Trottier’s amazing Castle Program has changed kids with learning disabilities to be educated in the best way possible!  Currently, six kids are a part of the program and many staff and students are involved, staff including Mrs. Day, who is the lead teacher of the program. The CASTLE program is a very great and important part of the Trottier community. 

First, CASTLE stands for Communication, Access, Socialization, Transactional, Supports, Learning, and Emotional Regulation. How Mrs. Day got into special needs is really nice. There was a program at her college in which she loved working with kids who were on the autism spectrum for autism, and she then decided she wanted to get her master’s degree in severe special needs. Mrs. Day joined the Trottier community about 5 years ago. She became a teacher in Trottier’s Castle Program. The Castle Program was created a few years before Mrs. Day, and the Castle Program is continuing today under her leadership.

The Castle Program currently has 6 kids who take part in the program here at Trottier. According to Mrs. Day, ”We do a lot of inclusion and I think for general ed students it’s really important to see students who are different from them, who communicate and act differently.” This means that CASTLE likes to interact with the General Ed. students. The students go to some general education classes and often come to lunches.

Peer Pals is also incorporated into CASTLE. Peer Pals is an elective where students can work with the students in the CASTLE program. Mrs. Day says, “Peer Pals is called reverse inclusion, so it’s when general ed students come into a substantially separate classroom. So that’s the elective that we run with our seventh and eighth graders, and students come in and do some peer tutoring with our students so they might do some reading and some math and writing with students, they also play games and get to know them and they hang out with them.” Peer Pals is a good way for CASTLE students to interact and grow.

The CASTLE program is a wonderful program that helps kids with different learning disabilities to learn and grow. Trottier is a great place and CASTLE makes it even stronger. Peer Pals helps in so many ways as well and the kids who take part in the CASTLE                  are awesome!