I have been reviewing and writing new IEPs for learners for the past two weeks. I have written hundreds of them over the years, but I have found them to be tedious and more of an exercise in pushing and filing paperwork than an actual working document.
Until now... having been a case manager for the special education service delivery has helped me see them in a different light. Each child has several service providers, and each service provider must review the IEP with parents and or me, to be sure that their services are in accordance with the reccommendations made by specialists in reports on file. I check in with the service providers monthly to review what they have been doing each month, and to see how the learner is responding to the intervention. The service providers also supply written reports throughout the year. This process has really helped us stay accountable to the learner and to the Ministry of Education. I find this process really helpful in keeping the learner's needs front and foremost in our minds.
I am curious if anyone has comments about the role that IEPs play, and what the experience in your neck of the woods has been?
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Rants and musings about dyslexia, learning disabilities and other challenges.
About Me
- Kathy
- I am a consultant for people with learning disabilities and have been teaching in individualized reading clinics for the past 11 years here in Canada. I am also a learning consultant in an independent distributed learning school. I left the public school system when it became impossible to offer instruction at the intensity level and duration prescribed in research literature. I am now a passionate advocate for families struggling to get their learners' needs met in the school system.
Why I screech
I work with children with severe learning disabilities, and I see alarming gaps in the education of these vulnerable students. I find many things in the field of special education "crazy making", and I just need to screech some times! Feel free to join me.
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2 comments:
I think that IEPs are valuable in a weird way in that they persuade teachers to implement the accommodations kids need better than I, the spec. ed. teacher supporting the student, can. Some classroom teachers are reluctant to make accommodations for the special needs kids until I play the IEP card. Yes, I know that that's a sad commentary when really the accommodations teachers are asked to make are really in most cases only excellent teaching strategies and nothing above and beyond what an excellent teacher would do. It's frustrating to say the least.
Hi Elona
I agree with you 100% that most accommodations are really just optimum teaching practices.
About IEPs... I was in the system during the years that the responsibility for IEPs and special needs kids shifted from the special ed teacher to the classroom teacher. It took a long time for the shift to occur- and I wonder if it is complete even now.
For years my experience as a special ed teacher was to have school-based team meetings with the classroom teacher, parents and other professionals like speech pathologists etc. sit down and discuss the needs of the student. Then I would write the IEP and put a copy in the file and give a copy to the teacher. That seemed to be the end of the process. There was a disconnect between the concept and the exercise of creating an individual education plan. I did mainly pull-out remedial sessions in those days, but when I did support learners in their classrooms, I arranged the accommodations- the teacher had not planned for those learners. It seems that the objective was to do the paper work for the IEP and have it in the file.
I remember an incident that happened my last year of teaching in the system- after the responsibility had shifted to the classroom teacher. It was the last day- June 29, and when I walked into the office, a colleague, a well meaning grade 5 classroom teacher was putting something in my mailbox. He saw me and announced with some relief that he finally got the IEP done. I asked for clarification-
I couldn't imagine why he would be writing an IEP at that time of year. He said it was the IEP for his LD student that he had had all year! He clearly saw it as a duty- a clerical duty that he needed to perform in the school year. He was delighted to have gotten it done before the summer vacation started.
I haven't been in the system for 12 years and I am sure things have changed. I hope things have changed!
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