General Curriculum

• General Curriculum is the established plan of instruction for all students in a Local Education Agency (LEA). It can be based on the LEA”S or state’s standards.

• Access to the general curriculum means that education planning for students with disabilities has as its foundation the curriculum being taught within the district and that curriculum be presented at a level and in a manner in which students with disabilities can acquire the content.

No Child Left Behind

• Requires accountability through assessment and students to make adequate yearly progress.

• Emphasis is to ensure all students achieve at high levels.

Access to General Curriculum

• General education can no longer reduce the diversity of skills in their classrooms by referring students out to special education.

• All teachers must be skilled at making accommodations.• This is no longer something that only special education

teachers do.• Standards – based school reforms and IDEA 97

challenge educators to demonstrate that all students can make meaningful progress in the general curriculm.

Making the Content Standards Work for All Students

DifferentiationAccommodationsModificationsScaffolding

What Differentiated Instruction is:

• Proactive• More QUALITATIVE than

quantitativeRooted in AssessmentProvides Multiple

Approaches to content, process a, and product

• A BLEND of whole-class, group, and individual instruction.

• STUDENT – CENTERED

Differentiation is:

• Classroom practice that recognizes that kids differ, and that the most effective teachers do whatever it takes to hook the whole range of kids on learning.

5 Important Steps

• Expect student to meet grade level academic content standards.

• Learn about accommodations for instruction and assessment.

• Choose accommodations with students.• Administer assessment accommodations. • Evaluate and improve accommodations use.

Step1: Expect students to meet grade level academic content standards

• http://www.michigan.gov/mde/0,1607,7-140-28753_33232---,00.html

Student participation in Assessments:

• No child left behind. (NCLB)• Individuals with Disabilities

Education Act. (IDEA)

Assessments for Accountability• How successful schools are

in including all students in standards-based education.

• How well students are achieving standards

• What needs to be improved for specific groups of students.

Step 1 cont.

Include All Students in Assessment.

• Provide accommodations to increase access.

• Use alternate assessments for student with significant cognitive disabilities.

• Follow state guidelines for decisions about the provision of alternate assessments.

• Equal Access to Grade Level Content.

• Think about ways to provide access to MI Content Standards.

• Every IEP member must be familiar with the MI content Standards.

• Collaboration between general and special education is the key!

Step 2: Learn about accommodations

Definition of Accommodations• Accommodations are procedures in the areas of

setting, scheduling, presentation, and response that provide equitable instructional and assessment access for students with disabilities.

• Accommodations mediate the effect of a student’s disability and do not reduce learning expectations.

Accommodation Categories

• Timing- change the allowable length of test or assignment and may change the way the time is organized.

• Presentation- Allow students to access information in ways that do not require them to visually read standard print (visual, tactile, auditory).

• Response- allow students to complete assignments, tests, and activities in different ways.

• Setting – Change the location in which a test or assignment is given or the conditions of the assessment setting.

Modifications

• Changing, lowering, or reducing learning or assessment expectations.

• May result in implications that may adversely affect a student throughout his or her educational career.

Examples include:• Requiring a student to

learn less material• Revising assignment or

tests to make them easier.

• ACT/MME testing no modifications allowed.

Modifications are:

• Changes made to curriculum expectations in order to meet the needs of the student. Modifications are made when the expectations are beyond the students level of ability.

• Examples• Withdrawal from class for

specific skills• Include student in same

activity but individualize the expectations and materials

• Student is involved in same theme/unit but provide different task and expectations

Step Three: Choose Accommodations

• What Doesn’t Work……. Checking every accommodation available on the IEP form, hoping something will work.

• What else doesn’t work? Question to consider.

• What are the student's strengths and needs?

• How do the student’s needs affect the achievement of grade level content standards?

• What specialized instruction does the student need to achieve state standards?

• What accommodations will increase the student’s access to instruction and assessment?

Review Current Accommodations

• Decide if the accommodations are working.

• Considerations for new accommodations if needed.

• Involve student in choice-making

• Document Accommodations.

Accommodations are:

• Actual teaching supports and services that the student may require to successfully demonstrate learning. Accommodations should not change expectations to the curriculum grade levels.

• Examples:• Taped books• Math charts• Additional time• Oral test• Oral reports• Preferred seating• Study carrel• Amplified system• Braille writer• Adapted keyboard• Specialized software

Step 4: Plan for the administration of assessment accommodations.

• Coordinating the Logistics – map out the actual accommodations.

• Ensuring Standardization. Ethical testing practices.

• No coaching students during testing.• Editing students work – giving clues in any way.

Step 5: Evaluate and improve accommodations use.

• What are the results of classroom assignment and test when accommodations are not used.

• What are the difficulties encountered in the use of accommodations for a student?

• What seems to be effective combinations of accommodations?

How Should We Differentiate?

• By readiness• By interest• By learning profile: take time to read the confidentials

and if needed consult with CA-60 IEPT reportgenderage / mental agelearning style: http://tinyurl.com/labexamintelligence: the multiple intelligences

Low Tech Ways to Differentiate

• Teach in multiple modes• Put key materials on tape• Offer choice regularly• Connect details to the big

picture of meaning• Connect ideas to student

interest• Connect schoolwork with life

beyond the classroom

• Use key reading strategies with the whole class (close reading, think-alouds)

• Provide options for journal entries

• Use highlighted text • Offer times for extra teaching• Watch more, listen better

Scaffolding is:

• Providing support to student learning and then re-teaching that support so that the student becomes self-reliant.

• Examples:• Study guides• Graphic organizers• Anticipation guides• Adapted reading level

material• Double entry journals• Structured directions• Cloze paragraphs

Key Characteristics of Effective Scaffolding

• Clear instructions: simple language, restate in another way

• Clarifies purpose• Keeps students on task• Clear expectations• Points students to high quality sources of help and

information• Reduces uncertainty, surprise and disappointment• Delivers efficiency

Anticipation Guides

• Build interest for the task• Help develop reading comprehension• Help establish prior knowledge• Build students’ prediction skills• Encourage students to reflect on what they have

learned

Vocabulary Building Activities

• Talk a Mile a Minute• Word Walls/personal glossaries• I have…Who Has?• Audio versions of vocabulary lists• Frayer Model: http://tinyurl.com/frayermodel• http://tinyurl.com/frayermodel2

Writing Scaffolds

• Answer plans• Cloze paragraphs/framed writing• Graphic organizers• Quick writes• Double entry journals

Five Steps to Implementing Accommodations

• Expect students to meet grade level academic content standards.

• Learn about accommodation for instruction and assessments.

• Choose accommodations with students• Administer assessment accommodations • Evaluate and improve accommodations use

The Bottom Line

• Special Education and General Education teachers need to work together to accomplish differential instruction that will lead to student success.

• Accommodations and Modifications are not the sole responsibility of the Special Education teacher.

• General Education teachers are accountable for every students educational development plan, it is crucial that they develop and structure lesson plans to meet the needs of multiple-level learning.

How Do We Make This Happen?

• The district needs to provide release time for secondary collaboration between the middle school and high school teachers for curricular development and preparation. This support should also be provided at the elementary and middle school level.

• Any Suggestions?

Resources:

• http://www.cast.org/publications/ncac/ncac_diffinstruc.html

• http://www.cast.org/publications/ncac/ncac_explicit.html

• http://www.cast.org/publications/ncac/ncac_diffinstructudl.html

• http://www.cehd.umn.edu/NCEO/OnlinePubs/AccommodationsMonitoring.pdf