Successful collaboration: principles and practices

Special Ed

Successful Collaboration in Special Education

To write an effective IEP (Individualized Education Plan-Program), it is essential for the student's regular and special education instructors to keep in mind the SMART principle. In other words, goals must be: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time Limited (Watson, 2007). For example, the vague phrase that a student with Attention-Deficit Disorder needs to become more focused or improve his or her reading skills is relatively meaningless. The child likely does not understand what 'focus' means, or what 'improvement' means. A regular teacher's interpretation of focus might mean 'works quietly all morning at seatwork' and judge the child by the standards of his or her peer group, not how far the child has progressed. The special education instructor might define focus for the child as 'not talking to neighbors while I am speaking,' and compare the child only to other special education students, not to state standards the child could conceivably fulfill.

Instead, it is better to set a goal that the child raises his or her hand rather than talks out of turn, and meets a projected percentage of state-mandated reading requirements which are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant goal to better academic performance, and the goals should have a definite duration or window of time during which the child should demonstrate measurable improvement, usually that of a year. The goal of an IEP team is ultimately to develop a series of individual goals for the student to move the student toward proficiency on grade-level standards (Cortiella, 2006). As well as specific, the goals should be prioritized and sequential so the skills and knowledge most important to long-term academic success and necessary to building a learning foundation are emphasized, and move the student on from the Present Level Of academic achievement and functional Performance, often known by the acronym of PLOP (Cortiella, 2006).

To ensure that the IEP is comprehensible to all of the child's instructors, it is also essential that the IEP include any curricular modifications required by the child's disability, such less challenging goals than may be expected of the student's peers, as well additional resource support need like talking books, support staff, and additional materials and/or resources (Watson, 2007). Discussing the child's limits and strengths is critical between all the child's teachers.

Historically IEPs have focused on individual academic or functional skills "and have had little if any relationship to a specific academic area or grade-level expectations" (Cortiella, 2006). But with the increased importance of state standards in measuring student and school performance, it is crucial that the student's educators be mindful of the most appropriate methods of measuring the child's compliance and that the general educators and special educators increase their collaboration to meet these new challenges. For some special needs students, "alternate assessments were developed and implemented...In 2003, most...states used a portfolio or body of evidence approach in their alternate assessments for students with significant cognitive disabilities" (Thompson & Thurlow, 2003) States have also been evolving other methods for students with different types of disabilities to take such exams, including computer-based tests or with modifications, such as being allowed to take lower-level assessments.