My Journey into Special Education

Since I graduated from university, I wanted to gain more experience with special needs kids. However, through many rejections/no calls, I realized that it was a tough field to infiltrate. I wanted to get the experience but they wanted people already with experience. Geez Louise! It's always the same dilemma in many fields. You want the experience but you can't get it unless you already have it! Do they not understand the impossibility of this? Well, it only took 3 years for this seemingly impossible task to become possible! Today, I started my first day of work at a school whose students cannot attend regular public school for one reason or another. These students have autism, emotional disturbances, aggression problems, etc. I am currently just a substitute one-on-one aide. This means that I work with a single student at a time with anything that they need. I do not know which student I am assigned until the day of. Today, I was assigned a particular student with autism. She arrives to school on a bus but her bus was in the parking lot and she was nowhere to be found. Other aides that have worked with her started giving me tips on how to work with her. All of them told me to be cautious because she is known to scratch and bite. She is very sensory, so she likes to be squeezed and tickled. Other tips were to give her short prompts - don't bombard her with wordiness. Let her think about what is said. She may need help walking. There was a lot of advice, I was trying to remember it all. Then the coordinator came and spoke to the other teachers in the same classroom. I heard him tell them that today is my first day and that he's not sure that this particular student would be a good way to start me off as she would be a handful. This worried me more than anything (not because she bites and scratches!) because he didn't think I would be able to handle her. She seemed like she would be an overwhelming case. I told him that I was ready and that I can do it! Everyone was preparing me so I was ready to just dive into the deep end. At first, I was quite nervous. I didn't know what was right, I didn't know what was wrong. I was pretty much on my own in the beginning. After she rummaged through some books and toys, she finally sat down at her desk. I let her do whatever she wanted for a while so she wouldn't be overwhelmed by this new girl all up in her space. She decided to read a book. She loves books! Then, I attempted to get her to do some desk work. It was great! I had looked through her logs and saw that she had worked with numbers 1-3. I tried to get her to show me the number of fingers but she was unable to isolate her fingers. I helped her with the fingers and I made her fingers touch mine to go with the sensory side of her. Then I had her match the numbers and she did wonderfully! I was so happy! Then when we were doing this, her previous aide came with another teacher to observe me. I was feeling the pressure to perform because it was my first day! They were a great help though! We had her spell her name using letter cards and then we took her to the swings for a break. Then after a while, her behavioral therapist came for a couple hours and she was also very helpful. We reinforced her good behavior, like staying on task and sitting nicely. I was with her for about 6 hours, but it didn't feel like it. I had a great first day! I hope the following days will be just as great. I'm not sure if I will get this student again because I am just a sub. I don't really care which student I get because I want to get to know all of them. I'm so happy to finally get the chance to begin my journey into special ed.