The online learning materials below help school district personnel, professional development providers, and regional service providers improve the quality and consistency of training available to instructional paraprofessionals. Each module includes relevant information assembled in 10 or 11 units, each incorporating a variety of learning tools such as webinars, activities, discussion prompts, and resources.
These materials can be explored by paraprofessionals directly, but might best be used to deliver facilitated training to teams of paraprofessionals and teachers.
Users’ Guide
The Users’ Guide provides a brief description of the modules and offers tips for two different groups that might use the modules: (1) parapros working on their own and (2) educators (e.g., school district and regional personnel) who train parapros.
Helping with Instruction
About This Module
This module is designed for paraprofessional educators who seek to understand the instructional process and possibly expand their role on a team with responsibility for providing instruction. Based on the principles of Universal Design for Learning, the module offers guidance about how to collaborate with a supervising teacher and other members of an instructional team to help students learn.
The module is organized, each of which presents a topic about instruction. The choice of the topics to include and the content provided about each topic reflect current thinking in the field of education. The discussion steers clear of instructional fads, and instead draws attention to practices with strong support from both theory and research.
Communication and Collaboration
Updated Module to be released in early 2023- thank you for your patience!
Helping Students Read
About This Module
This module presents key ideas, drawn from the latest research, about how students learn to read and how educators can turn students into good readers. Using this module as a guide, you’ll have enough knowledge and confidence to help teach reading as part of a student’s instructional team.
Helping Students Do Math
About This Module
This module is designed for paraprofessional educators who wish to find out more about math and how to help students learn to do math. It covers a range of topics relating to math instruction. It presents these topics in enough depth to enable a paraprofessional to gain confidence about offering math instruction under the guidance of a teacher.