I get some common questions about setting up a visual schedule in the special education classroom. These are some common questions I get about visual schedules and how I approach getting them set up in my classroom.
How do I teach my students to check their schedule?
You have your visual schedule set up. That’s great. Now what? When teaching my students to use a visual schedule, I use a task analysis and a prompting strategy of most to least restrictive prompts. That simply means that I start teaching my students to check their schedules using physical prompting for all steps of the task analysis. Then I start fading the prompts from the task analysis. I usually like backwards chaining because it allows my students to finish a behavior chain independently. Of course this depends on your students, for some I fade from the top to the bottom. It really just depends on your student. You know your students, trust your gut.
Ok, so what does that actually look like? Let me explain. I developed a task analysis that works for the schedule checking routine I’d like to use in my classroom. It’s really easy to set up a form that works for your classroom with my editable task analysis data sheets. Once I have the routine laid out, it’s time to prompt and collect that data!
I provide the cue for my student (usually “All done X”) and then I start the prompting chain. Step 1 on my task analysis is the student will clean up, so I will physically prompt the student to clean their work space. Step 2 is for the student to take their transition cue. I like to use name tags to place on their schedule, so I prompt them to pick up the name tag. Step 3 is for the student to stand up, so I will prompt and track. I continue to do this through all 9 steps that I have laid out for my transition routine in the classroom. Once the transition is complete I’ll often name the behavior and reinforce. For example: provide the student a token and say “great job transitioning to math”.
Once we’ve completed all the steps I make sure to track the prompts needed on my data sheet. The next time we transition, I’ll attempt to fade the last step in the behavior chain. Using this sequence has helped my students become successful schedule checkers in the classroom.
Do my students have to check their schedule every time?
Does this happen in your classroom? The activity has ended, your student gets up and transitions to the next activity in the classroom without walking to their schedule and seeing what the next activity is. It’s definitely happened in my classroom.
Do I send my student back to check their schedule. My quick and easy answer is no. When y students are doing this, it means they have internalized their schedule and they know what to anticipate. This is a great step.
On the other hand, if an activity ends and the student is wandering around the classroom or they transition to the wrong activity, I will provide them with their transition cue and have them reference their schedule.
Wait, won’t my students be confused if they don’t check every activity on their schedule?
Now, you may be asking yourself “But won’t they get confused the next time they get to their schedule?” The simple answer is maybe. I provide a basket next to our schedules for students to place their “all done” icons. For example, every day after snack we read a story in the classroom. Half of my students have internalized this routine and go straight from snack to our circle area without checking their schedules. When they return to their schedule for center times they’ll take the story icon and put it in the “all done” basket. Of course, this didn’t come naturally and I taught my students to look at the icon and think to themselves “all done story time” while placing the icon in the basket.
So, my tip when it comes to having your student check their schedule EVERY time is to use your judgement. If your student knows what to do, follow their lead. If they don’t know what to do, that’s what the schedule is for and refer them back to their schedules.
Do all of my students need schedules?
I’ll start by saying you know your students best, but I’m going to ask how you keep track of meetings, events, soccer practice? My bet is you’re using the calendar on your phone, a wall calendar, or some sort of planner. Believe it or not, these would qualify as visual schedules as well. It’s something you can look back at and reference.
So I’ll answer this by saying all of your students with executive functioning deficits probably need some sort of visual schedule, but they probably don’t need a traditional wall schedule. I have a variety of schedules that I use in the classroom. Read the next question to find out more!
What kind of schedule does my student need?
I wrote about how to up your visual schedule game a while ago. In this blog post I provided tons of information about how to change up your schedule to help your students use more functional versions of visual schedules. Here’s a brief overview.
- Object Schedule: For students who aren’t yet able to associate picture symbols with an object. Traditionally I will place a related object on the schedule and students take it to the space where they use the item. For example: a fork would be taken to our snack table, a puzzle piece to the puzzle table, etc.
- Picture Schedule: This is a great way for your non-readers to start using a schedule. It’s one of the most common forms of schedules I see in the classroom and one that most of my students are currently using.
- Word Schedule: Once I have readers on my hands I move to a word schedule. Having students read the activities is a great functional skill. I also try to move the schedule into a binder in this phase.
- Checklist Schedule: This is really as simple as it sounds. Once we’re reading and mastered our binder system, I’ll put a checklist in the binder of activities to be completed throughout the day. Students simply read the activity to transition and check it off when completed.
- Long Term Planning Schedules: These are for my students who have their routines DOWN and just need some reminders about upcoming events, projects, etc. I made some monthly calendars that I review with students to add important events to. This is a good reference for students and we can also use it to backwards map projects. For example, if a project is due in 2 weeks we may break down the tasks associated with the project and set due dates for those mini tasks.
When can my student stop using schedules?
My thoughts on this would be that you shouldn’t stop using a schedule with your student. There are many benefits to keeping schedules available to your students. You may not need to use a picture schedule with your student anymore, but keeping a checklist or long term planning schedule is great for many reasons.
First, you can use the checklist or long term planning schedules to highlight changes coming up in schedules. Do you have students who don’t deal well with unexpected activities (fire drills, substitutes, etc.)? Pull out their calendar and you can highlight the changes that are coming in their schedule.
Second, I don’t know about you, but even though my students are independently able to use a schedule they’ll still rely on me to answer questions about their day or to help them transition around the room. When I get the questions like “Is today PE?” instead of answering my students I’ll help them refer to their schedule and see if it’s an activity on their schedule. This helps them become more independent in solving problems.
These are some of the questions I often get asked about schedules. I hope these answered some of your burning questions. If you have any other questions about schedules drop the in the comments! I may be adding to this post or have a version 2 coming your way!
Looking for some items to help you get started with visual schedules in your classroom, these may be helpful:
