In a perfect world, you’d always feel prepared. You’d never teach a subject outside your wheelhouse, and you’d always keep growing as a professional, without suffering any growing pains. And in this perfect world, your students would always feel understood and seen.

In reality, as God pairs teacher with students, He may give you students who are navigating autism or an auditory, visual, or language processing disorder. Serving them can be both your greatest challenge and your means of the deepest fulfillment.

Perhaps your love of flexibility is about to meet their hard-and-fast need for structure. Things that to you seem like a fun break from monotony may feel like you’re tossing cold water on their comfort. So, it’s time to buckle up for a rigorous learning curve. They may be your students, but you’ll be studying them every day.

Preparing Your Classroom

Adjust the Lighting

You’ll likely want to soften the classroom lighting and reduce glare if possible. For example, students living with autism may experience overstimulation when exposed to bright light, manifested through disruptive behavior or struggling to focus. Block direct sunlight with curtains, attach light filters or diffuser panels to bright white lights—or even better, experiment with calming blue light.

Allow Noise-canceling Headphones

Whether you can provide a set for your classroom or you encourage parents to provide them, noise-canceling headphones can help students who are sensitive to noise or struggle with focus. Sound can be unpredictable in the classroom space, and any means to control the environment can create (as with the lighting) a better space for everyone.

Invest in Labels, Dividers, Timers, and Zones

Mapping out routine for predictability is your superpower when planning for students who need accommodations. Organizational tools like labelled wall mount storage or pocket charts, when paired with color-coded signage, can create visual cues to back up your verbal cues. Experiment with visual timers during transitions or lower-stress activities. And create dividers throughout the room (such as a rug or different chairs for the reading corner, or different décor for a quiet zone). Suit the task to the space, and train students in the types of appropriate behavior within the space and the best way to transition into that activity.

Prepare for Extra Paperwork

While your Christian school may not use IEPs (since U.S. law doesn’t require private schools to use this legal document for individualized education), your administrator may still ask you to incorporate, track, and report on a learning plan. Even if you’re not asked to track anything out of the ordinary, keeping a daily log of growth and challenge can give you clarity, organization, and documentation that could prove helpful in the coming weeks. For example, if you make any needed course correction in classroom management and see either a positive or negative outcome in student behavior, tracking it in writing is a record that reflects your due diligence and care for your students who need accommodation. You can then draw from this record during meetings with your administrator or parents.

Preparing Yourself

Start with a Dash of Humility

Whether you’re a first-year teacher or a veteran, your students who need accommodation will benefit from your rigorous research, especially in the first couple weeks of the school year. Lean into the research from the very beginning, with the knowledge that no one ever becomes the absolute expert. You can get all the training, only to have a new student whose file challenges your preconceived notions and education.

Research Industry Terminology

When parents enroll their child in your Christian school, they may have questions that include terms like FAPE (free appropriate public education), IEP (individualized educational plan), Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, and IDEA (the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act). But when they choose to enroll their student in a private school, parents are usually giving up their child’s right to free appropriate education, an IEP, and special government funding in the public system. Christian schools are still required by Section 504 to provide a certain modicum of physical access to facilities (like installing a wheelchair ramp should a student need it); however, the 504 requirements do not extend into curriculum accommodations. Your administrator and a quick internet search can usually help clarify terms as they enter your parent-teacher discussions.

Ask for Advice

One teacher has shared that during her early years of teaching students needing accommodation she was encouraged by an experienced teacher to use a certain labeled filing system to store students’ activity sheets for them to retrieve themselves during transitions. However, switching her entire system in August was daunting, so she chose to continue business as usual. In January, she noticed how smooth transitions were in the classrooms around her, while hers was like herding kittens. When she commented on her problem, other teachers mentioned how the color coding and labeled filing system had made all the difference for them. Years later, she encourages young teachers to dive into expert advice, despite the growing pains.

Build a Support Circle

Whether it’s talking with your student’s previous teacher to gain insight, meeting regularly with a team lead or administrator, or checking in with parents about what techniques work best for them at home, create a village for yourself. Both you and your students will benefit from your access to good support.

Plan to Model Work More

Whenever possible, rethink your teaching technique to show rather than tell. Break tasks down into smaller steps than you’re used to and be mentally prepared to repeat. Every student is different—so as you start to figure out learning styles and what best enables the student to stay on task and manage anxiety, you’ll learn to fine-tune the environment as you model work.

Ponder Their Preciousness

When you’re tired (and, yes, you will get exhausted), dwelling on Scripture is a vital part of serving your students well. As Psalm 139:13-16 notes, they are fearfully and wonderfully made—and were never for a moment hidden from God. You have this chance to introduce the children to Jesus, fulfilling His command in Mark 10:13-16.

As you prepare for students who need accommodations, remember that you too are made in the image of a Creative Designer. As you create a classroom that works for each of your students, you are behaving in the likeness of this nurturing God. May your students see Him in you.