the case manager. slash special ed teacher. That's kind of, those names are pretty inter, they're interchangeable. They're the same person. They're the special ed teacher. So, but it's for a charter school that I work at because I'm in elementary school right now, but I, Was like the special ed sub for elementary through high school. So my schedule was always different. I started doing that before that I worked in a lot of, like, I worked in homeless shelters. I was a nanny for a little bit. I was a mental health clinician. All of those were not great for my own mental health stuff. It was a little too close to home, but, teaching I found was really fun. Or really it's, it's very challenging, but it's something that I. Feel like I have a good skill set for. I didn't realize at first.
Jen: That makes sense. Well, that's good that you've realized that, when you think of the subjects that you help with your students, cause I know you help with a variety of ones. Are there certain subjects that you find or school projects that you find are easier for your students and others?
Taylor: I'm not quite sure yet. Cause I'm still getting to know them, but it's hard. I think something that's difficult for a lot of them is. It's just some students really have a hard time with like, not get like, if the directions are vague. Or like some students really, really like to have like them. Creativity to do whatever they want. But I think a lot of the time, my students are the ones that are struggling to find. You know, what. What is, what is required of me and like just the bare minimum, depending on who it is. But, yeah, that's a really good question. Cause I need to figure that out. I'm, I'm still learning, the kids in my caseload just cause I've only been in school with them for like two or three weeks so I'm just getting to know all of them.
Jen: Yeah, that makes sense. I was just curious. Cause I know sometimes, like I know for me, When I was in school, I had a lot of challenges with math and writing. Yeah, but I got better at it when I had tutors and the same thing with reading comprehension. I was really good at history , science, English and grammar. So I was just, you know, I think in general, sometimes, you can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think from my experience with people with autism, they sometimes, I think they're, Either good at math or science, or sometimes the other way around. They're bad at it. That would, I mean, that would make sense to me. Like the kind of the mindset, a lot of people like autistic people are very like black and white, depending on it, or very like rule oriented or, you know, so it's like science and math, their rules always stay the same. But I think a lot of the time. Like if you're good at English or writing, whatever language you're at, but like you're, you're, reading and writing that can sometimes be up to interpretation of the teacher more like writing, I guess, not so much an elementary school. But l like math and science, and how to solve those problems are always the same. Yeah, I would agree with you. When it's more abstract, it's harder for special ed students. What do you like best so far or least about your teaching? I know you're still discovering all that. My, what I like best, or maybe I'll start with what I like least.
Taylor: I'll start with what I like least and I don't know, I don't know. Okay. What I like least is that I am at a school where my predecessor was less than great., I was told that he called kids stupid. And I won't say much more, but like, literally like you, why are you in this role? If you could have any other job, if you aren't going to want to work with the one you're working with like the most vulnerable students, like just, But I Yeah, sorry. I lost my train of thought there. I, can you repeat the question?
Jen: That's okay. You were, I had asked what you liked least or best about your teaching.
Taylor: Oh, right. So I like least, I guess, that a lot of the teachers right now, well, first off it's hard because they are, this is. They are kind of recreating their elementary SPED program because last year they didn't even have a classroom for us. So we had to do push in services where we go into the classroom and, and teach and assist the children. Or we'd like to take them out, pull out and like, go to the library or something, but they finally have a classroom for us. So, but there's also different expectations that we currently don't have a lot of teacher assistants at all in our classrooms, like just even for the general classroom to help other general ed kids.
So there's a lot of pressure on me. Like people that don't understand my role are kind of like, well, why aren't you in our class yet? You know, which I haven't experienced too much of, like, they're very eager for my help because they need the help because we're pretty low staffed. With our teacher assistants and our aides. So that's kind of what I like at least it's kind of, it's a lot of different people expecting different things from me while I'm still learning the role myself, so I can't, so I have to say no, or I'm not sure if I'm supposed to be saying yes. But luckily I do have a good supervisor and mentor teacher who's helping me out with that.
Jen: That's good.
Taylory: yeah. But what I like best, I like that it's because like how we, how everybody learns is so unique and we just don't have the capacity usually to teach everyone in the exact way that would be best for them. But I like that I'm helping certain students in a way that. I Am working for them and that is my job because they are so young and vulnerable, they can't use the words that say, Oh, I'm this type of learner. I'm this, that I'm the one that's advocating for them because like so many kids struggle and just can't use, find the words. And there's not, we don't know. It depends on, you know, them at home, what kind of support they get, if they're getting a lot of support, but like, I like that. I'm at least an adult that is advocating for their needs. And hopefully they can learn when they're older to advocate for themselves.
