IEP Goals for Students with Significant Needs

Have you ever looked at IEP goals for a particular student and thought "how the heck are they going to achieve this?" or "What was I thinking when I wrote this?"

When it comes to working with students with significant needs these are questions you may find yourself asking over and over. No worries, I do too. Even when it comes to writing IEP goals I see so many things the student needs to work on but it doesn't align with the common core.

Today I am here to share with you some ideas for goals I have written for my students with significant needs. Most of these students are non-verbal, severely cognitive impaired and may have physical and/or behavioral needs.

*Disclaimer- Every district has different expectations for IEP goal and objective writing. Make sure to check with your team before implementing any of these goals.

Reading Goals:
For reading I focus a ton on core vocabulary. Let's face it, our students with significant needs need to work on functional communication. Why not have them read and comprehend functional words? Don't get me wrong, I think students need to be exposed to literature and have access to all types of books but for an actual goal lets make it functional!!!

Here is an example of a core vocabulary "phonics" goal and objectives.

Here is an example of a core vocabulary "comprehension" goal and objectives.

How do these fit into the common core? In Michigan we have Essential Elements and a range of complexity. Here is the Essential Element I chose for this goal. The gray area is the general education standard and then the white areas are broken down into high, medium and low.

Writing Goals:
Ahh!!! Writing, I dread it!! Come on now, how can writing be functional right? Is focusing on sentence structure, revising and editing really something that my students should be working on? Honestly, yes but....in reality it is really difficult when our students should be learning how to hold a pencil correctly and making a signature mark.

I will be honest, for writing I mostly tag onto the OT goals for fine motor. But here is an example of a goal and objectives. (The students first and last name start with L).

CCSS is listed in gray and the essential element is listed in yellow. This particular strand doesn't offer a range of complexity like reading.

Math Goals:
Students can work on so many things during math instruction. A lot of my students continue to practice using core vocabulary during math by working on put on/put in tasks. But here is an example of a very functional goal I wrote. The student needed to practice using the microwave and becoming independent with heating up his food. So I added a color coded system to help support this.

Michigan Essential Element

The big thing with writing goals for our students with significant needs is that we need to think outside of the box. Write goals that are truly going to help them in their future. For example, while learning 2+2 is important how does that really help us in our lives?

What types of goals have you written?


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Teaching Functional/Sight Words

The reading process is very challenging. You have to rely on your vision, hearing, memory and judgement skills to gain a true understanding of the process. Students with disabilities struggle with this and don't really get the chance to read and write for meaning on a daily basis. Because of this, it is our job as educators to make sure our students have access to the words that are the most meaningful to them. Teaching functional words to students with disabilities should be at the top of our list. Increasing a students vocabulary, increases their communication and in return should decrease those negative and unwanted behaviors. So here are 5 easy steps to teaching functional and sight words to your students.

Before you begin teaching it is essential to get a baseline on your students. Gathering data before you start teaching will do 2 things. First it will let you know exactly what area(s) your student needs direct teaching in and second it gives you a baseline so you can compare after you have done direct teaching activities. When assessing make sure to use your judgement on the amount of words you want to assess. It is okay to start small using only 2-4 words. You know your students best!

Now that you have assessed your students you can see the area(s) in which they need further teaching. Use those words to do the following direct teaching lessons.

To begin your teaching of functional and/or sight words you will have your students match the words. For this activity you will determine the field in which you want your students working in. I typically use 4 but I have also used as little as 2 and as much as 8. Lay out your main page. This will be a grid that distinctively separates the words.

Next copy those same words onto flash cards (notecards or scrap paper). You will then say the first word and hand it to your student and say MATCH (word). It is imperative that you use limited verbal instruction so you don't distract your students on what they are supposed to be focusing on (the word).

Your student will then match the word onto the main page you have laid in front of them. If they get it right give them a quick positive reinforcement (a high five, a "Great job", nice etc.) If they get it wrong give them a visual redirection (point to the correct word). You will do this until you have gone through all of the words. Repeat this 3 times during each teaching.

Once your students are able to successfully match the words 3 times they have mastered it and can move onto the next direct teaching lesson.

The next step in teaching functional/sight words is teaching your students to select words from a group. For this activity you will lay out the words in an array on the table directly in front of your student. You can create entirely new cards or simply reuse the materials from the matching activity.

Again making sure to use limited vocabulary, simply tell your student to give/point to the word (of your choice). Do this until the student has successfully made it through all of the words. Repeat this process 3 times.

Just like in the first activity, once your student has successfully selected the words 3 times, they are ready to move onto the next activity. 

Now that the student has been able to master matching and selecting words you have asked them to, it's time for them to start reading words of their choice. Hand them all of their flashcards (the words they have been practicing). Ask them to read the words 1 at a time. Giving them the entire stack allows them to choose the order in which they want to read the words. Again remember to give positive reinforcement and redirection when needed. 

