IEP Investigation: Classroom

After completing the child's ability investigation, the second part of the IEP investigation is the classroom. You will discover the resources, professionals and paraprofessionals available to the children and the amount of time in structured activities versus the individualized instruction time your child receives.

Resources

Each classroom is equipped with some standard items: desks or tables with child-sized chairs, chalk or dry erase boards, bulletin boards, calendars, globes, art supplies. Special education classrooms need other items as well:

• Tactile teaching aids
• Visual teaching aids
• Communication aids
• Physical accommodations
• Auditory aids
• Social skill teaching aids
• Disability specific curricula materials

While your child may not need all of these materials, the last one on the list is mandatory for a successful IEP. You already know what the grade level curriculum expects. Now, the IEP goals must use the curriculum which will educate your child to the grade level requirements and is best suited to your child's disability and abilities.

Self-contained Classrooms

Certain disabilities offer self-contained classrooms where all students have the same disability. Arguments for and against these classrooms are not equal.

Arguments for self-contained classrooms favor the instructors. The curriculum is applied to the class in more structured activities than individualized time with students. Resources are located centrally, thus costing the school district less money. This practice allows for more instruction time to be spent documenting the work done.

Arguments against self-contained classrooms favor the students. Mixing children with different disabilities of varying capabilities offers all students the chance to learn from one another. They will inadvertently observe the instruction of other children and learn in the process.

Segregating single disabilities can stymie progress in certain areas, particularly speech and social interaction. Children whose disabilities include poor socialization skills need the outgoing nature of children who are not equally or more gravely disabled.

Peer pressure in a mixed environment is a positive influence. Children will naturally emulate the more advanced students. More advanced students will often empathize with their more disabled counterparts, taking on leadership and helping roles. Overall, this is the most widely accepted argument for mainstreaming all special education children for at least some part of their day.

Most poignantly, in mixed classes, instructors must spend more individual time with each student in order to meet IEP goals. Special needs parents use this argument most often.

Professionals

All of the great tools on the list are useless if there is not an instructor trained to teach your child how to use them. The professionals are the special needs teacher, speech therapist, occupational therapist, physical therapist and psychologist.

Each school should have at least one of each of these professionals available to your child. If you are unsure if your child would benefit from one of these professionals in the school setting, ask your pediatrician to prescribe an evaluation to the school district. The school's professional will conduct an assessment to determine if your child meets the criteria for his grade level.

If he does, you will receive a report stating he does. This report may contain suggestions for you to pursue outside the school environment to help your child advance to stay on par with his peers. Discuss these suggestions with your pediatrician and a related, certified professional in the field who holds a minimum of a master's degree.

If he does not, you will receive a report stating he needs to be served by the school to address the areas in which he is deficit. When your child is receiving a school service, he should also be receiving a supplementary service from the private sector either in your home or in a clinical setting. The private therapist will create goals which will help him reach his IEP goals faster and/or will help you promulgate appropriate IEP goals.

Paraprofessionals

Paraprofessionals are the intermediaries between you and the professionals. Aides, curriculum coaches and guidance counselors are paraprofessionals.

Aides are the most important element to your child because they lower the student-teacher ratio. They can help your child with classroom activities, self-help skills and especially social skills. An aide is often your child's favorite person in the classroom. The aide will tend to place less pressure on your child, encouraging better results.

Curriculum coaches help keep you on track. By comparing IEP goals to grade level goals, the coach will keep your IEP goals high in your child's strength areas and reasonable where weaknesses arise. If this position does not exist in your school, employ the principal to play the role. As the school's administrator, she should have the complete knowledge of what is required.

Guidance counselors help both you and your child. Whether smoothing transitions, helping with social streaming or counseling you on behaviors which manifest during puberty or the IEP journey, the guidance counselor can give you information on how to help your child emotionally handle the changes.

Structured Activities

All classrooms have certain daily or weekly activities which all of the children do together. If the majority of the day is spent in structured group activity, begin asking important questions.

