Collaborative Teaming

Margaret E. King-Sears, Rachel Janney, Martha E. Snell

• Publisher: Brookes Publishing
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781598577891
• Topic: Bildung
• Subtopic: Inklusive Bildung

Collaborative teaming is the glue that holds an inclusive school together. But most educators don't get explicit training on teamwork skills—and that's why you need the new third edition of this popular how-to book. Packed with practical tips, tools, and vignettes, Collaborative Teaming shows your staff how to work together effectively to support students with disabilities in inclusive classrooms. Perfect for independent study, inservice training, or preservice study, this reader-friendly guide will get teachers on board with collaborative teaming and give them fresh ways to improve the academic progress and behavior of all students.

LEARN HOW TO:

• Master multiple types of teaming, from co-teaching to collaborative consultation
• Clearly define a team's purpose and focus
• Establish trust and consistent communication among team members
• Schedule and facilitate productive team meetings
• Make sound decisions by consensus
• Solve problems and create action plans as a team
• Use teamwork to increase the participation and learning of all students
• Ensure positive interactions with families

PRACTICAL MATERIALS: Activities that help teachers reflect on and apply the strategies; vignettes that show strategies in action; reproducible forms and checklists for conducting meetings, co-teaching effectively, and more. (For easy printing, full-size forms will now be available for download when you purchase the book.)

WHAT'S NEW:

• How teaming relates to schoolwide initiatives like PBIS and RTI
• Expanded chapter on co-teaching
• New chapter on collaborative consultation
• More strategies for effective communication and conflict resolution
• Insights on using today's technology to collaborate
• New vignettes featuring diverse students with a wide range of disabilities
• Helpful "focusing questions" in each chapter—perfect for use in courses and book clubs

1

Overview of Collaborative Teaming

FOCUSING QUESTIONS

• What are the characteristics of collaboration and collaborative teaming?

• Why is collaborative teaming important in schools today?

• What are the differences between multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary teaming?

• What are the types of structures teams use?

• How do roles change when professionals collaborate?

• What are the benefits and challenges of collaborative teaming?

Classroom Snapshot

Mrs. Soto, a third-grade teacher, and Ms. O’Brien, a special education teacher who is a member of the third-grade team (which also includes the two other third-grade teachers in the school), are meeting after school to put the final touches on the upcoming unit on simple machines. Mr. Maxwell, a vision specialist who serves the school system on a contractual basis, also is attending this particular meeting to consult with Mrs. Soto and Ms. O’Brien about classroom adaptations for Ava, who has an intellectual disability and is legally blind.

Mrs. Soto and Ms. O’Brien co-teach daily during the language arts block in the morning and 3 days per week during social studies and science lessons in the afternoon. This schedule enables Ms. O’Brien to be in the classroom to provide part of the literacy instruction required by the individualized education programs (IEPs) of three students in the class (Ava plus Landen and Amelia, who have learning disabilities) and to assist in ensuring that those students’ use of literacy skills is supported during content area instruction. Co-teaching during science and social studies also allows Ms. O’Brien to support Ava’s active participation in the hands-on activities involved in many content area lessons.

Mrs. Soto and Ms. O’Brien have already decided that they will present the input portion of each lesson in the unit together, using team teaching, with Ms. O’Brien handling visual organizers, showing three-dimensional models, and providing demonstrations, and Mrs. Soto providing oral explanations and showing slides and videos to explain concepts and terms. The team members strive to make their presentations clear and concise because Ava needs verbal descriptions of everything done and shown. This also benefits many students in addition to Ava. The two teachers will use station teaching when students complete their practice activities, with each teacher being responsible for a hands-on activity. The students will rotate through the two teacher-directed stations as well as a third, independent work station in small groups.

The third-grade team worked to incorporate universal design for learning (UDL) features into the unit during their grade-level planning and located many online resources, streaming videos, visual organizers, and hands-on activities in which students will experiment with simple machines and create their own invention that incorporates a simple machine as a culminating activity. The unit was designed from the start to use multimodal methods and differentiated materials, and the two teachers know that Landen and Amelia will need little in the way of further individualization, other than frequently checking their understanding of terms, concepts, and instructions. Ava, however, will need some modified materials and more individualized supports.

Mr. Maxwell, the vision specialist, previously met to consult with Ava’s entire team. He gave an overview of the tactile and auditory materials that could assist Ava to be more independent during the school day and demonstrated ways to support the use of her residual vision. The two teachers, however, were keen for Mr. Maxwell to lend his expertise to their problem solving about ways to facilitate Ava’s class membership and academic progress within some specific class lessons and activities. Mr. Maxwell shared several resources for accessible sound recordings of materials related to the unit topic, suggested adding braille labels to the hands-on materials used at the learning stations, and stressed the importance of allowing Ava ample time to explore the materials. The two teachers decided to adjust their teaching plans to give Ms. O’Brien time to preview the station materials with Ava during the last part of the whole-class presentation. The team also discussed strategies for facilitating peer support for Ava and decided to talk with Ava’s parents about creating a formal peer support network.

