December 4, 2024 • 20 mins
In this episode of Practical Access, hosts Lisa Dieker and Rebecca Hines are joined by Dr. Bree Jimenez, a professor of special education and chair of the Department of Educational Psychology at Baylor School of Education. Dr. Jimenez dives into her innovative work in making STEM education more accessible for students with disabilities.
Key topics include:
- Inquiry-Based Learning: Dr. Jimenez discusses how inquiry-based and explicit instruction methods can complement each other to engage students with extensive support needs.
- Communication and Access: Strategies to ensure that students with communication challenges can actively participate in STEM lessons, including the use of assistive technology and alternate forms of expression.
- Building Classroom Routines: The importance of establishing consistent routines to help students focus on content rather than adjusting to new processes.
- Supporting Educators: Practical advice for general education teachers, including the use of Universal Design for Learning (UDL), peer support, and explicit instruction to foster global classroom cultures.
Dr. Jimenez challenges the perceived divide between inquiry-based and explicit instruction, advocating for a blended approach to meet all student needs. She emphasizes the value of identifying essential skills and content in lessons while using UDL principles and systematic instruction to guide teaching.
Through examples such as integrating engineering and STEM concepts, Dr. Jimenez underscores the potential for accessible STEM education to improve post-school outcomes. Her insights offer practical, research-backed strategies for building a global classroom culture where every student can thrive.
We love to hear from our listeners! If you have any questions, feel free to reach out. We look forward to receiving your questions on our Twitter (@Accesspractical) or Instagram (@Practical_Access).
Bree Jimenez Bio and Publications: https://edp.soe.baylor.edu/bree-jimenez
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Unknown (00:00):
Music.
Lisa Dieker (00:07):
Welcome to Practical Access. I'm Lisa
Dieker.
Rebecca Hines (00:11):
And I'm Rebecca Hines and Lisa, I know today we
are speaking with someone thatyou've recently, very recently,
worked with, who is an expert intwo things I love. Who we have?
Lisa Dieker (00:22):
Yeah. So, today we're excited to have with us.
Bree Jimenez, who is a professorin special ed and the chair of
the department of ed psych atBaylor. We're so excited to have
you with us. Bree, thanks forjoining us.
Bree Jimenez (00:33):
Thank you for inviting me.
Lisa Dieker (00:36):
So, Becky, you had two things you're excited about.
I'm gonna let you kick it off,because I'm excited about a lot
of things. Bree represents whatwe both love is, is that that
deep niche in our field.
Rebecca Hines (00:47):
Well, Bree my you know I love your topics, because
I know that particularly thepopulation of students who have
more difficulty incommunication, maybe higher need
students, if you will, thatpopulation so often is forced
(01:08):
into one type of instruction,and I would love to hear a
little bit about your approachto opening up a more inquiry
based learning opportunity forpopulations that sometimes get
side checked.
Bree Jimenez (01:22):
Absolutely I you know, it's funny, I kind of fell
into this area because for solong I was working on general
curriculum access for studentswith more significant
disabilities. And by that I meanstudents often with more
moderate, severe intellectualdisabilities, communication
sometimes students on autismspectrum and with more complex
(01:46):
communication needs, and we keptdoing some great work in math
and science, and we would get,you know, really kind of deep
into often, you know, just evenfiguring out how to create
access. But then, you know,little by little, as we grow as
researchers and educators and welearn, you know, I kind of
(02:07):
always believe the kids can dowhatever it is that we figure
out how to teach them. So, it'susually has to do much more with
us as the educators. But we keptgetting into vocabulary, and
then we started, kind ofcreating access to text. And
then we started creating accessto, you know, how to use
explicit and systematicinstruction for comprehension
(02:30):
questions, but really kind of atthe nuts and bolts of it all. We
kept kind of jumping back into alot of literacy skills and
started looking at, you know, insome of our early work, Ginevra
Courtade, who I work with quiteoften now, when her
dissertation, many moons ago,was really looking at inquiry.
(02:52):
And over the past, gosh, 15years, we've kind of said, what
does that actually mean for, youknow, this group of kids, and
what does that look like? And,you know, often have been
pushing up against, sometimesthat false dichotomy of inquiry
versus explicit instruction,which I don't believe that
(03:14):
there's a verse, it's kind of ayes and type of situation.
