[nobe-l] teach without an aide

[Kayla James]

Are there some grades that are more easy to teach? I do remember that
from when I was younger, the self-contained special education class I
was in had many aides. All of them did.
Can all paperwork software be inaccessible? Does the attendance sheet
and grade book come in the computer software?

On 6/12/16, Heather Field via NOBE-L <nobe-l at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> Hello Kayla,
> It is difficult to answer your questions since they are so general. It is
> theoretically possible for a competent blind teacher to teach without an
> aid. Indeed, many very competent blind teachers teach without an aid every
> day.
> However, there are situations in which a blind teacher may choose to have an
>
> aid for a portion of a teaching day, or lesson. The circumstances may vary
> widely. For example, a blind teacher teaching in the early elementary grades
>
> will need an aide to be certain that students are learning handwriting
> correctly, so she will choose to have an aide assist for the 30 minutes long
>
> handwriting lesson.
> A blind teacher may choose to have an aide in his 5th-grade classroom during
>
> the 45-minute practical science lesson. An 8th-grade teacher may have
> several students with special needs included in her English class and these
>
> students will have an aide assigned to support them in the class. The blind
>
> teacher could request the aide to assist with various classroom supervision
>
> tasks, depending on how she determines the aide's time is best used to
> benefit the special needs students.
> A high school music teacher may choose to have an aide present during
> certain of his band lessons to ensure that students are marching in correct
>
> formation and making the changes tightly enough. The circumstances when a
> blind teacher may choose to have an aide are many and varied.
> However, who chooses to have an aide, for what lessons and for how long
> depends on many circumstances and may sometimes depend on the teachers
> perception of their own competence. So, one blind teacher may say that they
>
> never have an aide, while another may say they have requested one as a
> reasonable accommodation and have an aide in their classroom most, or all,
> of the day.
>
> Furthermore, there is the vexing area of record-keeping, IEPs and other such
>
> paperwork.
> Most blind teachers with whom I have discussed the paperwork side of
> teaching have told me that they use aides to assist them with this horrible
>
> part of the teaching responsibility. Others hire readers or use aides to
> assist with marking. These days there is a lot of data entry work where
> teachers are required to enter information into software applications which
>
> are not very accessible. So, aide assist blind teachers with this work.
>
> Finally, there is the area of special education. If one is teaching in a
> special education or resource classroom then teacher aides are automatically
>
> assigned whether the teacher is blind or sighted. So, from this very limited
>
> discussion of the topic, you can see that there isn't really a simple answer
>
> to your question. If you are wondering if you will be able to teach without
>
> an aide, the answer is probably, it depends. It depends on the grade you're
>
> teaching, the lessons you are teaching, whether you have lots of paperwork
> to complete and on your actual level of competence.
> I hope this is helpful.
> Warmly,
> Heather
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Kayla James via NOBE-L
> Sent: Sunday, June 12, 2016 7:45 PM
> To: National Organization of Blind Educators Mailing List
> Cc: Kayla James
> Subject: [nobe-l] teach without an aide
>
> Is it possible to be a blind teacher and teach without an aide with
> you? Does it feel like you're less of a teacher without an aide.
>
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