Special Education Assessments
Students with exceptionalities are just that: exceptional. So the methods and materials utilized must also be, by meeting them where they are and providing insight into how students learn best. Assessments supply critical information about students' current level of performance and overall functioning needs. For my students with exceptionalities, assessments conducted at the school building level serve as the foundation for their individualized education plans, or IEPs, which outlines specific goals and objectives geared towards their needs. While the educational diagnostician or other evaluation representative is responsible for conducting the initial evaluation, I use the results of the evaluation, both quantitative and qualitative descriptors, in order develop an appropriate IEP for each student. The IEP serves as a road map for future instruction and assessment by targeting indicators that are critical for the student to master in order progress developmentally. Ensuring that these needs are addressed is one of my primary charges as a special educator; however, doing so would not be possible without the layered elements of assessment and data, including both summative and formative checks.
Table of Contents
Diagnostic Assessment:
Special Education
Diagnostic assessment plays a significant role in identifying and determining if a student qualifies for special education services. An educational diagnostician heads a team of certified related service providers, who conduct assessments in all areas of suspected need. After receiving the initial evaluation, I conduct additional grade-level appropriate assesments that further help me hone in on the student's areas of strength and weakness.
A student's Individualized Education Plan (IEP) provides a qualitative and quantitative overview of a the child's functioning level in all areas. The IEP outlines specific annual goals as well a short-term objectives that are scaffolded. The student must master these smaller goals in order to successfully meet the criteria for their annual goal. The document at the right displays one of my student's IEP instructional pages in the area of Academic/Cognitive, specifically English Language Arts. This page states the student's current level of performance, taken from his initial evaluation, and classroom data, as well as the short-term objectives developed as a response to mediate these deficits.
One of my student's IEP is shown on the right. This student's area of strength is foundational skills, whereas his area of weakness is comprehension questions in response to text.
Formative Assessment: Special Education
While a student's IEP can outline numerous short-term objectives, district policy requires that I target, address, and document effort on at least five objectives per each instructional quarter. The image to the left illustrates all of a student's short-term objectives, taken directly from the IEP, while the addressed objectives are circled. Objectives are addressed according to the student's instructional minutes, and assessed weekly. The sample tally sheet shows this student's progress towards his goal.
Formative assessment for my students with exceptionalities can take various forms, though one major way is documentation of their IEP objectives. While daily whole group activities target core curriculum, students with exceptionalities receive also small group and individualized instruction that addresses the goals outline on their IEP. Often, these objectives are pre-requiste skills the student must acquire in order to be successful in the general education curriculum. These objectives may also be content specific deficits.
This assessment is critical to my development of student's instructional next steps. As prescribed by their IEPs, my students with exceptionalities receive instruction directly catered to their needs, both academically, as social-emotionally and behaviorally. Only through consistent implementation of the assess-instruct-analyze cycle am I able to provide the support and resources they need to be successful. Tally sheets act as a microscope for student's progress towards their ultimate IEP goal. They give me a clear idea of student's current level of performance, and allow me to make adjustments in my interventions in order to affect positive student outcomes. Sometimes, growth happens in ways that are too subtle to appear on core assessments. IEP tally sheets give exceptional children a reason to celebrate even the smallest of wins. Additionally, this form of assessment plays a direct role in the development of a student's annual IEP. Each year, a student with exceptionality 's IEP is updated, revised or amended to reflect the student's current needs and performance. Tally sheets provide the data I need in order to draft developementally appropriate, but rigorous goals that will guide their educational plan for the coming year.
Data Driven Decisions
Teaching Special Education naturally comes with a wealth of paperwork and documents, in particular after administering the aforementioned assessments. However, those assessments would be unproductive unless the data is used to drive further instructional choices and classroom decisions. In regard to my students with exceptionalities, the information gathered from their evaluation, IEP, and subsequent tallied objectives drives my development of student-specific instructional plans, as well interventions and enhancements.
After analyzing student assessments, both formative, and summative, my next step is develop a plan to address the evident student need. The image to the right illustrates an intervention plan developed for student who struggled with isolating and identifying initial sounds when given a word. This student has strong foundational skills-he knows all 52 letters and 26 letter sounds, aside from any articulation differences. However, when given a group of 3 to 4 concrete objects, and asked to identify the object that begins with the given letter sound, he struggles to do so accurately. The given plan details a series of accommodations and methods to be implemented in order to provide the student with additional opportunities for mastery, as well as assist me in further diagnosing any other misconceptions.
Using assessment data to make decisions regarding my students' instruction or exceptional needs is paramount in not only complying with IDEA and district regulations, but also in my ability to successfully intervene in a specific student deficit. Developing a plan such as the one to the right helps me scaffold the skills needed to master the IEP goal, as well as collaborate with my special education PLC around possible tools and approaches that will affect the biggest result.