Lisa Dieker (03:20):
I love that.
I love that yes and and, youknow, I think one of the yes and
that schools struggle with. AndI this is true. I was just out
of school last week, and wewere, you know, looking at some
beautiful students who had, youknow, extensive support needs in
communication and behavior, andreally, a real desire to put
(03:41):
them in classes, and we weretalking about science, and I
think one of the questions thatcame up that I would love to get
your expertise on is, you know,what about the students that are
in the group but don'tunderstand a communication board
or don't know how to communicatewith a friend who doesn't speak
in an inquiry based and youknow, as you well know, the
elementary classroom, someonetends to take over for you,
(04:02):
usually a little girl that says,Oh, let me just do everything
for you. And so what's some ofyour advice to schools and
teachers that are like, going,yeah, we want to do inquiry, but
we're not sure how to do thatwhen students have more
extensive communication needs inthe classroom, and it's
education based?
Bree Jimenez (04:19):
So, one of the things over the past couple of
years that I've been really,really really thinking about is
this idea that, you know, evenwithin the next generation
science standards, theyactually, you know, for just
because terminology gets us introuble often, and we say
inquiry, and then there getsthis, you know, idea that it's
this fixed set of steps. And,you know, the next generation
(04:42):
science standards will even talkabout it as a practice. And you
know, the word practice seems towork better with us, because we
don't have these falsepreconceived notions of what we
did, where we were told, firstyou do this, you know, then you
do this. And I think one of thethings with inquiry to. Is that
we are very, very we often see alike over, dependency on, on
(05:09):
this idea that the way that weshow what we know is through
verbal responses. And that'swhat's so much fun about true
you know, inquiry in a classroomis that we can show what we know
and show what we want to do oror show what we might want to
(05:30):
try or respond in lots ofdifferent ways. And so one of
the cool things is about likescience and engineering, and
often, you know, even withinmathematics and STEM fields is
thinking about all the ways thatkids can do and we can then
start to look for consistencies.
And I think the other kind ofhard part within that is this
(05:52):
idea that it has to be open ornothing. And open inquiry is
very different than guidedinquiry. And well, they're, I
guess they're not totallydifferent. They're, it's this
idea, and we do it already. AndI think often, if we use words
like scaffolding, often, youknow, our special educators and
general educators could talkmuch more efficiently back and
(06:16):
forth, where, when we start tosay prompting hierarchies or
things like that that are muchmore kind of driven within
systematic instruction orexplicit instruction, that
sometimes our teams are not allfluent on. We're not speaking
the same language. But when wereally get down to the nuts and
bolts through discussing what'sgoing on in a classroom,
(06:36):
everybody kind of starts toagree. Is that, yeah, we're not
just going to throw it out andbe like, just try anything
everybody. It's where we startto kind of give that, that a
little bit of structure, andthen we fade our supports over
time, which we all agree is, youknow, a great way to look at
this. So I think when it comesto communication, kind of going
back to your question, is thatwhen we start to kind of like
(06:59):
figure that out of what are thekey elements or the key things
we really want to make sure kidsunderstand or know or can
communicate in a more morestructured way, I guess we can
start to figure out, what arethe response word, or what are
the questions, or what are theyes, no responses, or what are
the things we just want kids todo? And I don't care if you
(07:21):
explain to me, I just want youto do it. And as I start to see
you thinking through or tryingdifferent materials, that's when
I start to realize you keepgoing to the fuzzy things. And
the fuzzy is the attribute thatyou could have raised your hand
and said fuzzy, or you couldhave used your assistive
technology, but instead, I justwatched you build and you used
(07:42):
those materials that were fuzzy.
And now I'm starting to makethose connections that you
understand properties and youunderstand the attributes, and
you understand why you might beusing those and so kind of that
over dependency of language canreally get in the way,
especially for kids with moreextensive support needs.
Rebecca Hines (08:04):
So, so Bree would, would you say that entry
steps for teachers? Does thatstart with the task analysis?
Does that start with breakingthings down and looking at
these, you know, these skills,all these things that people
need to use, you know, whateverapproach or obtain whatever
(08:27):
content. Where does somebodywho's just wrapping their mind
around this start?
