NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Tara Urban, a Special Education teacher at Allen STEM Magnet School, is the September Allen Samuels CDJR Teacher of the Month.
"I teach K-2 Communication and Social Skills," Urban said. "I work with students who typically have an autism diagnosis, are developmentally delayed, or are non-verbal. For the most part, they are non-verbal. Some have a little bit of oral language. Those that do have some oral language, we're working on those skills."
Urban said she uses a lot of strategies to find out what the kids are thinking.
"I try to teach a variety of methods and find adaptations for them to use," Urban said. "Some of my students, we use gestures or what we call a PECS system, which is just a picture communication board. We also have students who use AAC devices, which are augmented communication, so they have words or pictures on like an IPad, and they can tap it and it speaks for them."
Artificial intelligence tools may actually be able to help these kids communicate, once it develops further.
"I think that there's a possibility of it helping," Urban said. "In the future, being able to do an assignment, instead of, some might struggle with fine motor, so they are not able to write, so they can do speech-to-text, then."
Urban said a lot of her students are included in the regular class for much of the day and that is a good thing, because the general education students make an effort to include her students whenever they can, both in class and at recess.
Students in Urban's class received a pizza and ice cream party, thanks to Pizza Hut and Braums on Monday.