• Which IEP goal does this activity pursue?
• What progress toward my child's IEP goal has been made with this activity?
• How long will this activity remain in the daily/weekly schedule before it is exchanged for another activity?
• Can my child be scheduled for individual therapy during this activity, since it does not pursue an IEP goal?

Structured activities are a necessary part of the school day. They teach skills like sitting still, paying attention, being quiet, turn-taking and group participation. They do not provide the "I" of the Individualized Education Plan.

Individualized Time

Individualized time includes both therapies and instructional time in the classroom. How much time is being spent directly on the IEP goals for your child? Even though the only child you truly care about may be your own, there are other children in the class.

• Of the time not spent in structured activity, is the remaining time split equally among the students?
• Is the time productively pursuing IEP goals for your child?
• Is time being wasted on goals already mastered?
• Is the curriculum being followed?

Only the third question should be answered "no". If more than one "no" is answered, an IEP meeting is in order after a conference with the principal and the special education teacher.

The next portion of the Investigation is Disability Education Training.

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IEP Investigation: Child's Ability

The most important person to consider when building an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) is the child. Whether the special need is a physical, mental or learning disability or a combination, an IEP which actually provides an education for him needs to be based on his abilities, capabilities and potential.

Personal Observation

You know more about your child than his doctor, his teacher, his therapist...anyone else. By now you know what is expected of him at school. It is up to you to give your insight to everyone else on the team as to what he can accomplish.

Gather Resources

Buy a composition book. The pages do not tear from the book. Each time you write in the book, date the entry. While you may be tempted to video tape some activities, a written record can be reproduced to become part of his permanent school records. Tapes can easily be lost, damaged or erased.

For one week, write down all of the things you child accomplishes. Did he climb the kitchen cabinet to get a treat from on top of the refrigerator? (motor and cognitive skills) Did he ask you for chocolate cake for lunch? (language and social skills) Did he let you have a turn kicking the soccer ball? (social and motor skills)

Over the next week, try out some of the activities you foresee putting into the IEP. Did he name two of the colors correctly? Did he match five? Did he spontaneously point out a color in a book you were reading?

All of these accomplishments show readiness for the skills he needs to master. Staple the page where he matched the colors into the book. You will need to show your child is prepared to be challenged rather than coddled.

Audit a Class

Take a day to go to school to see what he does in school. Write your observations in the book.

• How is he interacting with other students?
• How much individual time is he getting with the teacher?
• Are the group activities aimed at satisfying his current (and/or future) IEP goals?

Your child will act differently in the school setting than he will at home. Be as unintrusive as possible in your observation of the class. You will see different strengths and weaknesses which present themselves only in the classroom.

Take a Day Off

Whether it is a day at the park, a trip to the zoo or simply a day care visit, being out of "his natural habitat" will produce a child you may not see that often. You will observe interests which can help you determine the best avenues for teachers to approach subjects to hold his attention. He may also excel in certain areas strictly by being exposed to a new environment.

Professional Observation

When negotiating IEP goals, therapists and paraprofessionals will give added weight to the opinions of professionals in their fields. Have your child seen by his speech pathologist, neurologist, gastroenterologist, orthopedic, audiologist and any other doctor or specialist treating him.

Bring your book when you go to the professional assessment. Your observations will be vital to the professional in accurately assessing your child beyond just the clinical observation which can be done during a regular appointment. Again, you are the primary resource the professional has in assessing your child.

Ask the professional to prepare a report with both progress and recommendations for integration of current therapy techniques into the educational classroom setting.

Assessments provided to the IEP team should be no more than six months old. Ideally, assessments should be one to three months old at the time of the IEP meeting.

Recommendations should be followed as closely as possible methods used to reach the goals. Often, recommendations from professionals will cross segments of the IEP presenting the possibility for more than one provider to help your child reach his goals.

You need to read the recommendations as well. Many of the recommendations can be implemented in your everyday experiences with your child. He will be no more the wiser you are helping him reach his goals!

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IEP: Special Ed. vs. Regular Ed.

Did you do the homework?

WOW! Did you notice something immediately? OK, I am going to give you a break if you did not do the homework...

Regular Education
When you look at the curriculum for the regular education for your child's grade level, you will notice a few things. The first of which is the length.

