Hi sports fans, as you may recall, we HAD had an IEP scheduled for Dar for September, but the district shoved it to October because…I guess their flux capacitor wasn’t fluxing. Tomorrow is Dar’s IEP for the Future Part II. As sequels go, let’s hope it’s a little better than Robert Zemeckis’s film from 1989.
Our main concern is speech and language, and Dar’s specialist in that area, Jennifer, is scheduled to present her annual goals for Dar tomorrow. We take him to a separate speech and language therapist at Alta Bates Hospital once a week, and I must say that this week that therapist almost threw up her hands. I believe her phrase was something like “I’m running out of ideas.” The good news is that she said this in response to the information that this week is Dar’s IEP – she volunteered that she’d be open to taking cues from the district. That could work out nicely, because Jennifer comes to these meetings overflowing with ideas – we love that about her. Two weeks ago, I said “Jennifer, these are great, but you only work with Dar for 30 minutes a week.” She assured me that the team all works on them together – including Dar’s 1-on-1 aide. But I’ll be even more assured if I can pass a few ideas and techniques onto his non-school therapists. At the half-IEP two weeks ago, I brought a full list of all the vocalizations he’s doing with his ABA person at home and left that with Jennifer – she sounded like she would try to integrate those into the annual goals.
It always comes back to Dar’s aversion to talking – to the fact that his cerebral palsy seems to have caused some kind of apraxia that prevents him from using his mouth for communication. Even that’s misleading, because he makes vocalizations all the time – “tee-tee-teeing” – but when we demand speech-for-desired-object, his mouth twists into a convoluted shape, his tone lowers to that of a child imitating “I’m a Lonely Frog”, and he speaks only the barest minimum utterance to obtain the item. If only there was some way to make the latter sort of speech as comforting for him as the former. Unfortunately, for Dar, making a coherent two-syllable utterance is like you touching your foot to your head – not impossible, but considerably aversive. And so we rarely know what he wants.
One thing I asked at the half-IEP was: if Dar doesn’t hit the new goals, does that mean he doesn’t go to first grade? The principal fielded that one. Because this is technically Dar’s second year in kindergarten (that’s a long story covered elsewhere on this blog), he’s already been “held back” once and so it’s very, very unlikely that he will be held back again. The principal said – I wish I had tape-recorded this, perhaps I’ll use my phone to record her tomorrow – that he won’t have the same goals as the other kids, but if he shows progress toward the goals we define, he should keep moving along in the grades. I didn’t ask this at the time, but doesn’t that call the BUSD’s immersion-only policy into question? If he’s not hitting the other kids’ goals, why is he there, exactly? Just the social aspect? Is that really enough?
AND then there’s all the horror stories I hear from all these other parents of special-needs kids who fought the BUSD for years and finally gave up and transferred their kid to an NPS or other.
So we have decisions to make…ugh. And this year really could be sink or swim.
Anyway, so, tomorrow’s IEP. We brought some of these up at the half-IEP. Let’s see…let’s cross out the ones they covered, and leave uncrossed the ones that we still need to discuss…
He’s being pulled out of class way too often – what are we doing about that? What sort of behaviors lead to him being ejected, and what can we do? (Gum?) We’d like an ongoing record of how often he’s taken out of class.Last year his aide said she would do about 50% time at his work station and 50% time integrated with the rest of the class. Is that still the rough calculation? And how much of each of those blocks get disrupted by him being ushered out of the classroom?- What’s the methodology behind the goals? Let’s say that last year he was observed to do a given activity 5 out of 10 times, and we projected that by now he would be doing it 7 out of 10 times, and he’s *actually* now doing it 6 out of 10 times. What’s the new goal? 7 out of 10? 8 out of 10?
- What’s going on with Kaufman cards? What are the goals with those?
- How are his math skills? We read the March IEP assessment of him counting from 1 to 5 – how’s that going?
- What about state standards? For example, we noticed math sheets that Dar brought home about having 12 apples and taking away 2, that sort of thing. We don’t know that Dar has done anything on state standards and we’re not sure how long that can last, long-term.
- Help us define success/failure. We want his goals set high, but reasonable.
- We are skeptical that inclusion works for Dar.
- If Berkeley Unified is going to help with process of transferring Dar to a private school (or another school inside or outside the SELPA, one with different special-needs policies), what would the BUSD need to facilitate that? And what kind of timeline are we talking about? (For example, if transferring for Fall 2016, would March 2016 be too soon and June 2016 too late?)
Does S/L 4 cover him saying “break” and not just screaming to be let out of class?Can we have a goal of him making fewer random noises at all times?Can we have a goal of him expressing his displeasure with tasks in ways other than raising his voice?- Can we have a goal (if we don’t already) of him seeing the first 10 digits and identifying them? (Example: He sees “1” and says his approximation for “one.”)
Based on your experience, how soon should we introduce a “letter board” for Dar? (In the 2000s these were done with an 8 ½ by 11 sheet with 26 letters on it; nowadays we would presume iPad.)Throwing things in class?Phasing out PECs?Plan is for him to go 1st grade next year?Tapping people instead of grabbing their hands?
