Special education is the use of specialized programs to aid a student in the classroom who has specific educational, emotional and social need. These teachers are the jack-of-all-trades. As best said by special education teacher Emma Pullano, “We tackle their academic needs, teach social skills and coping with stress and anxiety.”
When people think of a grade school classroom, they imagine a room with a chalk board and a teacher standing by it, looking over a bunch of desks with wide-eyed students waiting to learn.
What doesn’t come into the picture when they think of a grade school classroom is the teacher off to the side working furiously to help a student understand the curriculum, while also doing their best to teach them social skills and work through other issues. This is a special education teacher: the forgotten teacher. Special education teachers are extremely valuable to the educational world.
Pullano has been teaching in special education for three years, her first two years being in Holyoke, Massachusetts as a part of the Teach for America program. She has seen and experienced many things as a special education teacher and currently works in Springfield, Massachusetts at Martin Luther King, Jr. Charter School of Excellence. She teaches groups of students who struggle in learning the curriculum like other students, but many of the students also fight with social anxiety and emotional problems that can impede their ability to learn.
These teachers are superheroes and don’t get the recognition and help they deserve. They value the needs of students that are often overlooked of by the rest of education system. Former special education students on average earn $9.40 an hour, compared to $13.20 for former general education students.
Pullano tells a story that she would often have a detailed plan together in subjects, such as math, and would get through no more than one problem, but would be able to help a student learn how to cope with frustration and how to deal with stress in the future.
Special education teachers provide students with much more than math and English help, but instead teach all sorts of techniques for coping with stress and management of social and emotional issues. Special education teachers do it all despite little recognition in the classroom.
By John Pullano, Contributing Writer
pullanjj18@bonaventure.edu