Jen: Yeah. Yeah. That would make sense to me because I know for myself, it was, it was a little, it was a little challenging for me to advocate for my needs. When I was in, uh, college and still learning about, and I'll be in my diagnosis. But when I got out of college, it was easier because I knew more of how I learned and what I needed from people. I think to some extent I'm still learning, you know, what I needed first in school versus what I need now in adult life. Yeah, that's different. , And I'm sure that that might be true for your students too. You know, they're probably learning it won't, I don't know, they know. If any of them know that they are special ed It's kind of weird. I don't, some of them do know, like, they're like, when am I seeing you?
Taylor: Like, they're like, when am I seeing you? But I don't have this like we had, uh, our personal school has been like reaching, rechanging, rechanging, rechanging. What is the intervention they're getting? What type of services are they getting? Because they have a different time where they go into groups, they switch classes based on where they're reading levels at. So there's like, well, maybe. Like kids that are almost below reading level or grade level below, like reading below grade level kids. And then like the kind of accurate level. And then maybe the ones that could be challenged a little bit, cause they're a little bit above. So they might get a hint of that if they, but not, so that's like something that we're doing that they're already doing. So they might get a hint of if they're special ed.
They, I try not to make it super obvious in case it is embarrassing for them. And not make it like a bad thing. Like I just, they, I mean, other kids have seen me take certain students out of class just to introduce myself. Cause I was like, okay, they need to all know me. For the first few weeks of school, that's kind of what I was doing. Just kind of popping into classrooms, seeing kind of observing the kids helping in where I can. But I'm still learning the teacher part of it. Like I've worked with like, different like, like a wide range of different populations. I was a psych major, but then I wanted to do social work. But now I'm a teacher, which I like, yeah. So they, they don't, they don't always know, and it's not maybe the best to tell each child, but a lot of them know that, oh man, I get in trouble for fidgeting a lot. Yeah. But no one else gets, like, why don't they get, why don't they fidget like me? And why aren't they getting in trouble? I'm sure they know something is unique and different about them. They might just not know why. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cause I, I can definitely see where you are, it might be hard to share that with a child, depending on their age.
And, I think that their age can definitely be different if they are special ed. Yeah, I was, I was in middle school last year and it was very awkward at times. Okay, so it was pretty awkward last year when I was teaching mostly middle schoolers, because they would have, they call it like a special day class if they I mean you probably you have us. You have your podcast about special ed so maybe I'm just teaching you like what you already know, but like the. They have their own period, called college bound, which is just like to work on other work from other classes to like assist them, but they would like use the R splur
Jen: I think you just froze.
Taylor: They were a place. Insecure like they know, hey, like extra tutoring when other kids don't, you know, so that was very awkward. And like, you know, some of them kind of understood because at that point, I think, at least in high school, they were invited to their own IEP meetings. I think in middle school, sometimes they go to them as well. Okay. In case they want to advocate for themselves, but they, that wasn't as common. It was usually high schoolers that would go to their own meetings, but not middle school yet. Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah. I didn't know that. I didn't know that they could go to their own IEP meeting. Yeah I'm still learning that. I think for the most part, most of the time it was like high schoolers that would want to, cause they were more in on it or maybe they wanted a different accommodation. So, but yeah, the elementary school kids definitely don't go to their own IEP meetings.
Jen: That makes sense. You said you were teaching, fourth, fourth or fifth graders, right?
Taylor: Yeah. All my kids on my caseload are fourth and fifth grade this year.
Jen: Gotcha. So I'm not sure if you have experienced this yet, but I know that sometimes bullying is common at schools and I was wondering how it's handled at your school.
Taylor: Oh, right. Well, I did. Yeah, I was looking at that question. I. For bullying at my school, they try, I guess for punishment for bullying, like they try to do restorative justice as much as possible. Like, Oh, you said something really mean to the student. You're going to write an apology letter to them. It's different. It's different with sped kids because a lot of sped kids tend to get in trouble or bully or get bullied, depending on, I haven't seen it. Can you hear my dog bark? Okay, good. Let me know if he isn't, and I will restart my sentence. Typically, like in elementary school, I haven't seen lots of bullying. I just, on my own caseload, there's like a student that has autism and he got really mad last week at his friend. So he kept saying things like, you're not my friend anymore and stuff. And students can't get disciplined for something that would be part of their IEP because it's technically illegal. Like they have, we have to kind of determine what, Is part of like, what is preventable and then like, what is, what, yeah. , so it's kind of tricky. It's kind of usually a discussion of like, well, what did, what exactly did they say and what did they do and what, how does this break a school rule? I would say the elementary school does a really good job though, of keeping it very positive. And I don't know, I don't know if other schools do that. Still stop doing this, but like, I don't know, have other people said if they go to elementary schools where they still have like the gate program, like the gifted and talented class, or have they stopped doing that altogether?
