Running head: M5 REFLECTION ON CO-TEACHING CONCEPTS: THE "BROKEN

M5 Reflection on Co-Teaching Concepts: The "Broken Arm" Case Study

Jennifer Gamble
University of Kansas

M5 REFLECTION ON CO-TEACHING CONCEPTS: THE "BROKEN

M5 Reflection on Co-Teaching Concepts: The "Broken Arm" Case Study

Each of the characters in the case study has a different view of Jims needs and their
expectations for him as a learner. To truly understand the problems and gain insight into the
situation, its important to know each of the characters and what their perspective brings to the
case study.
Helen Williams has been teaching for twenty years. She has never co-taught before and
really is not sure what she thinks about the whole concept. This is her first year teaching English
at Crossroads High School, as there were some position shifts in her district. She is well aware
of the expectation that students meet the standard on the end of term high-stakes test. She
believes that all students need to know how to spell to succeed in life. She spent the summer
reviewing curriculum and planning her teaching. Helen is known for giving a great deal of work
to students and having high expectations. This belief has been reinforced by students coming
back years later and saying how much they learned in her class. This feedback combined with
pressure to do well on end of semester high-stakes assessments motivate Helen to continue to
teach this way. She believes that all students should meet her expectations, with
accommodations, and thinks she needs to be fair. She says modifying the curriculum for a
student may mean they cannot pass the test or that other students will think its not fair. She has
taught alone for many years and taught the content. She says her students have done well and
she doesnt see a need to change that. She even told Mary that she could be responsible for
helping the students that need help, in a sense separating both Mary and those students in her
mind and essentially the classroom.
Mary King has been teaching for fifteen years and been part of the co-teaching program
for five years. She is a special education teacher that has seen many students succeed using this

M5 REFLECTION ON CO-TEACHING CONCEPTS: THE "BROKEN

model. Mary is a soft-spoken teacher who believes in making sure her students with learning
needs feel safe to learn. She spends a great deal of time forming relationships with them that she
believes help facilitate this. In addition, Crossroads High School has seen success mixing
general and special education students in the same classrooms and using a co-teaching model. It
is often difficult to tell which students have IEPs and which ones do not. Mary has found this
experience to be worthwhile as a teacher and for her students, as it takes away some of the
stigma of removing them from the classroom. Mary is excited to teach using this model. She is
upset that she wasnt part of the interview process to choose her new co-teacher, but she decided
to go to Helen before school started to discuss their roles and who would do what. Mary truly
believes that co-teaching provides students the opportunity to achieve high standards with their
peers. She works to teach them strategies that they can use to meet these standards and if these
strategies prove to not work, she believes that the curriculum should be accommodated further or
modified. This was shown when she spoke to Helen about having Jim choose the correct
spelling of a word from a few options or choosing the correct word in a sentence. Mary is
motivated by having her students meet standards, even if it requires modifications to do so in
situations where their disabilities interfere with their access to the regular curriculum.
Jim OHara is a 17-year old student athlete who was identified as having special
education needs in 2nd grade. He has both an auditory processing disorder and language learning
delays. He has always struggled with spelling. He received both direct and indirect special
education services through elementary school, but since entering middle school he has been
integrated into the general education classroom and received consultation from the special
educator. He is currently doing well in the literature portion of his class, as the reading material
is being read aloud. However, because spelling counts for 50% of his grade, even with

M5 REFLECTION ON CO-TEACHING CONCEPTS: THE "BROKEN

accommodations, Jim will fail the class. He has worked on various instructional strategies to
learn his spelling words since the beginning of the year with Mrs. King, but these strategies have
not helped him. He is at grade 4.6 in language arts and a grade level 1.8 in spelling on an
assessment found in his file. He is getting frustrated and has started to miss class. In addition,
Jims mother reports that he is embarrassed that the spelling grades are posted each week and
that the class knows his is the low grade. Jim is hoping to go to college after high school on an
athletic scholarship. This motivates him to do well in school. His parents are proud, supportive
and believe in special education, but are also concerned about Jims feelings about this class.
In this case study, there are many different issues at play. First, the two co-teachers have
different teaching styles and rather than talking through how they could work together to
compliment one anothers styles, they are not communicating about this at all. Mary has a more
laid back style and takes the time to build relationships with her students while Helen has a
stricter teaching style and believes her style helps students reach academic goals she sets for
them.
Another problem in this case is that Jims spelling level is far below that of his peers.
The strategies Mrs. Kin has tried are not effectively helping Jim learn to spell the words as
evidenced by his grades on weekly spelling tests. Mary believes it is because of his disability,
but Helen believes Jim needs to learn to spell the words to pass the end of the semester
assessment.
The teachers also have different beliefs about the grading system that should be used with
the class. Mary is willing to use a different grading system or method of having Jim complete
the spelling tests so that he is able to meet expectations. Helen believes that spelling is very

