When teachers hear "accommodations", many picture expensive equipment, special rooms, or a one-to-one aide. In reality, the most useful classroom accommodations are small adjustments to how a lesson is delivered — where a child sits, how instructions are given, how much work is expected at once, how a child may answer. They cost nothing, they take minutes, and they help far more children than the one they were designed for.
This guide gives you 30 such ideas, grouped into seating and presentation, assignments and homework, assessment and exams, and environment and routine. Pick two or three to start. You do not need to use all 30 — you need the right few for the children in front of you.
What Accommodations Are — and What They Are Not
An accommodation changes how a child accesses learning; it does not change what the child is expected to learn. Extra time on a test is an accommodation — the child answers the same questions. A simpler test is a modification — the child answers different questions. Both have their place, but most children in an ordinary classroom need accommodations, not modifications. The distinction matters for fairness: when parents ask whether accommodations are "cheating", the answer is that they remove barriers, not standards. Glasses are not cheating for a child with weak eyesight; extra time is not cheating for a child who processes slowly.
Accommodations also need consistency. An accommodation that applies on Monday but not on Wednesday teaches the child that support is random. Once you agree an accommodation for a child — with the child, the parents, and any other teachers — write it down, share it with every teacher who teaches that child, and apply it in every lesson and test until the review date. The ideas below are organised so you can pick a set for a specific child and record it in their plan.
Seating & Presentation (1-8)
1. Seat near the teacher and the board — the single highest-impact accommodation for children who are easily distracted or have weak eyesight or hearing. 2. Seat away from doors, windows, and noisy corridors to cut the distractions that derail attention. 3. Use a study carrel or a desk facing the wall for independent work — a cardboard divider works fine. 4. Pair with a steady peer who can quietly repeat instructions and model what to do next.
5. Write the day's plan on the board so children can see what comes next and how long each part lasts. 6. Give one instruction at a time, and ask the child to repeat it back before starting. 7. Say it and show it — speak the instruction and write it on the board, so children who miss spoken words can read them. 8. Use larger, well-spaced writing on the board and read aloud everything you write. These eight presentation changes are part of good classroom seating arrangements and help the whole class, not just one child.
Assignments & Homework (9-17)
9. Break work into chunks — five questions, then a check-in, then the next five — instead of twenty questions at once. 10. Give a worked example at the top of every worksheet so the child can see the expected method. 11. Reduce copying — give the child a printed worksheet instead of requiring them to copy from the board. 12. Allow oral answers for some tasks: the child explains, the teacher or a peer writes.
13. Shorten the assignment, not the standard — ten well-done questions teach more than twenty rushed ones. 14. Provide a checklist for multi-step tasks: "1. Read the question. 2. Underline the numbers. 3. Choose the operation. 4. Solve. 5. Check." 15. Use a homework notebook with the task written in, not dictated, so parents can see exactly what is expected. 16. Give homework in two parts — a short core task for every child, and an extension for those who finish — so a struggling child finishes something rather than failing everything. 17. Allow extra time at home without penalty, and agree the expectation with parents in advance. Our guide to homework for weak students goes deeper on making home practice work.
Assessment & Exams (18-24)
18. Extra time — typically 25% more — on class tests and, where the board allows, board exams. 19. A separate, quiet room for tests, so a child who reads aloud or needs to move is not disturbing others or embarrassed by them. 20. Read the questions aloud for a child whose reading is far behind their understanding. 21. Allow answers in a different form — pointing, drawing, matching, or oral explanation — where the learning goal is knowledge, not writing.
22. Break the test into two sittings with a short break between, so fatigue does not decide the result. 23. Use clear, uncluttered test pages — one question per block, generous spacing, no decorative borders that distract. 24. Mark for content first — give credit for the right idea even when spelling or handwriting is weak, and mark spelling separately where it is a specific goal. A class test should measure what a child knows, not how fast they write or how neatly they copy.
Fairness, Explained
Environment & Routine (25-30)
25. A visual timetable — pictures or words for each period, ticked off as the day goes on — reduces anxiety for every child who worries about what comes next. 26. A predictable routine for starting and ending lessons: the same greeting, the same signal for attention, the same way of handing out work. Predictability is a support, not a restriction. 27. A quiet corner where any child may sit for five minutes to calm down, without it being a punishment. 28. Movement breaks — a two-minute stretch or an errand for the teacher — built into long periods for the whole class.
29. A private, non-public way to ask for help — a coloured card on the desk, a hand signal, a note — so a child never has to announce their difficulty to the whole class. 30. A calm, consistent response to mistakes: correct the work, not the child, and keep classroom expectations visible on a classroom rules chart so every child knows the standard. A predictable, kind classroom is the foundation every other accommodation stands on — and group work management can extend it into cooperative learning where diverse learners support each other.
Start with two or three accommodations for one child, apply them consistently for a month, and note what changed. The best accommodation is the one that is actually used — every day, by every teacher, without fuss.
AI Help: Muse AI
Muse AI is Meta's personal AI assistant, available in the Muse app. It can help you turn a child's needs into a short list of matching accommodations from this guide — and draft a one-page accommodation card you can hand to every teacher who teaches that child.
Join Muse with invite code LTGSWD — in the Muse app, go to Settings > Redeem token and enter the code.
Disclosure: LTGSWD is the author's Muse invite code.