Creating Your Own "Roadmap" to Inclusion

A few weeks ago, we had our first cohort meeting with all the schools involved in our Inclusive Practices Pilot.  As my colleagues and I sat down to plan out what we would do, it become clear very quickly that every school was in these vastly different places.

Some schools are in a planning year: they're trying to create buy-in from staff, plan for schedules, and learn about strategies that will support students in the inclusive classroom. Other schools are working hard at creating better "push-in" services: they're working towards keeping students who would typically be pulled out of their classroom for specialized instruction IN the regular class. Some schools have started dabbling in co-teaching. A few schools have ripped off the band-aid and got rid of all their resource rooms. Then there are the schools who have full co-taught classrooms and are attempting to now start including students with more significant needs who would typically be in a self-contained classroom.

How can we possibly all be learning the same thing at the same time?!  It felt like being a general education teacher, trying to meet each team where they were at on their own learning path.  As we embrace the philosophies of personalized learning and universal design, it would only seem fitting that an activity was designed to challenge each school on a level that met their individual needs....


The Roadmap Activity:

Each school was tasked with several guiding questions.  Follow the link above to give you the guiding questions we used.  I wanted schools to think about what they are doing NOW.  What is working, what services currently look like, what the buy-in level is like at the school.  Then each school was asked to think about what they envisioned their school to look like in a year, in two years, in five years.  What did services look like along the way?

We know that there are several KEY INGREDIENTS  that schools need to have in order to be a successful and effective inclusive school.  The reality of the pilot program and of most current schools is that there won't be a designated inclusion facilitator/coach/mentor for the entire process.

 In order to create sustainability, it's important that each school owns its own path, determines what is a sustainable pathway for itself, and identify what specific needs and fears should be addressed.  I think that it is imperative that the members of the learning community at the school level be the ones to develop their plan.  They truly understand the specific ingredients they already have and can identify what they need to move forward.  When the road map is designed with this front-loaded planning, it greatly helps a facilitator know where to effectively begin the work to support the school. It's personalized learning at it's most personal.

The best part?  Each school had a rare opportunity to sit down and be accountable for creating their own inclusion scope and sequence.  Every school in attendance was engaged and ownership was felt throughout the room. As a facilitator, I was absolutely blown away with the amount of think time each school put into their own plans.  It was so so so cool to see the self-assessment of where each school feels like it's at, to see a list of specific needs and fears that they have, and to learn more about the specific vision and goal they wanted for their school.  It is what will help drive my facilitation and coaching this school year.

There are so many possibilities for an activity like this!  It can be done at the school level: at a department meeting, at a principal leadership committee meeting, with parent groups, at a classroom level, or even as a vision and goal setting meeting with a facilitator.  Check out some roadmaps below!

There are so many incredible resources out there that discuss how to build effective inclusive schools. Thomas Hehir with Lauren Katzam'book, Richard Villa and Jacqueline S. Thousand's book, and Paula Kluth's book are all phenomenal resources when determining how you will create your own "roadmap".  What key ingredients do you think make a school inclusive?

Fairness and Equality

Many teachers, principals, and even some parents use equality as an arguing point against including all students in the general education setting. "It's not fair to the general education students". "It's not fair to the teachers to have to do more work". "More attention will be put on the students who have IEPs and the typical students will fall behind".

Fair is getting what you need.

Fair is getting a shot.

Fair is not getting the exact same thing.



These are such important notions to discuss with students as you embark including all students with all types of needs in the classroom.  Open, frequent discussions need to be had as a classroom community to ensure that all students understand why and how they learn.

I'm so excited to be discussing this very topic with a group of teachers who are embarking on the inclusion journey this week at our first cohort meeting.  At the advice of a colleague, we are going to be doing this activity! It is my hope that teachers will take this activity back to their own classrooms to facilitate these discussions.

Having the language be part of the daily school culture will help students to understand how they learn, how their classmates learn, and why their classroom is a place that welcomes and celebrates all learners!

Inclusion is Not a Location

Your school decides that it's going to "try inclusion".  Binders with the word "Inclusion" are made, schedules that include students at recess and lunch are created, and everyone feels warm and fuzzy that students are getting to enjoy inclusion.... This is the reality in our schools in 2015.

In my brain, I want to scream, "This is not okay! What is happening?!".  But even though I come from a Utopian land of a fully inclusive school, I know that this IS okay.  This IS the starting place for many (okay most) schools as they begin to think about how they will use better practices for their students with diverse needs.

Everyone needs to start somewhere.  I want to start changing peoples' ideas about inclusion. It is not a place. It is not a location. It is not a schedule.  It is a belief system.  And you have to start somewhere. This blog will serve as diary of several urban public and charter schools as they start their journeys towards inclusion and using best practices for ALL learners.

Thanks for joining the journey!