Activity from Inclusion Conference 2011

Last week, we attended the annual Inclusion Conference, hosted by the New Jersey Coalition for Inclusive Education. It was a good conference with many ideas and strategies shared to help support students with special needs in general education.

I attended a session called "Literacy Success for All: A Balanced Approach" with Tara DiBattista and David Smith from Cherry Hill School district. They do an activity on the first day of school called "The Band Aid activity". It is taken from Toby Karten's book Facilitator's Guide to More Inclusion Strategies That Work!

Here's how it works:

Each student gets a card with a different ailment written on it (broken arm, bloody nose, cut, ect.). The teachers pretend to be doctors who will be taking care of the students. For each ailment, everyone receives the SAME fix, a band aide. The purpose of this activity is to start a discussion about how the same thing doesn't work for everyone, everyone learns in different ways and some students will need different supports to be successful in the classroom. This activity sets the tone for the rest of the school year to promote acceptance and tolerance.

I thought it was very cute and clever and wanted to pass it on. Do you use this activity in your classroom or something similar? Share it!