Continuity of Learning During COVID-19 Resource Database

Here are tips and ideas for helping children identify emotions when your face, your most expressive feature, is covered by a mask. Use these strategies to let children know that behind the mask, a kind and warm expression is still there!

This scripted story helps to explain to children the how, why, and when of wearing face masks.

Use this tip sheet to help practitioners of infants and toddlers intentionally plan and think about how to reconnect, help children transition back to the classroom, and support children's social and emotional development after being away from the program.

To support educators, as well as state and district leaders, in answering critical data questions, these centers shared how the four essential elements of data literacy can guide teams in using data, both virtually and in-person, to make accurate and feasible decisions in times of unknown. Additionally, SEAs were given tools to help support their LEAs to work together to meet student’s diverse needs during this webinar.

The Unified Young readers Club is a great inclusive activity for a younger audience and accompanies Special Olympics Young Athletes play with books and study guides that support teachers as they address such topics as inclusion, awareness, friendship, bullying, and acceptance to audiences of both students with and without intellectual disabilities. Each book has a theme that relates to multiple state academic standards, and aligns with the precepts of positive school climate initiatives.

To successfully launch the 2020-2021 school year for students with disabilities, state education agencies (SEAs) have an essential leadership role to play in supporting local school systems to plan for multiple scenarios, including services delivered in-person, through distance learning, and via blended approaches.

This Voices From the Field piece shares lessons learned from Justyn Poulos, director of MTSS at the Office of the Superintendent of Public Education (OSPI) in Washington state. In the piece he discusses how he and his team shifted their annual MTSS Fest conference from a face-to-face event to a virtual event in less than 3 weeks due to COVID-19 restrictions.

In this webinar, Susan Barrett highlights the challenges presented by the current context and emphasizes the importance of supporting the social and emotional needs of all. She shares specific suggestions for supporting students, promoting staff wellness, and compassionately navigating the current context.

This lesson, featuring Karen McWilliams, a 504 Coordinator and Dyslexia Teacher in Rochelle ISD in Texas, supports educators in using technology to teach foundational reading skills to students in elementary grades using a variety of facilitated activities to support phonemic awareness, phoneme–grapheme correspondence, irregular and high-frequency words, writing, and connected text. The collection, adapted from content developed by the University of Florida Literacy Institute, includes a tip sheet, a video examples, and slides illustrating the lesson.

School and District leadership teams can download and use this resource to develop their own plan for welcoming staff back to school in Fall 2020 and providing 2 days of professional development.

Resources on self-care, mindfulness, and self-compassion for families. Includes a recording of a presentation by a family consultant for the Arkansas Project for Children and Youth with Sensory Impairments.

We have talked with many administrators, advocates and teachers and a pressing concern is “How do you collect data for students with significant cognitive disabilities when you are not in the same room?” This resource offers some suggestions.

Students’ emotions may be running high and low with distance learning. This resource offers strategies and tools to help students and their families communicate and manage emotions to engage in meaningful learning.

Learning in quarantine is emotional work! Here are some strategies and tools to help families and their children communicate and manage emotions during this time of transition.

This overview is intended to communicate a framework for supporting all students (including those with significant cognitive disabilities) to actively engage with classmates, learn grade-level general education curriculum, and learn other essential skills.