I received this email today from the Essential Skills teacher at Triton Central Elementary School. The faculty loved the Bulldog Buddies video, and they are already starting to brainstorm ideas for a similar program, Tiger Buddies, at TCE next school year. It brings me so much joy to know that Triton is putting in the effort to promote inclusion, friendship, and kindness in their school!
1 Comment
My school district liked the video about Bulldog Buddies, so they shared in on their YouTube page and in the school newsletter. Here's another way to check out the video!
Don't forget to include & be kind to others every day! In the last two weeks, I have been working on compiling all my pictures and video clips to create my final video, and here it is! I am so happy with how it turned out. The original goal of this video was for it to be shared with the faculty at Triton Central Elementary School to encourage them to start a program similar to Bulldog Buddies. I am happy to say this will be shown at a meeting on May 16th with the goal of the program being approved of and started next school year!
I showed Mr. Agnew, Brandywine's Essential Skills teacher, the final video. He loved it, and now he is planning to show it to the principal at Brandywine to ask for approval of the program becoming a club at Brandywine. This would create more ease and possibly some funding for the program! Both Ms. Delaney (Essential Skills at Triton) and Mr. Agnew have shared with me plans to show it to teachers at other schools. Inclusion is so important to me, and this program has an unlimited amount of benefits. I can't wait to see the progress this video will bring! This week, I began the process of making my "promotional" video. I went to Brandywine Elementary while Bulldog Buddies was in action, and took some videos of the kids hanging out. I also took videos of each student answering questions in the hallway. These videos were good, but I'm not sure I have enough footage to make a positive, impacting video. I need to upload them to my computer and begin editing them. Then, I will decide if I need more videos of the kids. If I do, I'll have to set up another time to observe Bulldog Buddies. I also need to take videos of my host teacher, Mr. Agnew, who started the program. I think his story behind starting it will really help pull it together.
This week, I have been preparing to make a video. I can't do so without permission from parents, so I put together a permission slip (which is attached). I got approval from the person in our school district who is in charge of privacy and permission. He gave me suggestions, and I was able to make some improvements. I am planning on printing and handing out this permission slip when we return from spring break. I then have plans to collect them a week or two later. In the time between, I will work on planning the outline of the video and any images and charts it may need. I will start making video pieces as soon as I have received permission slips back from students. I am expecting permission slips from students with and without disabilities at Brandywine Elementary and New Palestine High School, so there are going to be a lot to collect. I'm hoping for a lot of returned slips, so I can make a video that will make an impact in another school.
In my English class, we are using a program called Sidekick that gives us opportunities to work with adult mentors outside of our school on projects based around topics about which we have passion. This is a really cool opportunity that most high school students don't have! I decided I wanted my topic to revolve around education or special needs because those are both topics I'm passionate about. I decided to write my first essay about Inclusion in Special Education. After I started doing my research, I realized there wasn't much to be done in the actual education area. The programs America has in place are all really great for students with and without disabilities and special needs.
Because of this, I came to a point where I needed to go in another direction. As I was brainstorming and discussing ideas with my mentors, I thought of all the different inclusion programs I had seen outside of the classroom. My high school has programs like Best Buddies and Peer Tutoring, and the elementary school I'm a cadet teacher at has a program called Bulldog Buddies. All of these programs allow for relationships to be created between students with and without disabilities. These programs can pull schools together in unity and create a completely different atmosphere where kindness and inclusion are promoted in all areas of life, not just with people who have disabilities. As a future teacher, this is the kind of school I would want to teach at. Therefore, I want to be able to play a part in promoting inclusion programs like these at schools in my area. I am still working on details, but at the moment, I am looking at putting together some information, a presentation, and/or a promotion video about the benefits of these programs and the way they bring students together. I plan to first share this with Triton Central Elementary. I have contact with the Essential Skills teacher there, so it should be a little easier to be in contact with staff there. I am really excited to be starting this project, and I can't wait to see more schools in my area continuing to promote inclusion and friendship among all students! |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
May 2018
Categories |