Functional Academic and Life Skills
Supporting Students with the Most Significant Needs
As states and teachers continue to align their curriculum and strategies to the standards, they face the challenge of designing instruction that is both rigorous and engaging. All students are required to take nationally normed assessments that directly align with the standards; this poses a unique challenge for special educators. This is especially true for those working with students who have the most significant needs.
Roughly 1% of students with the most significant cognitive impairments are eligible to take alternate assessments in lieu of traditional state exams (e.g. SmarterBalance and PARCC). Like state-wide exams, these alternate assessments are standard-aligned; which means that our IEPs need to be as well. So the question becomes: How do we develop a curriculum and write an IEP for our students with the most significant needs that align with the principles of rigor and engagement behind the standards?
As special education teachers, our focus is always on the individual student: “What does this specific student need?”
Research already shows that standards-based individualized education plans are more meaningful and measurable; the challenge is adapting the standards for the needs of the 1% of students who qualify for alternate assessments. The majority of states have adopted standards developed by leading organizations like Choosing Outcomes and Accommodations for Childen (COACH), The National Center and State Collaborative (NCSC), and Dynamic Learning Maps (DLM).
Alternate Achievement Standards
These standards are helpful for guiding educators, but we’re still faced with difficult standards that vary across all subjects and grade levels. It’s still very challenging to develop an individualized plan for success — particularly one based on a specific student’s current level of performance that also addresses the learning barriers he or she faces.
As special education teachers, our focus is always on the individual student: What does this specific student need? This is a question we ask ourselves constantly, with every activity (planned or not), for every student. By using Goalbook’s alternate assessment goals, it is easy to develop meaningful, individualized IEP goals that look at a student’s specific needs while aligning to CCSS to ensure our students have fair access to state curriculum and assessments. Goalbook Toolkit offers meaningful, relevant support for teachers, allowing them to easily adapt their teaching to meet the needs of our students with the most intensive supports with researched-based interventions and specialized instructional strategies that provide:
- Attention Support
- Visual Support
- Hearing Support
- Physical Support
- Expressive Language Support
Read about how the Present Levels Wizard supports drafting statements for Functional Life Skills.
If you’re not signed up for Goalbook Toolkit, you can register for a free 30-day trial or see what a sample goal page looks like here:
Follow our publication Innovating Instruction to stay up to date on all of our product updates and to read about the impact Goalbook is having on our district partners.
Follow us on Twitter @goalbookapp and join the conversation about how we are working toward success for ALL students!