Bree Jimenez (08:32):
Yeah, it's, it's funny, because I'm in a, I'm in
a place right now with some ofthe research we're doing on
engineering, that's kind of gotme rethinking a little bit of
this. I think, generallyspeaking, yeah, breaking steps
down. But I think one of thefirst things that's really,
really helpful is for a teacherto first think about the lesson
(08:53):
it is that they're doing, or theunit that they're going to
teach, and then determine whatare like the essential, you
know, kind of the essentialthings, what are the critical
things that kids need to know orbe able to do? And so I would
say, you know, thinking about,is there some math in here
that's going to be reallyimportant, or is it going to be
(09:15):
important that I have supportsin there? Because right now is
not the time I want to do a 20minute lesson on how to measure
something, but it's going to bea big part of them understanding
something is longer or shorter,or heavier or lighter, in the
concepts that they're going tobuild. And then I would start to
think about, are there scienceconcepts that need to be built
(09:38):
into this lesson, and can Ibuild them, and maybe they're
earlier concepts, like we didthis whole unit on solar ovens,
and in order to do that, Ineeded to understand
temperature. But I was workingwith a bunch of students who
didn't know how to measuretemperature using a thermometer.
Didn't maybe even know thatthermometer was the appropriate
(09:59):
measurement tool. And so wespecifically built these things
into this, you know, sixth gradelesson. So, I think determining
some of those kind of things.
And then I think in the end,what is it that you care the
kids get? Because, if not, andyou don't prioritize what some
of those outcomes you actuallywant them to measure, or the
things that you're going to needto build in, and just prioritize
(10:22):
a couple of those to make surethat we don't go down these
weird rabbit holes where we'respending so much time on
something that isn't even theessence of what that lesson or
unit was supposed to be on. So,I think that's a really, really
big one, and then breaking downthe steps and looking for
routines that kids could useevery single day, and they could
(10:44):
be generic. What are the thingsthey're going to need?
Rebecca Hines (10:50):
So I if, if I could ask my my final question,
considering you know your yourview of this process, one which
I share is, is this about skillsat the end of the day? Is it
about a student of any abilitiesaccess to the material, whether
or not we can even evaluate howmuch of it he or she absorbs? Or
(11:16):
do you think that there thereare required skills for people
to participate in this type oflearning?
Bree Jimenez (11:23):
I don't think there's prerequisites.
Definitely don't think there'sprerequisites, but I do think
that we have to, in good measurewe are educators. It's not just
about kids exploring and justplaying. It's about kids going
to school to gain skills. And Ithink that there are, I don't
(11:47):
want to say levels, because thatsounds, you know, kind of too
hierarchical, but there areskills that we can build, and
some kids are going to come withcertain skills and some don't.
And that is the same exact thingas any general education
classroom lessons, student, itdoesn't matter, all of our
students are gaining differentskills at different levels. And
(12:07):
I think one of the big, big ahamoments, though, for me, has
been that it's the practices,it's the habits of mind, it's
the this is where themetacognition kind of comes in,
and this is the piece that is soexciting for me, because I think
it is the true, tried value ofspecial education, and always
has been, which is the selfdetermination, the
(12:31):
communication, the initiation.
But when we look at STEMeducation, there is so there are
so many opportunities to buildall of these in which makes the
science and the math come alivein a very, very meaningful way.
For all students, whether or notthey're digging deeper into
(12:51):
their science and mathematics,understanding and concepts,
they're building the skills. SoI think, like inquiry and
engineering, they're similar.
They're not the same, but theyare such an exciting way for us
(13:12):
to really think deeply about howto build the skills that are
going to help our studentscontinue to prosper and
transition. And you know, myhopes are no data to support
this yet, but is, it's the postschool outcomes. I think that
there are direct relationships,there should be, there will be
(13:33):
direct relationships. We can mapof post school outcomes for
students who have high qualityopportunities to engage in good
STEM education through inquiryand engineering practices.