Jen: That's a good question. I think. I think they, I try, I was trying to remember what the other teachers I interviewed said. I think one of them might have been gifted and talented. I've been interviewing mostly people who do, middle school, not elementary school. So , yeah, maybe they have it and they use a different term for it.
Taylor: Yeah, like, because when I was a kid, I was in that class and we, it was like very obvious and you took a test and like, people knew that they were not in that class. It was like that, so I know that a lot of schools don't do that anymore. And they're like, cause like at my, like at my school, there's no gate class. There's no like, Kids that are, you know, working at grade level or above. It's like everyone is in a general class. So, which I think helps with, you know, them understanding each other more, which makes the bullying not really as prevalent. And they do a good job of being very positive and everything. , so thankfully it hasn't been a huge thing, but the bullying in the, in the, there's lots of bullying in middle school still. , but mostly kids that are. They have an IEP and they're working on things like their own emotional social regulation skills.
Jen: That makes sense. What I thought was an interesting question. I, Been asking all the teachers I've interviewed about this. When you compare the neurotypical students that you interact with, , to the special ed , what do you wish they had, the neurotypicals knew more about the special ed ones, like, to try to understand them better?
Taylor; What do I wish that the neurotypical students knew kind of about the sped students. I wish that they would know that there's not really something very much wrong with them. Because. Just how, I mean, this is like me on my soapbox, but like the school system in itself is like, you know, still very much like, ah, like we're teaching kids to sit down when they're supposed to sit down and stand up when they're supposed to stand up and raise their hand before they talk. And, you know, you can only go to the bathroom at this time and they've moved past that, but I mean, the school day is long on purpose. They try to train us to get ready to work an eight hour job. So what I wish like other kids knew, which I haven't seen too much of Thankfully, yeah, just that like they're just because their behavior is different doesn't mean that they're not like able to be friends with them or, you know, cause I, or, or that, don't like just, I wish all the kids knew that it's okay to be yourself and that everyone's a little bit unique. But I mean, it's, you know, we ha I don't have the answers, but I wish that they all kind of knew that it's okay to be unique and that everyone, like everyone's going to have a rough day and that looks different for every type of student. Yeah, that makes sense to me. I, I definitely would, would definitely see where that is helpful to, and I think that goes both ways with the special ed, knowing about the neurotypical students in terms of knowing that, even the neurotypical ones can have a bad day and being able to, , try to, if not empathize with each other, at least sympathize with each other on some level.
Jen: Yeah, for sure. So when you are going into another classroom, um, what kind of environment do you usually go to, I guess, like what, what kind of environment is usually present so that the student can learn easily? In a different teacher's classroom? Yeah, since, or in your own classroom, I'm not sure you have those.
Taylor: I do have both currently. It is not set up yet because of supply chain issues and our stuff wasn't ordered in time. I don't want to spend so much complaining, but. It does not make me feel good that the most vulnerable students do not have their classroom set up yet. And we're entering the fourth week of school. I have a kidney table. Finally, I got it this week. It's. It's kind of showing a little bit about priority, like how SVED gets prioritized at schools. I didn't say the name of my school, right? No, you didn't. Yeah. Okay, cool. I'm going to keep it anonymous. But, just, Yeah, I'm sorry. Can you repeat your question again?
Jen: It's okay. I was asking about the environment of the classroom.
