From Special Connections

What are the five types of co-teaching?
Friend, Reising, and Cook (1993) identified five options teachers typically use when implementing a co-teaching model. As teams progress through these 5 types, it is important to remember these types are hierarchical across three variables. First, as you move down the continuum of models, more and more planning time together is needed. Second, as you progress in the models, teachers need an equal level of content knowledge to make the model work effectively. This equality of content knowledge can be the greatest barrier to team teaching at the secondary level. Third, as you move down the continuum, teachers must share the same philosophy of inclusion and have a level of trust and respect. Typically this level of trust and respect has to be built over time, which also is another reason it is sometimes difficult to team teach at the secondary level or in larger schools, if there is not consistency over time in building team support. Key aspects of each type of co-teaching are provided below.

From Teaching Exceptional Children
by Wendy W. Murawski and Lisa A. Dieker

Kali is a special education resource teacher who has 32 students with mild to moderate disabilities on her caseload. The special education department at Chavez High School (CHS) decided 2 years ago to organize by grade level, so most of the students on Kali’s caseload are in the 10th grade, although she has two in the 9th grade and four in the 11th. At the end of the last school year, CHS teachers discussed at great length how the school was supposed to become more "inclusive" and how the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act might affect secondary special educators.

Although Kali was accustomed to teaching resource classes in English and algebra, her principal just informed her that she will be expected to "coteach" so that more of her students could be included in general education classes and have their needs met in those classes.

From Teaching Exeptional Children
by Susan E. Gately and Frank J. Gately, Jr

Initiatives to tighten eligibility requirements for special education, an increasing reliance on Section 504 (of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973) accommodations to serve students with disabilities, and inclusive schooling practices have increased the diversity of general education classrooms and highlight the need for all professionals in the schools to work together in collaborative partnerships (Wood, 1998). Coteaching between general and special educators has become a common method of service delivery (Reinhiller, 1996).

In this article, we describe the components of coteaching and give examples of what the teacher interactions of that component may resemble at each of the developmental stages of coteaching: the beginning stage, the compromise stage, and the collaborative stage. We also present the Coteaching Rating Scale (CtRS) and describe how teachers and administrators can use it to develop appropriate objectives and directions for coteachers.