Special Education Professional Development
Designed for all K-12 general and special educators, administrators, and paraprofessionals.Many schools and districts report that special education students are underperforming compared to their general education peers. However, new research links more time spent in inclusive educational settings (aka, the “least restrictive environment”) to higher academic performance, better post-secondary outcomes, and more employment opportunities for students with disabilities. For special education to work, you have to start with the belief that all students deserve an excellent education and pair that steadfast belief with effective instruction. We can help you get there with our Barrier-Moving Mindset special education professional development.
At Action Driven Education, we give districts, schools, and teachers–both general and special education–the tools they need to design a high-expectation individualized education for every student with special needs that fits within their unique classrooms. Our professional development helps shape the mindset of teachers and provides them with specific actions they can do to improve student achievement.
Our synchronous professional development is personalized for each organization and the participants involved, and is held on-site at the location of your choice.
Introducing Action-Driven Professional Development!
Discover the Tools for Effective Inclusion
Effective accommodations support a learner around their needs.
In this course participants discover that by using student strengths as leverage, accommodations and modifications should provide a “just right” level of support that empowers a child to engage in class, instruction, and assessment in a meaningful way by supporting them around their needs. By recognizing and embracing ownership of their instructional setting, teachers will discover how accommodations should fit their practices making them less of a chore and more effective.
Equipping a Learner’s Tool Belt
Educators and parents should work to build barrier-related skills and strategies!
In this session, educators will learn how to identify the specific barrier-related skills and strategies students need and how to teach them with intention. Every skill becomes a tool on the learner’s belt — something they can reach for when they hit a challenge. Through practical strategies, real examples, and a barrier-moving mindset, you’ll walk away knowing how to teach what matters most: the tools that increase independence, unlock abilities, and move barriers out of the way.
Accessibility – The Foundation of Rigor
Assignments aren’t rigorous because they’re hard—they’re rigorous when they stretch students just beyond their current skill level and remain accessible.
In this session, educators will explore how academic rigor is achieved when accessibility is fully in place. By designing content, instructional environments, and assessments that are accessible from the start, teachers reduce student frustration and lay the structural groundwork that allows every learner to engage, grow, and rise to challenge. Accessibility is the build site for meaningful, inclusive, and rigorous learning.
Explore the Blueprint of Engagement
A learner’s experience of “disability” can be controlled – presenting educators and parents with a powerful opportunity.
Disability isn’t fixed — it’s task and environment specific. That means every moment of struggle is also a moment of opportunity. In this hands-on, workshop-style course, educators will learn how to recognize when a barrier is impacting engagement and then decide whether to support with just-right accommodations or build barrier-related skills through intentional instruction. Participants will walk step-by-step through a blueprint for engagement, designing classroom strategies that not only deliver grade-level content but also embed skill-building into daily routines. By the end, teachers will leave equipped to create classrooms where every student is engaged, included, and actively building the tools they need for success.
Controlling a Learner’s Experience of Disability
Master the ability to control a learner’s experience of disability—not by changing the child, but by transforming your environment, a task, or the support you provide.
In this engaging professional development session, educators, paraprofessionals, and school leaders will participate in a collaborative jigsaw activity to become local experts on four critical components of the Barrier Moving Mindset: understanding behavioral manifestations, accessibility, the Build-or-Bypass Moment, and barrier-related skills and strategies. Each participant will dive deeply into one of these topics, exploring its key concepts, practical applications, and classroom impact. Through group collaboration, participants will teach their peers and uncover how these essential elements interconnect to support inclusive practices and improve student outcomes. By the end of the session, every team member will walk away with a unified understanding of how to identify, respond to, and plan instruction around students’ needs—while keeping rigor and engagement at the forefront. This is a hands-on, mindset-shifting experience that strengthens school-wide consistency and empowers every adult to move barriers together.
Barrier Moving Mindset Exceptional Leaders Workshop
Effective school leaders have the mindset and tools to not just respond to students’ academic, social, emotional, and behavioral barriers but remove them entirely!
This full-day professional development session empowers school leaders to shift from reacting to student barriers to strategically removing them. Participants will explore the core competencies of the Barrier-Moving Mindset, learning how to guide educators in recognizing student needs, reading behavioral cues as instructional opportunities, and reshaping how disability is experienced in their schools. With a strong focus on accessibility as the foundation for rigor, this workshop equips leaders to drive engagement, reduce behavior referrals, and close ability gaps. Leaders will leave with a concrete action plan to build and sustain an inclusive school culture — one where every student is equipped to thrive.
Additional Special Education Professional Development Topics of Interest
Heroes are so important to schools, but sometimes we throw compliments like calling someone a hero without clarifying why. Heroes… engages participants in discovering why they are, in fact, a hero! But Action-Driven professional development needs to be more than just a motivational presentation – it needs to be action-driven! Heroes… pushes participants to discover that many children need more than a hero; they need a super-hero! But what are the characteristics of a super-hero? Schedule a free professional development consultation to find out! – Heroes… can be presented as a keynote, general, concurrent, or workshop session.
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Let’s work together to individualize professional development to meet your teacher’s and school’s needs!