The goals are broken into categories of language, science, social science and mathematics.

On average, there are between 300 and 500 goals for elementary school children and 1,200 to 1,500 goals for high school children.

Special Education
Individualized Education Plans (IEP) are divided into four major categories: Cognitive (intellectual skills), Social (adaptive and self-help skills), Motor (physical ability) and Language (speech and communication).

Based on where you live, IEP average ten (10) goals per section, with many children having no goals in areas where they need no special attention.

A-B=Where is the "education"?
If you are holding your child's IEP in one hand (A) and the grade curriculum in the other (B), a good IEP will be balanced. The IEP will have the same goals adapted to suit your child's disability.

When A-B is less than a desirable balance, it is time for you to do some investigating.

Areas of investigation
In order to give credit where it is justly deserved, most especially in your child, your investigation must include all of the following areas.

Child's ability

• Personal observation at home, school and outside settings
  
• Assessments and meetings with doctors, therapists and paraprofessionals

Classroom setting

• Availability of resources
• Availability of professionals and paraprofessionals
• Structured activities vs. individualized education time
  

Level of disability education training

• Administration (principal, curriculum coach)
• Professionals (therapists, teachers, school psychologist)
• Paraprofessionals (aides, guidance counselor)

School District

• Availability and location of resources
• Disability education training and/or awareness of board member serving school
• Performance of supporting services (transportation, meal services)
  

We will tackle the investigation one step at a time over the next few posts to eliminate the majority of stumbling blocks to the successful IEP.

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George Chmiel: Leaving Wednesday

George is leaving for Egypt on Wednesday morning! If you have not already been, stop by his blog and leave a comment. Show your support!

Share the story of George and his courageous run, not on the smooth paved road, but in the grueling sun-parched sands of the Sahara Desert.

That's right. 155 miles in temperatures as high as 140 degrees Fahrenheit. And he will be carrying his gear and a ration of water.

He will be able to take a break in the evening at the virtual oasis: a tent where runners can send word back to those of us feverishly waiting on word from them.

George has been training hard these last few weeks. Stop by and leave him a note wishing him well. And while you are there, why not take a minute to donate to the MAGIC Foundation?

After all, if George Chmiel can run across the Sahara for Luci...

What would you do to save a child?

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IEP: It really is a team effort.

Over the next few posts, we are going to look in depth into the Individualized Education Plan (IEP) Process.

Today, we begin with the IEP Team.

The bare minimum for an IEP is:

• Parent(s)
  
• Principal
  
• Special needs teacher
• "Regular education" teacher
• Special needs representative from the school district
  
• Specialist(s) (Speech, occupation and/or physical therapist, psychologist)

Optional team members are:

• Advocates (from state or county/parish agencies, disability organizations or charities)
• Service Coordinator
• Personal or in-home therapists

Each person should have input toward goals, progress and accommodations in his/her specific area of expertise.

When certain goals have been met and need to be changed, parents have the right to waive the presence of certain team members who are not involved in the particular goal. (**Personal note** I do not recommend this at any time. Keep reading to find out why.)

The Team Leader:
Despite what the onlooker without a special needs child may think, the team leader is the parent. Even though the specialists may have more education in a certain area, no one knows more about your child than you do.

By the time a child is five years old, parents have spent more time with him than a specialist will spend with special needs children in the entirety of her career, even if that career spans 45 years.

Your advocate may know more about "the process", but without your information, there is no "process". Think of the IEP as a blank computer program. Until you put in your child's information, progress, strengths and weaknesses, the program does nothing.

There is no "I" in "TEAM".
All members of the team need to be working toward the goals of your special needs child: not standardized tests scores to get school funds (NCLB), not number of special needs children seen (IDEA), not personal career statistics.

All members of the team should be pursuing all of the goals on the IEP. While some specialists will focus on certain parts of the IEP, they should not ignore the remaining goals on the IEP. All activities for special needs children can be adapted to satisfy two or more areas of the IEP (i.e. cognitive and social, social and language, cognitive, social and occupational, etc.).