Lisa Dieker (13:47):
Well, and that's I mean again, I think that, you
know, the mindset here is we allagree. And some beautiful things
you said, and I think one of thewords like that you said, and I
really appreciate, was the wordgeneral-ed teacher. So my last
question for you is I'm ageneral-ed teacher, maybe I'm
mature, career changer. Didn'tgo to school with kids with
(14:09):
extensive support needs. Theyweren't even in the building. I
don't have any experience, andI'm a science teacher, and I
don't know how to build aclassroom culture, period. How
do you suggest I think aboutmaybe a couple of resources I
would go to to start to buildnot only this inclusive mindset
for me, but more importantly, weknow a good STEM classroom has a
(14:30):
culture of scientists workingtogether and experience one of
those cross-cutting standards.
What would be some of yourthings you'd recommend to that
new person who says, I want todo this. I just, I just don't
have a toolkit to do it, and Imaybe don't have a special-ed
teacher my building prepared todo this either. So, I stand
alone and say, yes, I'm ready.
But where do I start to buildthat culture my classroom to
(14:52):
make sure everybody learnssuccessfully?
Bree Jimenez (14:55):
Yeah. So I think one of. The the superpowers is,
if you know the content you wantto teach, that's that's one of
the superpowers of our generaleducators, even when we have
great collaborative teams, isthat we can't all be everything,
(15:17):
but what it is is knowingexactly what it is that is the
most important element, theessence of that lesson, and then
from there, back mapping it, andnot trying to do everything, all
day long, through every lessonfor every learner. I think
that's one of the you know, weare. We have lofty goals, and we
(15:39):
put a lot of pressure onourselves as educators, but we
have to recognize, you know, andso I kind of go back to
Universal Design for Learning,and the most I can dig in that,
and I know sometimes that is,you know, cast is a great
resource for This, but I thinkit is UDL recognizing that UDL
(16:03):
itself. It's a concept. It is.
It's an idea of how we and weuse different vehicles to get
there. You know, it's thisdestination of creating more
universally designed things. Andso I think that's where, when I
look at the essence, I look atthe elements of exactly what it
is that I want the student toget. So for example, I'm in a
lesson, and there's, you know,the science concept I want them
(16:25):
to get. But then there's also acouple of these skills, like
being able to share my idea withthe person next to me, which is
a key element of group work,which is huge. And in you know,
one of the staples ofengineering education is being
able to collaborate in groupsand be able to share and compare
and contrast. Well, if I couldreally work for a student, to be
(16:47):
able to recognize what I wantand be able to share that with a
partner and listen to mypartner, that would be huge. So,
recognizing what are thoseskills you want, what is the
content you want, and then thoseare the things that I put my
time and my energy into. And Ithink, you know, getting to know
some of the supports withinuniversal design for learning
(17:09):
that are kind of outlined,looking at the guidelines to get
ideas of, oh, I already do this.
Oh, this is something I coulddo. or, I think another, another
support I would really think of,and maybe one that's
underutilized, I thinksystematically, is peer
supports. And looking to seewhat are the peer supports, and
(17:31):
recognizing what do typicalpeers also do? Because I think
also sometimes, when we thinkabout students with
disabilities, we set really highexpectations, and sometimes
they're higher than what wewould even, you know, ask of
their peers without disability.
So, I think using peers cast,you know, through the UDL
(17:51):
guidelines would be another one.
I always everything, kind ofalways leads me back to explicit
and systematic instruction. Italways goes back to that. How do
we use our peers? We help themimplement explicit and
systematic instruction? How dowe really think about setting up
(18:12):
our classrooms to be moreuniversally designed? Often it
goes back to breaking down tasksfor everyone, which is a form of
explicit instruction. So, Ithink also looking at maybe high
leverage practices, looking atsome of those things that could
really help us engage ourstudents more systematically and
give our students routineswithin the class, or all
(18:35):
students routines, so that theycan start to build their
knowledge and their skills andthe content within the routine.
The routines are the naturalthing of how we inquire. You
know, we ask questions. We dothis all day long in routines
like, what am I going to eat fordinner tonight versus, you know,
what is? What do I need to getprepared for the rest of the
(18:57):
week to what do I need to doduring this inquiry lesson? So
those routines are really big tobuild, and that allows our
students, I think, to put theenergy and time and brain power
into learning the skills andimplementing them, rather than
(19:18):
learning a new routine everysingle day, or trying to figure
out what it is that we're doingtoday that was so different than
yesterday, but really thatwasn't what you were trying to
teach in the first place. Andthat can really overwhelm all of
our students, I think, and allowus to kind of open up some of
that opportunities for allstudents in a more universal
way.
