Music for Exceptional Children: Course Reflection

Over the course of the semester, I have learned many different strategies and a lot of good

information relating to teaching students with disabilities in the music classroom. On the first

day of class I did not know what to expect, I had very limited knowledge when it came to

working with students with disabilities. Growing up, I did not get to observe many situations in

which students with disabilities were being addressed in a music setting. Oftentimes, they would

come to music class, one of the only times we would see them in a day, do a few activities, and

then they would leave. This class taught me how valuable including our students with disabilities

into our classes is and how we should always be trying our very best to be providing them with

the most appropriate education for them, whatever that might look like.

There are many strategies I will be taking with me into my future teaching that I learned

in this course. From the use of UDL in my lessons to specific strategies for specific scenarios, I

learned a lot about how to make my classroom as accessible as possible. There was so much I

would not have even considered had I not been exposed to it in this course. I feel that having this

experience and being exposed to these things so early on in our careers was extremely beneficial

and it will definitely make us better educators for it. Any educator can make a lesson and teach it

to their students, but it takes a great educator to create that lesson and revise it until it is as

accessible as possible and all of their students can gain something from experiencing it. The

strategies we learned about in this course will help us become those kinds of educators, the ones

that consider and care about educating their entire student body, not just the ones who can

understand and participate in their lessons with no adaptations.

One of the biggest takeaways from this class, in my opinion, is the importance of

collaboration. From day one, we were taught to collaborate and communicate with our

colleagues, our students, and our students’ families. I would have never considered how having
different resources like we were exposed to and just talking to other people could help so much

in the planning of your classes. Before taking this class, I would have been so lost when faced

with certain scenarios, but now I feel like I have a better understanding of where to start to tackle

teaching my students with disabilities. One of the first things I plan to do when I get my first job

is create strong relationships with my colleagues, such as the special education teachers,

paraprofessionals, the different therapists and counselors at my school or in my district, and my

administrators. Developing an open dialogue with these colleagues will be key in the ability to

rely on them as resources related to accessibility in my classroom. Talking to my students and

their families will also be such an important aspect of promoting inclusivity and accessibility in

my classroom. Collaboration with all important members of a student’s experience will be vital

to having a functional, inclusive, and safe classroom for all of my students.

There were many resources shared with us over the course of this class that I also found

very useful. I will definitely be referencing the UDL guidelines when I lesson plan from now on.

I have many different options for resources when it comes to learning about different disabilities

and things. I am so glad that we have access to all of these helpful resources and I am

appreciative of everything that was shared with us over the semester.

I found great value in the different activities we did over the course of this class,

including the writing of adaptations in lesson plans for low-pressure practice, the exploration of

specific disabilities and different strategies pertaining to each of them, and the different

generalized activities and strategies we did and used to see how these concepts can be applied to

real-life scenarios. Having these experiences as a pre-service educator was certainly beneficial

and I am glad I got to partake in this journey of exploring this content and learning more about

teaching students with disabilities. I will absolutely be taking the skills, strategies, and resources

I gained from this course into my future teaching.