M5 REFLECTION ON CO-TEACHING CONCEPTS: THE "BROKEN

important and that Jim will not be able to pass the end of the semester assessment unless he
learns to spell the words and she will be held responsible if he does not pass.
Mary believes that it is fair when students get what they need, as shown by her proposed
plan to let Jim choose the correct spelling word rather than spelling on a traditional spelling test.
In contrast, Helen believes that if Jim does not spell the words the traditional way, other students
may view this as unfair.
Mary has tried to talk to Helen, but feels that she is not getting anywhere. Helen wishes
that Mary would try to talk to her more. Consequently, it may be that they both want to
communicate more and better, but do not know how.
The issues mentioned above about different teaching styles, communication issues, an
imbalance of power, a view that students with special needs belong to the special education
teacher, differences in opinion about modifications and the fairness of them, and not having
come to a common agreement about grading systems are common issues when looking at
problems that occur in co-teaching experiences (Mastropieri et al., 2005).
Many procedures can be put into place to prevent these problems. In this situation, using
the 5 Ps prior to beginning co-teaching may have helped the teachers be on the same page.
Many of these problems would have been addressed ahead of time (Robinson, 2003). The 5 Ps
would have ensured that the teachers had talked about 1. Presenceworking out the times and
schedules that teachers will meet to plan and also teach together, 2. Planningthis involves
designing the program, course, unit and level of lessons being taught, hopefully including
grading systems, 3. Presenting--In what way will teachers present information to students and
how will each of them be part of the co-teaching model, 4. Processingteachers having time to
talk to one another about how co-teaching is going, and 5. Problem-solvingteachers working

M5 REFLECTION ON CO-TEACHING CONCEPTS: THE "BROKEN

together to solve problems students are having (Robinson, 2003, p. 316). Mary, the experienced
co-teacher, could have taken on a leadership role and pushed forward with ensuring that the 5 Ps
were addressed, further balancing the power in the relationship. Following these steps could
have helped the teachers to develop a common understanding of how their co-teaching would
look prior to beginning and allowed for further discussion and problem-solving once they began
co-teaching. Following these steps would have given both Mary and Helen a chance to establish
a working relationship on which to build communication and collaboration skills necessary in
co-teaching.
It is appropriate to make instructional accommodations as students need them. Not all
students learn the same way or in the same time. It is important for co-teachers to carefully
assess student learning using both formative and summative assessment measures to make
decisions about differentiating their instruction to meet student needs. Since accommodations
do not change what a child is taught, children are still meeting the same standards.
Accommodations allow for presentation of the same material to occur in a different manner, the
child to respond in a different manner, the child to learn or take assessments in a different setting
that better meets his/her needs or the child to have extended time or a different schedule to
complete work or assessments (The Understood Team, n.d.). Modifications are most often used
when the gap between what a student should know and what they do know is large (Strom,
2013). Modifications change the amount of material or the material the student is expected to
learn. Modifications are listed in a childs IEP (Strom, 2013). In this case study, an assessment
has shown that Jim is significantly behind his peers in spelling, functioning at grade 1.8. This
means that modifications or a change to what Jim is expected to learn or how his grade is
determined would be appropriate.

M5 REFLECTION ON CO-TEACHING CONCEPTS: THE "BROKEN

Some instructional accommodations include how the material is presented, such as the
reading selections being read aloud as described in the case study. Other accommodations
include working with fewer items on a page, responding orally rather than in writing, using a
spell-checker or dictionary, using a word processing program rather than writing, or giving a
student extra time to process information and complete assignments (Strom, 2014). Instructional
modifications include taking alternate assessments, completing fewer or different problems on an
assignment or assessment, or being graded using a different system than the rest of the group
(Strom, 2014).
In this case study, Mary tried a variety of different instructional strategies to help Jim
learn his spelling words. These included: reducing the number of words she introduced to Jim at
a time with 6 each day, helping him make flashcards, teaching him a method to study the words
using the flashcards at home, spreading the words out by only introducing a few each day and
spreading all the words over the week, teaching Jim specific word patterns that might help him
spell the words, and providing Jim with opportunities for repeated practice by writing the words
several times. These accommodations were not successful, as evidenced by Jims poor
performance on the weekly spelling test. When the percentage of the grade that spelling would
count for was shared with Mary initially, she suggested to Helen that this might be a large
percentage of the grade for students that struggled with spelling, but Helen disagreed. Finally,
Mary spoke to Helen and proposed that they make modifications for Jim. She suggested
possibly having him pick the correctly spelled word from three choices or having Jim match the
word in a sentence. Helen was not in favor of trying these modifications.
Collaboration with others provides the information that helps solve problems so that
children can succeed. Without collaboration, it is impossible to get a clear picture of what the