Lisa Dieker (19:39):
Yeah, and I love that, and thank you for, you
know, reminding us that it'sboth the content and the social
skills that we're all trying tolearn every day in life, and I
think school is no different.
So, I love that summary for thatGinevra teacher. Well, we thank
you for joining us, and if folkshave questions for us, please
send us a Tweet at AccessPractical or send us a question
on our Facebook page. Thank youagain for. We really appreciate
(19:59):
your expertise and the workyou're doing in the field.
Bree Jimenez (20:03):
Great. Thank you so much for having me. It's
great to talk with you.
Music.
Lisa Dieker (00:07):
Welcome to Practical Access. I'm Lisa
Dieker.
Rebecca Hines (00:11):
And I'm Rebecca Hines and Lisa, I know today we
are speaking with someone thatyou've recently, very recently,
worked with, who is an expert intwo things I love. Who we have?
Lisa Dieker (00:22):
Yeah. So, today we're excited to have with us.
Bree Jimenez, who is a professorin special ed and the chair of
the department of ed psych atBaylor. We're so excited to have
you with us. Bree, thanks forjoining us.
Bree Jimenez (00:33):
Thank you for inviting me.
Lisa Dieker (00:36):
So, Becky, you had two things you're excited about.
I'm gonna let you kick it off,because I'm excited about a lot
of things. Bree represents whatwe both love is, is that that
deep niche in our field.
Rebecca Hines (00:47):
Well, Bree my you know I love your topics, because
I know that particularly thepopulation of students who have
more difficulty incommunication, maybe higher need
students, if you will, thatpopulation so often is forced
(01:08):
into one type of instruction,and I would love to hear a
little bit about your approachto opening up a more inquiry
based learning opportunity forpopulations that sometimes get
side checked.
Bree Jimenez (01:22):
Absolutely I you know, it's funny, I kind of fell
into this area because for solong I was working on general
curriculum access for studentswith more significant
disabilities. And by that I meanstudents often with more
moderate, severe intellectualdisabilities, communication
sometimes students on autismspectrum and with more complex
(01:46):
communication needs, and we keptdoing some great work in math
and science, and we would get,you know, really kind of deep
into often, you know, just evenfiguring out how to create
access. But then, you know,little by little, as we grow as
researchers and educators and welearn, you know, I kind of
(02:07):
always believe the kids can dowhatever it is that we figure
out how to teach them. So, it'susually has to do much more with
us as the educators. But we keptgetting into vocabulary, and
then we started, kind ofcreating access to text. And
then we started creating accessto, you know, how to use
explicit and systematicinstruction for comprehension
(02:30):
questions, but really kind of atthe nuts and bolts of it all. We
kept kind of jumping back into alot of literacy skills and
started looking at, you know, insome of our early work, Ginevra
Courtade, who I work with quiteoften now, when her
dissertation, many moons ago,was really looking at inquiry.
(02:52):
And over the past, gosh, 15years, we've kind of said, what
does that actually mean for, youknow, this group of kids, and
what does that look like? And,you know, often have been
pushing up against, sometimesthat false dichotomy of inquiry
versus explicit instruction,which I don't believe that
(03:14):
there's a verse, it's kind of ayes and type of situation.
Lisa Dieker (03:20):
I love that.
I love that yes and and, youknow, I think one of the yes and
that schools struggle with. AndI this is true. I was just out
of school last week, and wewere, you know, looking at some
beautiful students who had, youknow, extensive support needs in
communication and behavior, andreally, a real desire to put
(03:41):
them in classes, and we weretalking about science, and I
think one of the questions thatcame up that I would love to get
your expertise on is, you know,what about the students that are
in the group but don'tunderstand a communication board
or don't know how to communicatewith a friend who doesn't speak
in an inquiry based and youknow, as you well know, the
elementary classroom, someonetends to take over for you,
(04:02):
usually a little girl that says,Oh, let me just do everything
for you. And so what's some ofyour advice to schools and
teachers that are like, going,yeah, we want to do inquiry, but
we're not sure how to do thatwhen students have more
extensive communication needs inthe classroom, and it's
education based?
