Welcome back to our Student Involvement in the IEP series, where we have been exploring different ways of involving students in their own Individualized Education Plan, both as part of an IEP meeting and throughout the year. 

In Part 1, we focused on what student involvement can look like, and in Part 2, we talked about preparing for the IEP meeting. In Part 3, we took a closer look at how to teach a student about their own involvement in the IEP process, and in Part 4, we are examining ways to involve students in their own IEP process throughout the school year.

As important as the IEP meeting and the IEP itself are for setting the tone and establishing student needs, they are ultimately only a stepping stone to the curriculum that will enable students to work toward their goals and measure their progress. And it is often in the process of that much larger part of the process that we learn more about how things are working, how a student feels about their own progress, and whether a student’s goals are still the same. 

When we have laid all the important groundwork of building an IEP through a shared process, we may also feel a desire to make sure everyone remembers the goals that were set and connect them to activities that may feel challenging or like extra work.

So let’s take a closer look at ways we can involve students in their IEP throughout the year!

One reality of the IEP is that it is a starting point for a much larger variety of activities, educational topics, and work, and it is all too easy for those goals to become abstracted in the process. 

When students express frustration with a lack of understanding as to why a particular activity is important, it can be a valuable tool to return to those shared and established IEP goals. 

Not only does it serve as a reminder of what the student wants and give them the opportunity to decide that it’s worth the extra effort, but it also helps to remind them of the goals they set for themselves earlier and decide whether that goal still makes sense the more they work toward it. 

The more we can connect what we do to our IEP goals, the more students can both develop a sense of what they are working toward and what is working for them.

While it will always be the case that teachers will handle a good deal of putting together curriculum, one helpful component of the IEP process that we may not always think to share with students is translating the written goals of an IEP into activities for skill development and/or for measuring progress. 

It may not be practical to go through that process every single time with every single student, but taking a little time to set a certain part of the curriculum or plan out a few activities based on a goal that is especially important to the student in question can go a long way toward building investment in the process and also helping students more effectively self-advocate when they run into challenges or want to express new needs, since they are coming from a place of better understanding how things might work in practice. 

How extensively you want to involve students in planning their own work is ultimately up to your best judgment, but it’s worth examining the process together from time to time!

One reality of IEPs is that they are built around checking in and measuring progress, and we can easily offer students a space where they are able to do that on their own terms without worrying about balancing input from the entire IEP team. If you are actively measuring certain goals, it can be a great time to check in on those outcomes ahead of time. 

Offering students a space, especially leading up to the IEP meeting, where they can open up on how they feel about their own progress can help to inform next steps in the meeting itself, and going over each individual goal as written can sometimes be a real eye-opener, as a student’s priorities may have already shifted in their mind and they may not even remember the exact wording of their original stated goal! 

A check-in time is great for deciding when to recalibrate and when change is necessary, and is valuable at any frequency a student finds helpful and practical!

One other crucial component of checking in throughout the year is evaluating how well the accommodations and support a given student is currently receiving are enabling them to reasonably and effectively complete their work. 

As we put in the effort of evaluating progress toward goals, it is also helpful to regularly check in with students about whether there are still unnecessary obstacles to their learning process or whether the supports and/or accommodations they are currently receiving are sufficient to meet their needs. 

While the IEP meeting is a great time to officially revise a student’s accommodations, it is never too early to get the ball rolling on making people aware that a new accommodation may be necessary and figuring out what implementation will actually look like if necessary.

With that, we are wrapping up our series (for now!), but we are never done hearing from you, whether it is your thoughts on our series, your personal experience, or a request for a new series or product. Just drop us a line at hello@autismgrownup.com and stay tuned for a new series next week!