Taylor: Okay, so the other environments of the classrooms from what I've seen, like, some of them are very positive. Some of them are about restorative justice. And then there are other educators that are kind of like, Still struggling to move past certain phrasing, like I went into a classroom where the teacher said, like, this is really simple. And it seems like no one's getting it. And I'm like, okay, well, like, you know, I don't like to hear. I don't like to tell any kid that anything's easy or not. Yeah. And I know she means well. And I know I've watched her. I mean, I, I'm assuming like they've all, I've seen all the fourth and fifth grade teachers at my school and I've watched them all like progress and do like, I've seen a lot of them and their different styles and like what I really like from each of them. And for the most part, they're making it a welcoming class. Like my school is pretty unique in that it is a neighbor. It's a charter school, but it is just in the neighborhood that we're in, in San Diego. And it's a pretty, low socioeconomic status school. It's a lot of students of color and there's a lot of white teachers for a school. That's mostly students of color. For example, I'm a white teacher. So I think that there's some, There's a lot more work that could be done. And I think I've seen a lot of work by the white teachers like making their classrooms more welcoming, trying to be as racist as possible. Yeah, but it's, there's still that struggle there. Yeah, but I see, but I do see a lot of very positive classrooms, a lot of group work. You know, in elementary school you have such a short attention span, but it's been great to see like, you know, all the teachers like trying to incorporate things that are good for everybody. Like they all have horrible attention spans because they all had to do school during COVID and they all grew up with Tik TOK and Instagram and iPads. Right. Like we didn't have to, we didn't have that. Yeah, very true. Yeah.
Jen: Actually I was going to ask, I know you didn't teach during the pandemic, but I was curious if you knew anything about how your school handled that.
Taylor: I heard a little bit, like, do you mean just like how they work, how it was, how it was.
Jen: Yeah, like if they did hybrid or, you know, how, how they try to, respond to do, to education during the pandemic, because I know some people did hybrid and then, or they had to do it completely online in the beginning.
Taylor: Right. I think that they did like March 2020 through the end of the school year, of course, being locked down over online. And then the next school year was all online as well. So 2020 fall till spring 2021 was online as well. But then they came back in person. this, the school year, The before ours to 2021 to 2022. And I didn't get hired there until December 2021. And as a roving substitute so I worked there every single day. And was just going different like working mostly I'm working. I worked mostly in their middle school but it was like right now it's kind of like if they, it's not hybrid and it was never hybrid this past school year because. They just, but they did have to like having a COVID team and, Oh, you know, if they, if they, if a kid has independent study, it probably means they have COVID or someone in their house has COVID. So just having a lot of adaptation that way, but they didn't act like a hybrid in person at all. They were like, okay, let's keep each, let's keep them safe. Let's try and give them as much as possible, like giving them the technology they need, having to get a WiFi box for everybody and then a computer for everybody. That makes sense. That's good that they provided the Wi Fi and the computer because I know with some of the teachers I was talking about interviewing, they, they, what they did was they had like, Wi Fi spots and buses that they would go around to different neighborhoods with. And I thought that was creative. Oh, that is really creative. Oh my gosh. Yeah. So, you know, there's definitely different ways that people came up with to try to combat that during the pandemic.
Jen: Yeah. Also, what was I going to ask I was, This probably won't apply yet because you're still in the beginning. But one of the questions I had was, if you, like if any of the special ed students, have done, have done better with the schooling than they, than you thought, or maybe other teachers thought that they were going to.
Taylor; Oh, yeah. I mean, I could speak to one student I have, but, I, this is just my own little irk. I have a student that is basically textbook autistic, like everything about this kid. I'm like, yeah, duh. Well, he's autistic. And because he has had meltdowns, like he, like where they have to evacuate the class and they have like, you know, me or whoever I'm not, I wasn't, This kid's teacher, I taught extended school year during the summer. So I had this student in the summer and now he's on my caseload because I got the TO through five for elementary school. And I have fourth and fifth graders. This depends on how many students with IEPs, like how it's spread out. But I have 15 fourth and fifth graders. And he was in my summer class, so I knew him before the summer and he did have some meltdowns and stuff, but it's all just like sensory overload of stuff with routine. , he has been doing better, but because like more, because like. The teachers have been more willing to hear. Oh yeah. Like let's do some preventative action. Let's not like we have to really pick our battles. Like what is essential to make him try and do what is not like him , He doesn't like pic.
Jen: As I wrap up, there are some things I would like to share with you. I do have a website for this podcast. It is called living with nld. com. I also have a Facebook and Instagram page for this podcast. It is called Living with NLD. I will include the links for those in the description. In conclusion, I would like to hear from my audience. If you know individuals with NLD that I could interview for this podcast, please email me at living with nld at gmail. com. What are you interested in learning about NLD? I know I'm not an expert, but I do know I have the living experience of having it. I would like you to practice journaling about your gifts and differences. Also see if there's a way that you can make that difference become easier for you to do than originally it was. Thank you for listening today, and please go to my YouTube channel and subscribe to it. Thank you. Bye.