Bree Jimenez (04:19):
So, one of the things over the past couple of
years that I've been really,really really thinking about is
this idea that, you know, evenwithin the next generation
science standards, theyactually, you know, for just
because terminology gets us introuble often, and we say
inquiry, and then there getsthis, you know, idea that it's
this fixed set of steps. And,you know, the next generation
(04:42):
science standards will even talkabout it as a practice. And you
know, the word practice seems towork better with us, because we
don't have these falsepreconceived notions of what we
did, where we were told, firstyou do this, you know, then you
do this. And I think one of thethings with inquiry to. Is that
we are very, very we often see alike over, dependency on, on
(05:09):
this idea that the way that weshow what we know is through
verbal responses. And that'swhat's so much fun about true
you know, inquiry in a classroomis that we can show what we know
and show what we want to do oror show what we might want to
(05:30):
try or respond in lots ofdifferent ways. And so one of
the cool things is about likescience and engineering, and
often, you know, even withinmathematics and STEM fields is
thinking about all the ways thatkids can do and we can then
start to look for consistencies.
And I think the other kind ofhard part within that is this
(05:52):
idea that it has to be open ornothing. And open inquiry is
very different than guidedinquiry. And well, they're, I
guess they're not totallydifferent. They're, it's this
idea, and we do it already. AndI think often, if we use words
like scaffolding, often, youknow, our special educators and
general educators could talkmuch more efficiently back and
(06:16):
forth, where, when we start tosay prompting hierarchies or
things like that that are muchmore kind of driven within
systematic instruction orexplicit instruction, that
sometimes our teams are not allfluent on. We're not speaking
the same language. But when wereally get down to the nuts and
bolts through discussing what'sgoing on in a classroom,
(06:36):
everybody kind of starts toagree. Is that, yeah, we're not
just going to throw it out andbe like, just try anything
everybody. It's where we startto kind of give that, that a
little bit of structure, andthen we fade our supports over
time, which we all agree is, youknow, a great way to look at
this. So I think when it comesto communication, kind of going
back to your question, is thatwhen we start to kind of like
(06:59):
figure that out of what are thekey elements or the key things
we really want to make sure kidsunderstand or know or can
communicate in a more morestructured way, I guess we can
start to figure out, what arethe response word, or what are
the questions, or what are theyes, no responses, or what are
the things we just want kids todo? And I don't care if you
(07:21):
explain to me, I just want youto do it. And as I start to see
you thinking through or tryingdifferent materials, that's when
I start to realize you keepgoing to the fuzzy things. And
the fuzzy is the attribute thatyou could have raised your hand
and said fuzzy, or you couldhave used your assistive
technology, but instead, I justwatched you build and you used
(07:42):
those materials that were fuzzy.
And now I'm starting to makethose connections that you
understand properties and youunderstand the attributes, and
you understand why you might beusing those and so kind of that
over dependency of language canreally get in the way,
especially for kids with moreextensive support needs.
Rebecca Hines (08:04):
So, so Bree would, would you say that entry
steps for teachers? Does thatstart with the task analysis?
Does that start with breakingthings down and looking at
these, you know, these skills,all these things that people
need to use, you know, whateverapproach or obtain whatever
(08:27):
content. Where does somebodywho's just wrapping their mind
around this start?
Bree Jimenez (08:32):
Yeah, it's, it's funny, because I'm in a, I'm in
a place right now with some ofthe research we're doing on
engineering, that's kind of gotme rethinking a little bit of
this. I think, generallyspeaking, yeah, breaking steps
down. But I think one of thefirst things that's really,
really helpful is for a teacherto first think about the lesson
(08:53):
it is that they're doing, or theunit that they're going to
teach, and then determine whatare like the essential, you
know, kind of the essentialthings, what are the critical
things that kids need to know orbe able to do? And so I would
say, you know, thinking about,is there some math in here
that's going to be reallyimportant, or is it going to be
(09:15):
important that I have supportsin there? Because right now is
not the time I want to do a 20minute lesson on how to measure
something, but it's going to bea big part of them understanding
something is longer or shorter,or heavier or lighter, in the
concepts that they're going tobuild. And then I would start to
think about, are there scienceconcepts that need to be built
(09:38):
into this lesson, and can Ibuild them, and maybe they're
earlier concepts, like we didthis whole unit on solar ovens,
and in order to do that, Ineeded to understand
temperature. But I was workingwith a bunch of students who
didn't know how to measuretemperature using a thermometer.