Have the students successfully read the words 1-2 times before moving on. Once you feel they have mastered the words it is time to assess them again.

Use the same assessment you used at the beginning. Compare the data and see the growth!!! If the students have successfully mastered the words they are ready for the next step. For words they didn't mastered start the process over again. If you were working on 4 words and they mastered 3. Repeat the process with the 1 they didn't along with 3 new words!

After your students have mastered words it is important to continue to practice them. Here are a list of possible reinforcement activities you can do with your students. I use these activities all year long and continue to add words. By the end of the year they will have all of their words (unless the amount is overwhelming). 

Jenga

                        

**I pulled these pictures from Google.....I do not own them**

Write the mastered words on the Jenga pieces. As your student play Jenga they can read the words. If your students struggle with playing Jenga they can have a basket with all of the pieces, pull out a piece, read the word and build something with the peices.

Twister

**I pulled these pictures from Google.....I do not own them**

Tape word cards to the different circles. Play the game as you normally would but when the student touches a new circle they will read the words. To make it more challenging students can read all of the words their hands and feet are touching every turn.

Lily Pads

**I pulled these pictures from Google.....I do not own them**

Write the words on lily pads (or any fun design) and have your students hop from one lily pad to the next. As they hop they have to say the new word. I really like this activity because it helps my kids get their wiggles out.

Make and Break

Have students use letter tiles (these can be magnet letters, Unifix cubes or anything you write letters on) to spell the word they are shown. As the teacher you will write one of their mastered words on a white board. The student will then use their tiles to correctly spell and read the word. You can level this activity. If they are just starting out consider only having the letters that correctly spell the word. To make it more challenging have the students choose letters from a larger field.

I hope you enjoyed learned a quick, easy and structured way to teach those functional and/or sight words. 

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Functional Calendar Routine

Calendar skills are something that are super important. Students (of all ages) need to be able to look at and understand a calendar. There are also so many skills you can tie into a daily calendar routine. In the past I always printed cute theme calendar pieces that I laminated, Velcroed and stored in a cute little container by the board. Don't get me wrong, there is absolutely nothing wrong with doing this. However, I don't have time for that. It was so much prep work. And then.....something comes up and you don't have a piece you need AHHHH!!!! My friends, no worries. I have the answer, introduce this Functional Calendar Routine into your day.

This idea was one that came to me at 3:00 in the morning and I had to roll over and add it into my Amazon account before falling back asleep. In most of our special education classes we are teaching functional/life skills. So....why not get the kids using a REAL calendar? Since this idea just came to me and I haven't started school (heck I haven't even been allowed in my classroom) I don't have it set up and these pictures have totally made up activities on them but I wanted you to be able to see what the heck I am talking about.

Here it is......a standard (well school year) desk calendar. You can purchase any calendar but I liked this one because it has holes in the binding. That way I can hang it on Command hooks. I also liked that it has large day boxes and a section for notes.

Using this desk calendar allows me to do WHATEVER I want. If I want to work on patterns I can, if I want to add special days I can, if I want to show my students when school and non-school days are I can. Best of all, after I think I have the month complete and I get the news that "Mrs. Smith's" class is going on a field trip to the Dairy Queen I don't have to run to the computer, print off a picture, laminate it, velcro it and get it on the calendar. All I have to do is WRITE IT!!!! Actually I am going to have my kids write it. I am going to get them used to handling a real calendar just like I do everyday.

Here are a few things you could do:

Patterns- Since you are able to do whatever you want and you don't have to worry about prep work do whatever your kids need. Make the patterns easy or complicated. You could have monthly theme patterns like I have shown. You could do a color pattern (just draw colored dots), community signs, school supplies, core words, spelling words....honestly it's endless!!

Special Days- color in the box, outline the box, write inside the box, use the notes section and color code it. I am really excited about this because my students are assigned to a general education class as well as my class. There are so many different activities going on, it gets overwhelming having to make cute pieces to go along with everything. I know, I know I could just throw something up on my cute calendar but....my students I won't have it. I can't deal with things not all matching. I think I am going to utilize the system I have below. I will write in the box when it has something to do with my class and then color code the boxes when it has to do with a gen. ed class. For example...students in "Mrs. Smith's" class will know their color is blue. So when something is outlined in blue they will know it is their day. Then I will write what the activity is in the notes section.

Weekends- Color weekends/no school days red. This was students can visually see when they don't have school. My students really struggle with the concept of school/no school days. This will be an added visual support for them.

Review Months- since the month before and after are listed on the calendar its a good way to practice/review.

Something else that is cool is when the month is over you can rip it off and hang it up like an anchor chart or take a picture, print it and store in a binder or have for student scrapbooks. That way you and your students can look back and see all of the things they did throughout the year.

Is this something you will be adding to your classroom? Do you have another use for this functional calendar routine?

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