ACTIVITY: Identify the many aspects of effective collaboration featured in this Classroom Snapshot.

Classroom Snapshot

Mr. Samson is a high school biology teacher who co-teaches one class with Ms. Franklin, a special education teacher. They have co-taught for several years, so they are familiar with each other’s styles and strengths. Routines and procedures (particularly for lab work in science) run smoothly for them and the students; they use guided notes and checklists, and they both agree that scaffolded inquiry provides structure and support while also teaching students how to be scientists. Brad is a student with emotional disabilities and has presented some behavior challenges for the co-teachers and the other students. The co-teachers have a solid classroom management system in place, with individual and group reinforcers available. Brad is not responding well to the reinforcement system, however; he is disruptive and off task, and one of the teachers needs to leave his or her team teaching frequently to talk with him privately. Ms. Franklin suspects Brad’s inappropriate behaviors are ways he has learned to get attention from teachers and peers.

Mr. Samson and Ms. Franklin begin noting the number of times Brad is disruptive because that seems to be the main issue right now. After collecting data for several days, they realize the frequency of disruptions is more than they had originally thought. They develop a plan to teach Brad how to use a self-management system to appropriately gain attention. Then, Ms. Franklin figures out when she can meet with Brad to teach him the self-management system. It is difficult to teach self-management during the science class, so she targets several of the study periods that all students have every other day. (The school uses block scheduling.) Brad demonstrates that he knows how to use the self-management system after about three sessions, which include using multiple role-play scenarios that Ms. Franklin developed based on what she had observed during the science class. Now it is time for the real test: Can he use the system during science? Brad begins using self-management in the next science class. The co-teachers continue collecting data on the number of times Brad is disruptive. Wow—what a difference they are seeing! And what a difference Brad must be feeling now that he knows more appropriate ways to gain attention from teachers and peers. The co-teachers also notice that more peers are interacting with Brad in positive and supportive ways.

ACTIVITY: If the co-teachers did not already have a strong positive and proactive classroom management system in place, then what effect might this have had on Brad’s behavior?

COLLABORATIVE TEAMS

The teachers in these vignettes engage in multiple types of collaboration as they go about the tasks involved in teaching students with and without disabilities within typical classrooms and shared learning activities. Some students have differentiated learning goals; some need supports for special sensory, physical, or behavioral needs; still others bring with them unique cultural and linguistic characteristics. This book describes how teachers from general and special education backgrounds can collaborate with each other and with other school staff, students, and families to effectively include all students. Their joint work can include several types of teaming efforts, including those designed to 1) prevent students from requiring special education services, 2) develop students’ IEPs, and 3) provide ongoing support for those students. Teams also may collaboratively deliver classroom instruction and receive consultative support from other professionals.

The previous edition of this book (Snell & Janney, 2005) primarily focused on student-level teams—groups of people organized to address the learning priorities and related needs of individual students identified to receive special education (York-Barr, 1996). This topic is still addressed in detail in Chapters 2–4. This edition, however, looks more deeply at services indirectly delivered through collaborative consultation (see Chapter 5) and direct services delivered through collaborative teaching (see Chapter 6). This book is meant to be a guide for educators from general and special education backgrounds who are serving or planning to serve students with a range of abilities and disabilities in inclusive classrooms. In addition, it can be a useful resource for anyone working with an educational team (e.g., related services personnel, administrators, family members). We assume that our readers work in schools where teachers and support staff from general education and special education are jointly responsible for students through various formal and informal types of collaborative teaming—but not necessarily through full-time co-teaching. We also assume that this collaboration is determined by the needs of the students.

The members of collaborative teams apply their complementary skills and knowledge, along with effective teamwork skills, to enhance all students’ academic and social success. Collaboration in schools entails joint planning, decision making, and problem solving, and collaboration occurs in a variety of formal and informal group configurations. These collaborative efforts are made possible by belief systems that value shared responsibility for student success, the development of effective team structures and processes, and strong support from administrators who guide the development of a school context that supports those values and processes (Cook & Friend, 2010).

The range of supports that teams can plan for and provide is not limited to establishing success in schoolwork. Team-generated supports can have many different functions, such as

• Reducing barriers to participation in school activities

• Facilitating social interactions among students

• Building peer support

• Encouraging (then using) the contribution of ideas by family members

• Embedding related services into the school day

• Replacing problem behavior with skills

• Designing plans to ease students’ transitions between grades and schools and into jobs or college

Likewise, teams take many forms to accomplish these functions.

The ensuing chapters address the essential components of collaborative teaming and the structures within which it occurs. Chapter 2 addresses building a team’s organization—its membership, distribution of responsibilities, and ways of operating—and the substantial roles that building administrators play when schools utilize collaborative teaming as they prepare for, initiate, and maintain inclusive education. Chapter 3 delves into the skills and processes team members need to effectively and efficiently work together, including basic communication skills and skills to deal with areas of disagreement and conflict. Chapter 4 describes various problem-solving and action-planni...