Didn't maybe even know thatthermometer was the appropriate
(09:59):
measurement tool. And so wespecifically built these things
into this, you know, sixth gradelesson. So, I think determining
some of those kind of things.
And then I think in the end,what is it that you care the
kids get? Because, if not, andyou don't prioritize what some
of those outcomes you actuallywant them to measure, or the
things that you're going to needto build in, and just prioritize
(10:22):
a couple of those to make surethat we don't go down these
weird rabbit holes where we'respending so much time on
something that isn't even theessence of what that lesson or
unit was supposed to be on. So,I think that's a really, really
big one, and then breaking downthe steps and looking for
routines that kids could useevery single day, and they could
(10:44):
be generic. What are the thingsthey're going to need?
Rebecca Hines (10:50):
So I if, if I could ask my my final question,
considering you know your yourview of this process, one which
I share is, is this about skillsat the end of the day? Is it
about a student of any abilitiesaccess to the material, whether
or not we can even evaluate howmuch of it he or she absorbs? Or
(11:16):
do you think that there thereare required skills for people
to participate in this type oflearning?
Bree Jimenez (11:23):
I don't think there's prerequisites.
Definitely don't think there'sprerequisites, but I do think
that we have to, in good measurewe are educators. It's not just
about kids exploring and justplaying. It's about kids going
to school to gain skills. And Ithink that there are, I don't
(11:47):
want to say levels, because thatsounds, you know, kind of too
hierarchical, but there areskills that we can build, and
some kids are going to come withcertain skills and some don't.
And that is the same exact thingas any general education
classroom lessons, student, itdoesn't matter, all of our
students are gaining differentskills at different levels. And
(12:07):
I think one of the big, big ahamoments, though, for me, has
been that it's the practices,it's the habits of mind, it's
the this is where themetacognition kind of comes in,
and this is the piece that is soexciting for me, because I think
it is the true, tried value ofspecial education, and always
has been, which is the selfdetermination, the
(12:31):
communication, the initiation.
But when we look at STEMeducation, there is so there are
so many opportunities to buildall of these in which makes the
science and the math come alivein a very, very meaningful way.
For all students, whether or notthey're digging deeper into
(12:51):
their science and mathematics,understanding and concepts,
they're building the skills. SoI think, like inquiry and
engineering, they're similar.
They're not the same, but theyare such an exciting way for us
(13:12):
to really think deeply about howto build the skills that are
going to help our studentscontinue to prosper and
transition. And you know, myhopes are no data to support
this yet, but is, it's the postschool outcomes. I think that
there are direct relationships,there should be, there will be
(13:33):
direct relationships. We can mapof post school outcomes for
students who have high qualityopportunities to engage in good
STEM education through inquiryand engineering practices.
Lisa Dieker (13:47):
Well, and that's I mean again, I think that, you
know, the mindset here is we allagree. And some beautiful things
you said, and I think one of thewords like that you said, and I
really appreciate, was the wordgeneral-ed teacher. So my last
question for you is I'm ageneral-ed teacher, maybe I'm
mature, career changer. Didn'tgo to school with kids with
(14:09):
extensive support needs. Theyweren't even in the building. I
don't have any experience, andI'm a science teacher, and I
don't know how to build aclassroom culture, period. How
do you suggest I think aboutmaybe a couple of resources I
would go to to start to buildnot only this inclusive mindset
for me, but more importantly, weknow a good STEM classroom has a
(14:30):
culture of scientists workingtogether and experience one of
those cross-cutting standards.
What would be some of yourthings you'd recommend to that
new person who says, I want todo this. I just, I just don't
have a toolkit to do it, and Imaybe don't have a special-ed
teacher my building prepared todo this either. So, I stand
alone and say, yes, I'm ready.