This is why all members of the team should be present every time a goal is changed on the IEP. A change to one portion of the IEP may open a world of possibilities for another service provider for your special needs child.

IEP is not just for school.
Yes, the IEP is educational. After all, the "E" stands for "education". Do not leave the IEP in the hands of the school.

As a parent, you have taught your child all he knows. Nothing changes when he goes to school. YOU are still his first and best teacher. Ask your service coordinator, advocate and teachers for activities which you can do at home to help your child meet IEP goals.

Next post, we will explore the first stage of preparation for the IEP meeting.

For homework, check out your state's Department of Education website. Find the requirements for the "regular education" grade level for your child.

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Meet Luci: George Chmiel's Inspiration

Here she is. Luci is George's inspiration in running across the Sahara.

She is a charming three-year-old who suffers from panhypopituitarism. It causes her hypothyroidism, hypoglycemia, adrenal insufficiency, growth hormone deficiency and partial diabetes insipidus. Her little system is not strong enough to fight off a common cold. In spite of all of that, she loves to read and play with the family dog.

Jolie and Mike (Mommy and Daddy) have to give her medicine and injections everyday. And the frequent flier miles are accumulating between home and Texas Children's Hospital.

How do they do it? With the support of other families of children with growth disorders Luci they met through The MAGIC Foundation. Networking at the annual convention MAGIC holds in July. Meeting professionals who deal with growth disorders everyday and can provide accurate information and treatment.

The MAGIC Foundation is a501(c)(3) charity which operates on donations. Jolie and Mike host a "Walk for Luci" each fall to benefit MAGIC.

This year George Chmiel is going to run across the Sahara Desert to raise money and awareness for panhypopituitarism for MAGIC. And he leaves in five days. And this is where he is going:


Are you up for 155 miles across THAT? ^^^

George is tackling it after only running for two years. If he can do that, what can you do to help save a child? How about some ideas?

• Stop by George's page on MAGIC and donate directly to the cause.
• Pass this link to everyone you know who cares about children or has a special needs child.
• Go to George and Luci's website to learn more and donate.
• Join The MAGIC Foundation. Your membership will get special families the information and help they need for their special children.
• Let your doctor know about The MAGIC Foundation. Let your clinic get the best information available to diagnose children properly.
• Learn more about the disorders which affect children and are effectively treated with growth hormone.
• Show your support by joining The MAGIC Foundation's cause on Facebook, inviting your friends and donating.

George is only $18,000 away from the total goal of $53,000. Would your employer or physician sponsor George or donate directly to MAGIC? Help support a champion.

Visit Virginia's Dream. International shipping available on request. All proceeds from Virginia's Dream are been donated to the Autism Research Foundation from now until December 31, 2009.

Never stop talking!

We had an autism breakthrough this weekend!

We were on the way for a celebratory "Happy Birthday, Daddy!" breakfast at a local restaurant. Along the way, the road is lined with fields of horses and cattle, corn and pine trees, lakes and tractors. While his sister was busy pointing out the flora and the fauna, Nicholas was looking out her window at something entirely different.

He was listening to us talking to her as she pointed things out to us and watching like a tennis match between her and me as we talked. He wanted to play, too. As we passed a line of tanker cars parked on the railroad tracks alongside the road, Nicholas clearly said, "Train."

So, chalk up word number 18! Even if your child is non-verbal, you just keep talking. Talk about everything. Narrate everything you do. Identify everything you pass...even if all you pass is the cabinet, the bathtub and the rubber ducky.

While we do not have a locomotive to walk past at home, we do have a book we read regularly which identifies all the cars on the train. He may be acting like he is not paying attention all the time, but he is understanding.

So, keep reading. Read one book everyday for a week. For fun, read a second book your child picks out. Keep a record of what you read. You may just discover what interests your quiet little one!

No matter how old your child is, never give up on speech therapy and talking to your child. Even non-verbal children who successfully sign can learn to talk. I met a woman this weekend whose daughter began talking at eleven.

Celebrate and rejoice in every single utterance!

Visit Virginia's Dream. International shipping available on request. All proceeds are being donated to the Autism Research Foundation from now until December 31, 2009.