And here’s our ideas for Jennifer. By tomorrow we’ll know if she’s going under or over these. Less clear will be what we’ll do if and when Dar doesn’t clear these bars. Wish us luck.
Measurable Annual Goal S/L 1
Functional Communication, Goal: By October 2015, upon seeing a variety of reinforcing items, Dar will go to communication book and select the picture from all available pictures and give to communicative partner before retrieving the item independently on 8 out of 10 opportunities as measured by teacher observation and charting.
Goal accomplished if picture is on iPad. We just need to make sure all extant Pecs or picture icons are on the iPad, as well as make sure that Dar knows to BRING the iPad to the adult and THEN make his selection.
Measurable Annual Goal S/L 2
Functional Communication, Goal: By October 2015, given the use of visual support, Dar will complete 5 classroom “jobs” (e.g. choose afternoon song, water plant of the day, breakfast helper) with no more than 1 verbal prompt as measured by teacher observation and charting.
By November 2014, Dar will independently choose a classroom job from a field of 2, place his chosen job on his topic board for the week and complete the job once per day with 4-5 physical/gestural/verbal prompts to complete two jobs total with 80% accuracy in 4 out of 5 opportunities as measured by teacher observations, data collection and/or student work samples.
By March 2015, Dar will independently choose a classroom job from a field of 2, place his chosen job on his topic board for the week and complete the job once per day with 2-3 physical/gestural/verbal prompts to complete two jobs total with 80% accuracy in 4 out of 5 opportunities as measured by teacher observations, data collection and/or student work samples.
By June 2015, Dar will independently choose a classroom job from a field of 2, place his chosen job on his topic board for the week and complete the job once per day with 1-2 physical/gestural/verbal prompts to complete two jobs total with 80% accuracy in 4 out of 5 opportunities as measured by teacher observations, data collection and/or student work samples.
Projected:
By November 2015, Dar will independently choose a classroom job from a field of 3, place his chosen job on his topic board for the week and complete the job once per day with 1-2 physical/gestural/verbal prompts to complete two jobs total with 80% accuracy in 4 out of 5 opportunities as measured by teacher observations, data collection and/or student work samples.
By March 2016, Dar will independently choose a classroom job from a field of 3, place his chosen job on his topic board for the week and complete the job once per day with 1-2 physical/gestural/verbal prompts to complete two jobs total with 90% accuracy in 4 out of 5 opportunities as measured by teacher observations, data collection and/or student work samples.
By June 2016, Dar will independently choose a classroom job from a field of 4, place his chosen job on his topic board for the week and complete the job once per day with 1-2 physical/gestural/verbal prompts to complete two jobs total with 95% accuracy in 4 out of 5 opportunities as measured by teacher observations, data collection and/or student work samples.
Measurable Annual Goal S/L 3
Expressive Language, Goal: By October 2015, Dar will use 15-20 word/sound approximations in context across 3 different activities with 1-2 visual/verbal prompts with 80% accuracy on 4 out of 5 trials as measured by teacher observation and charting.
Short-Term Objective: By November 2014, Dar will use 5 word/sound approximations across two different activities with verbal prompting as needed on 3 out of 5 trials as measured by teacher observation and charting.
Short-Term Objective: By March 2015, Dar will use 10 word/sound approximations across two different activities with verbal prompting as needed on 3 out of 5 trials as measured by teacher observation and charting.
Short-Term Objective: By June 2016, Dar will use 10-15 word/sound approximations across two different activities with verbal prompting as needed on 3 out of 5 trials as measured by teacher observation and charting.
Projected:
Short-Term Objective: By November 2015, Dar will use 20 word/sound approximations across two different activities with verbal prompting as needed on 3 out of 5 trials as measured by teacher observation and charting.
Short-Term Objective: By March 2016, Dar will use 20-25 word/sound approximations across two different activities with verbal prompting as needed on 4 out of 5 trials as measured by teacher observation and charting.
Short-Term Objective: By June 2016, Dar will use 30 word/sound approximations across two different activities with verbal prompting as needed on 4 out of 5 trials as measured by teacher observation and charting.
/t,d/ phonemes have been identified as problems, Kaufman cards as solutions
Measurable Annual Goal S/L 4
Expressive Language/Functional Communication: By October 2015, Dar will initiate the use of a “break” or “all done” icon with a corresponding verbal approximation with no more than 1 verbal prompt on 8 out of 10 trials as measured by teacher observation and charting.
Short-Term Objective: By November 2014, Dar will choose a “break/all done” icon from a field of one prior to taking a scheduled break in his school day, with the corresponding break happening immediately following the choice, given 2-3 verbal prompts on 4 out of 5 occasions as measured by teacher observation and charting.
Short-Term Objective: By March 2015, Dar will choose a “break/all done” icon from a field of 2 prior to taking a scheduled break in his school day, with the corresponding break happening immediately following the choice, given 2-3 verbal prompts on 4 out of 5 occasions as measured by teacher observation and charting.
Short-Term Objective: By June 2015, Dar will choose a “break/all done” icon from a field of 2 prior to taking a scheduled break in his school day, with the corresponding break happening immediately following the choice, given 2-3 verbal prompts on 4 out of 5 occasions as measured by teacher observation and charting.