But where do I start to buildthat culture my classroom to
(14:52):
make sure everybody learnssuccessfully?
Bree Jimenez (14:55):
Yeah. So I think one of. The the superpowers is,
if you know the content you wantto teach, that's that's one of
the superpowers of our generaleducators, even when we have
great collaborative teams, isthat we can't all be everything,
(15:17):
but what it is is knowingexactly what it is that is the
most important element, theessence of that lesson, and then
from there, back mapping it, andnot trying to do everything, all
day long, through every lessonfor every learner. I think
that's one of the you know, weare. We have lofty goals, and we
(15:39):
put a lot of pressure onourselves as educators, but we
have to recognize, you know, andso I kind of go back to
Universal Design for Learning,and the most I can dig in that,
and I know sometimes that is,you know, cast is a great
resource for This, but I thinkit is UDL recognizing that UDL
(16:03):
itself. It's a concept. It is.
It's an idea of how we and weuse different vehicles to get
there. You know, it's thisdestination of creating more
universally designed things. Andso I think that's where, when I
look at the essence, I look atthe elements of exactly what it
is that I want the student toget. So for example, I'm in a
lesson, and there's, you know,the science concept I want them
(16:25):
to get. But then there's also acouple of these skills, like
being able to share my idea withthe person next to me, which is
a key element of group work,which is huge. And in you know,
one of the staples ofengineering education is being
able to collaborate in groupsand be able to share and compare
and contrast. Well, if I couldreally work for a student, to be
(16:47):
able to recognize what I wantand be able to share that with a
partner and listen to mypartner, that would be huge. So,
recognizing what are thoseskills you want, what is the
content you want, and then thoseare the things that I put my
time and my energy into. And Ithink, you know, getting to know
some of the supports withinuniversal design for learning
(17:09):
that are kind of outlined,looking at the guidelines to get
ideas of, oh, I already do this.
Oh, this is something I coulddo. or, I think another, another
support I would really think of,and maybe one that's
underutilized, I thinksystematically, is peer
supports. And looking to seewhat are the peer supports, and
(17:31):
recognizing what do typicalpeers also do? Because I think
also sometimes, when we thinkabout students with
disabilities, we set really highexpectations, and sometimes
they're higher than what wewould even, you know, ask of
their peers without disability.
So, I think using peers cast,you know, through the UDL
(17:51):
guidelines would be another one.
I always everything, kind ofalways leads me back to explicit
and systematic instruction. Italways goes back to that. How do
we use our peers? We help themimplement explicit and
systematic instruction? How dowe really think about setting up
(18:12):
our classrooms to be moreuniversally designed? Often it
goes back to breaking down tasksfor everyone, which is a form of
explicit instruction. So, Ithink also looking at maybe high
leverage practices, looking atsome of those things that could
really help us engage ourstudents more systematically and
give our students routineswithin the class, or all
(18:35):
students routines, so that theycan start to build their
knowledge and their skills andthe content within the routine.
The routines are the naturalthing of how we inquire. You
know, we ask questions. We dothis all day long in routines
like, what am I going to eat fordinner tonight versus, you know,
what is? What do I need to getprepared for the rest of the
(18:57):
week to what do I need to doduring this inquiry lesson? So
those routines are really big tobuild, and that allows our
students, I think, to put theenergy and time and brain power
into learning the skills andimplementing them, rather than
(19:18):
learning a new routine everysingle day, or trying to figure
out what it is that we're doingtoday that was so different than
yesterday, but really thatwasn't what you were trying to
teach in the first place. Andthat can really overwhelm all of
our students, I think, and allowus to kind of open up some of
that opportunities for allstudents in a more universal
way.
Lisa Dieker (19:39):
Yeah, and I love that, and thank you for, you
know, reminding us that it'sboth the content and the social
skills that we're all trying tolearn every day in life, and I
think school is no different.
So, I love that summary for thatGinevra teacher. Well, we thank
you for joining us, and if folkshave questions for us, please
send us a Tweet at AccessPractical or send us a question
on our Facebook page. Thank youagain for. We really appreciate
(19:59):
your expertise and the workyou're doing in the field.
Bree Jimenez (20:03):
Great. Thank you so much for having me. It's
great to talk with you.
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