M5 REFLECTION ON CO-TEACHING CONCEPTS: THE "BROKEN

student truly needs. Jim was successful when appropriate accommodations and modifications
were in place, as evidenced by his academic history and performance in other classes. It is
important to note the collaboration that was used to determine the real problem in this scenario.
Mary looked back into Jims file and saw that an assessment showed that he was spelling at a
grade 1.8 level. She collaborated with other teachers to learn that he was doing well in his other
classes. This information gained from other teachers that worked with Jim showed that he was
capable of learning when the appropriate accommodations and modifications were in place.
Mary also collaborated with Jim and learned that at home he used a computer with spell-checker
and was successful. Mary communicated and collaborated with Jims mother. In talking to her
Mary learned that Jim was getting frustrated because the grades were posted and he felt that his
peers knew doing poorly each week. This contributed to increasing absences. When Mary put
all of the information gained from collaborating and communicating with Jim, his mother, and
his other teachers together, she got a clearer picture of the problem. Without appropriate
accommodations and modifications in place, Jim was failing and became frustrated, losing
motivation. His opportunity for an athletic scholarship was compromised so Jims motivation
was diminishing. Then Mary learned about Jims feelings about having his grades posted. After
collaborating, Mary had a better idea of what she could do to help Jim. However, she did need to
put some time into her relationship with Helen so they could develop a co-teaching relationship
that had a balance of power and greater mutual understanding of how to work with one another.
Without collaborating to improve their co-teaching relationship, it was going to be difficult for
them to come to a mutual understanding that would help Jim succeed.
This case study is a good example of how collaborating with others to provides teachers
with a clear picture of what students need to learn and reach grade-level standards. It also shows

M5 REFLECTION ON CO-TEACHING CONCEPTS: THE "BROKEN

how collaborating with a co-teaching partner is essential to figure out how to implement
effective co-teaching practices so that students are learning all that they can.
When we are able to use effective co-teaching strategies and put the 5 Ps: presence,
planning, presenting, processing and problem-solving in place, we are working to ensure that
students are doing well while also taking care of the need for positive communication in the
collaborative co-teaching relationship (Robinson, 2003). Decisions and adaptations can be made
based on student data. Only then have we collaborated successfully to make proactive
instructional decisions that allow our students to learn and succeed.
Having proactive communication and collaboration with students, parents, and colleagues
builds a sense of trust in ones ability as a teacher. It also reinforces the sense that the teacher
has the childs best interest at heart. Stakeholders are then more likely to support the educational
experience that you are providing to a child. This support stands to motivate others to work with
you and the child. It also lets the child know that you believe in them. When everyone rallies
around a child and works together, a clearer picture of the childs strengths, needs and abilities
can be developed. It is this knowledge that enables a team to create a program that best meets a
childs needs, helping a child to succeed not only at school but also in life.

M5 REFLECTION ON CO-TEACHING CONCEPTS: THE "BROKEN

References
Mastropieri, M. A., Scruggs, T. E., Graetz, J., Norland, J., Gardizi, W., & McDuffie, K. (2005,
May). Case studies in co-teaching in the content areas: Successes, failures and
challenges. Intervention in School and Clinic, 40(5), 260-270.
Robinson, S. (2003). Linking to other professionals. In B. K. Lenz & D. D. Deshler, Teaching
content to all: Evidence-based inclusive practices in middle and secondary school (1st
ed., pp. 301-322). Boston, MA: Pearson Education.
Strom, E. (2013). Accommodations and modifications: How theyre different. Retrieved from
https://www.understood.org/en/learning-attention-issues/treatmentsapproaches/educational-strategies/accommodations-and-modifications-how-theyredifferent
Strom, E. (2014). Common modifications and accommodations. Retrieved from
https://www.understood.org/en/learning-attention-issues/treatmentsapproaches/educational-strategies/common-modifications-and-accommodations
The Understood Team. (n.d.). Accommodations: What they are and how they work. Retrieved
from https://www.understood.org/en/learning-attention-issues/treatmentsapproaches/educational-strategies/accommodations-what-they-are-and-how-they-work

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