To excel at your job, you'll need not only patience, adaptability, perseverance and strong assessment skills, but also an outstanding special education teacher resume.
Discover how to create yours with the help of your comprehensive guide. Inside, you'll find all the best writing tips, resume templates, plenty of detailed examples, and samples submitted by actual professionals. This is how you make your resume step by step.
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Keep on reading this guide and learn how to:
- Start with a captivating special education resume summary
- Showcase your best skills on your special education resume
- Impress them with your special education work experience
- Put your special education teacher training to good use
- Extra sections to put on your special education teacher resume
- Access resources for job-seeking special education teachers
1. Start with a captivating special education resume summary
Regardless of whether you want to work at a private or public school, a residential facility, hospital or even at a student’s home. You alway want to properly assess the needs of your potential employer.
Why? Because this will allow you to tailor your resume and create a captivating special education resume summary that speaks their language.
A good way to do so is by going over the job posting and drawing inspiration from the key traits and skills that they’re searching for. Write the ones you possess and add them on your resume summary to get their attention from the get-go.
Also add strong achievements, relevant positions, and other skills you think they might benefit from. Just make sure to quantify them.
In the end, it should look something along these lines:
Example of a special education teacher professional summary
Licensed Special Education Teacher with 3+ years of experience supporting young learners in their educational journey. Seeking a position at [name of organization]. In the previous position, taught classes of 15-20 special education students. Was able to raise the average state test scores by an average of 15% by implementing new lesson plans.
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2. Showcase your best skills on your special education resume
As a special education teacher, your main role will be in teaching and nurturing students’ skills. It’s not surprising that a skilled person is essential for the job.
A good way to showcase your skill-set is by creating a skills resume section in which you list your strongest and most relevant skills.
Try to include both soft skills and hard skills.
Examples of soft skills for your special education resume
- Perseverant
- Patient
- Organization
- Effective communication
- Active listening
- Ability to work under pressure
- Adaptability
Examples of useful hard skills for special education teachers
- Powerpoint (Advanced Proficiency)
- Microsoft Office Suite(Advanced Proficiency)
- Online teaching
- Audio-visual aid implementation
- Curriculum and lesson planning
- Blackboard
- SMART Notebook
Also, as a good rule of thumb. Don’t just add a skill section and call it good, you need to make sure you reinforce such skills throughout your entire resume.
Just like a teacher reinforcing a topic, you want to keep reminding an employer that you’ve got what it takes to be an astounding special education teacher.
3. Impress them with your special education work experience
As we stated before, a special education teacher can work in various environments. It's important that you take this into consideration when drafting the work experience section of your resume.
For example, if you’re to work in a hospital setting you'll probably benefit from adding work experience related to the field, such as volunteering at a blood drive. This might not be as relevant if you decide to work at a school.
When it comes down to it, special education teachers vary greatly from one another due to their field of interest and the more relevant you can make this section to the job listing the more likely you are to get hired.
Pro Tip: Show your previous accomplishments instead of simply listing the job description. Hiring managers are likely to know what you did in a previous job and would rather want to know how you applied your traits to the role and what you accomplished.
Example of a special education teacher work experience section
Juvenile Detention Center — Special Education Teacher — 2015 – present
- Create and implement multi-sensory unit plans which follow the Common Core State Standards for Language and Writing grades 6-12.
- Virtually teach students through video conference platforms such as Hangouts, Skype and Zoom .
- Collaborate with support staff to intervene during student crisis scenarios.
- Utilize SMART Board technology to maximize student engagement.
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4. Put your special education teacher training to good use
As for your resume's education section, you'll be required to prove you have a degree in special education.
This section of your resume can be rather important if you’re straight out of college, as you might lack experience.
In such a case, add your GPA if above 3.0, relevant coursework, and other achievements you gained through your time in school.
However, if you've worked or volunteered in a relevant position, make sure to give more attention to them instead. As most applicants will have a similar educational background and this will distinguish you more.
