Do you:
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enjoy working with children?
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have excellent communication skills?
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demonstrate kindness, patience, and have a positive attitude?
Being an educational assistant (EA) may be a good career choice for you!
Are you:
- organized and committed to personal and professional excellence?
- interested in assisting the classroom teacher in establishing and maintaining appropriate levels of student behaviour?
- able to thrive as part of a multi-disciplinary team?
Consider becoming an educational assistant with the SCDSB.
It takes a remarkable human being to support students with special needs in their educational journey. For some, this is not only a job, it’s a calling. We need extraordinary people like this in our schools!
Interested in pursuing a career as an EA? Read below and apply today!
While there are many skills needed as an EA, we’ve highlighted the top three that will position you for success.
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Communication. In any job, communication is a key skill, but for EAs it’s imperative. This includes thoughtful speaking, active listening, reading comprehension, and writing. You will be working with a variety of individuals who have a range of communication skills, from the classroom teacher to parents/guardians and the student with special needs you are helping. That individual may not communicate verbally or may express their needs in different ways. You must be prepared to work in a range of communication styles. You’ll be delivering verbal and written reports to the classroom teacher, and some of this will be shared with parents/guardians.
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Social perceptiveness, or ‘being aware of others’ reactions and understanding why they react as they do’. As an EA, this skill will allow you to create a stronger relationship with the individuals you directly work with. Students with special needs may have unexpected ways of expressing themselves or struggle to communicate in standard ways, so there are behaviours and responses that you will need to learn to identify and interpret. Once you pick up on these cues, you’ll be able to better support and help the students advance in their education. You will need to constant look for ways to help others, whether that is the student, the classroom teacher, or the parents/guardians and family of the student.
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Critical thinking and problem-solving. There will be times when you will need to apply reasoning and logic to situations to identify the potential outcomes of different solutions. For example, if a student hasn’t responded well to a particular video or a lesson, you will have to find an alternate method to teach them the same concept. There will be many times you won’t fully understand the problem or have an answer, but with experience and practice you will learn what to do in these situations.
There are many other traits that will help you thrive as an EA, including patience and the ability to remain calm. EAs should demonstrate a positive attitude and fundamentally believe in the benefits of integrating students with special needs into mainstream environments. You’ll need to be flexible as circumstances change, you’ll change with them, adapt and quickly redirect to a new plan.
Can you see yourself as an EA? Apply today or contact us using the following form for more information.