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Handling Mountains of Paperwork and IEPs
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Julia G. Thompson
A graduate of Virginia Tech, Julia is the author of several books for teachers. Her newest book, First-Year Teacher’s Survival Guide, Second Edition, was released in July 2007. She is also the author of Discipline Survival Kit for the Secondary Teacher. In each of her books, Julia presents classroom-tested ideas, activities, and strategies designed to make each school day a successful one.
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Dear Julia Advice Column
Dear Julia,
I am a special education teacher and have A LOT of paperwork on and surrounding my desk. I have tried numerous ways to organize my paperwork and would really appreciate some ideas and help! Especially with managing and organizing my student’s IEP’s. Thanks.
Amanda
Hi Amanda,
Your concern is one of the most common ones that teachers everywhere share. We all want to find better ways to manage the paperwork load efficiently. Special Education teachers really have more paperwork that the rest of us, too. You are right to be concerned.
Here are some suggestions to help you keep those papers straight. Please pick and choose whatever works well for you.
General Tips
• For any sheet of paper you receive, you have three choices: act on it, file it, or throw it away. Get in the habit of acting quickly, and you will never have to face towering piles of papers.
• Allocate a space for the papers you must manage throughout a school term. Many teachers use a file drawer or part of one to store paperwork. Others use three-ring binders or a combination of binders and file drawers.
• When you file papers, the ones you use often should be most easily accessible.
• Papers that you do not need to use often can be stored in a less accessible spot, such as the back of a file drawer. These may include blank progress reports, blank report cards, student inventories, receipt books, purchase orders, field trip permission forms, or textbook inventories.
• Make sure to file forms containing sensitive or confidential information in a drawer that can be locked. These can include IEP forms, completed progress reports, completed report cards, and medical histories.
• To maintain all papers with a minimum of stress, make it a habit to file them away promptly each day. Allowing papers to pile up on your desk will make finding the right paper when you need it needlessly difficult.
• Color code whatever you can. File all the papers for one class in a blue folder and other in a red one, for example. Purchase colored labels or pens to help you keep everything that should be together in one place.
clp58
4 days ago
2 comments
My family just moved to Pittsburgh and I need to be with them. I am a certified ,tenured with PSEA SPED teacher soon to have my Superviosor of SPED cert. Can anyone help me to find employment? I have over 10 years exp. in educating special neds students.Thanks!
lizzielou2
9 days ago
4 comments
I've taught for 20 yrs, if I can be of assistance, contact me at jbaa6082@yahoo.com. I've found some things over the years that will help you immensely, or may not. :)
kimtaylor
about 1 month ago
268 comments
If an IEP is involved you would have gotten papers (ie- meeting notice, and a packet from the meeting outlining goals, accommodations, etc) and these would have "IEP" denoted on them. You would have had to sign them. Don't let them slide on only providing the 504 plan if you feel an IEP is warranted. The IEP is enforcable- I don't think the 504 is. And, there are protections automatically provided under the law to the student on an IEP. One of those being limited suspension times, except in certain extreme cases.
external hard drive
robertlouis
about 1 month ago
14 comments
in our country public schools with lots of students use correl programs for some major paperwork, though in small schools like mine everything has to be done manually. thanks for the advice