All in all, your education section should be kept short and sweet.
Example for listing your education in your resume
Ohio University — Master of Special Needs Education (Early Childhood) —09/2013 – 05/2017
- 2016 Dean’s List; Top 5% of the Program
5. Extra sections to put on your special education teacher resume
A good way to separate you from the competition is by adding extra sections to your resume that will showcase your uniqueness and expertise.
Just make sure the sections are relevant to the position.
You can list the extra sections as seen below:
Extra sections for special education teacher resume
Certifications:
- 2021: NYS Childhood Education (Grades 1-6)
- 2020: Wilson Dyslexia Practitioner
- 2018: NYS Student with Disabilities (Grades 1-6) 2017
Related Experience:
- Phonics teacher — Wilson Reading Program 2019
- Tutor — Blue Basket 2017
- Soccer coach –– Windsor Soccer Program 2016
6. Valuable job search resources for special education teachers
The demand for special education teachers is high, which means that you'll have plenty of job opportunities to choose from. But to get to the best of them, you need to know where to look. That's why we've prepared this list of resources for you:
- Job boards for special education teachers: The first place you want to look at is websites that gather job postings especially for your line of work. For example, EdJoin, TES Jobs, or TopSchoolJobs.
- General job search platforms: But that doesn't mean that you should disregard websites with broad focus like Indeed, ZipRecruiter, Glassdoor, or SimplyHired.
- Networking: You can always discover interesting opportunities through friends and colleagues, but LinkedIn allows you to make connections directly with industry experts and potential employers.
- Professional associations: Organizations like the Council for Exceptional Children (CEC), the International Association of Special Education (IASE), or the National Association for Special Educational Needs (NASEN), can support you by granting you access to job listings, networking events, and career development programmes.
- Specialized publications: It's not always easy to keep up with the latest research findings, teaching methods, or trends, but following media like “Teaching Exceptional Children,” “International Journal of Special Education,” or “International Journal of Inclusive Education” makes your access to relevant information easier than ever.
- Continuous learning: As an educator you know very well that learning never stops. That's why you should always seek out new challenges with online learning platforms like Coursera, edX, Khan Academy, or Udemy.
Before we say our goodbyes, let us remind you that you need to custom tailor every single resume you send. After all, every job opportunity is unique, and your resume should reflect that.
Special Education Teacher Resume FAQ
How should I use keywords effectively in my special education teacher resume?
First, take a look at the job posting and identify any specific skills or qualifications mentioned. Then, incorporate these keywords naturally into all sections of your resume. This not only helps align your resume with the specific requirements of the job but also ensures it performs well in applicant tracking systems (ATS) which might scan for these keywords.
What are common mistakes to avoid when crafting a special education teacher resume?
Some of the most common mistakes include: vagueness and generic descriptions of your job duties, not mentioning the age range or specific types of disabilities you’ve worked with, spelling or grammatical errors, and typos.
What can I include to show ongoing professional development?
Show your progress by including any relevant professional development activities, such as attendance at special education conferences, seminars, or specialized training sessions. Listing these activities shows your commitment to staying current with best practices and emerging trends in special education.
How can I demonstrate my ability to handle diverse learning needs on my resume?
You can showcase your experience with various instructional strategies that cater to different learning disabilities and challenges. For instance, mention your use of visual aids for students with autism or communication devices for students with speech impairments. Provide examples of personalized adaptations you have implemented, such as modified curriculum materials or alternative assessment methods, to accommodate diverse learning needs effectively.
How can I reflect my adaptability and problem-solving skills on my resume?
Adaptability and problem-solving are key skills for a special education teacher. Illustrate these traits by describing situations where you adapted teaching methods or curricula to meet diverse student needs and overcome challenges in the classroom. For instance, you might mention how you modified lesson plans during remote learning periods or developed unique strategies to engage students with particular behavioral or learning challenges.
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