High Leverage Practices for Special Education: Collaborative Methods at Home

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In part one, we discussed the four different categories of high leverage practices (HLP) and how educators utilize these practices to drive instruction and learning. Whether in a physical classroom or not, the goal of HLPs is to ensure that young learners are engaged, supported, and challenged. Now that we’re all in the throes of virtual learning, where much of our schooling is happening at home, it’s helpful for families to be able to adopt and modify various high leverage practices for their own use.

 

Collaboration is key, especially since much of the learning is currently happening outside of the classroom. Students are no longer experiencing a fully monitored, structured school day, which makes collaboration and open communication all that much more important.

 

  • Goal statement: Since the aim of collaborative HLPs is to ensure that all members of the child’s support system are on the same page, working towards the same goals, parents should use a goal statement as a starting point when reaching out to teachers. Whether in person, on the phone, or via email, parents should make a point to advocate for their child’s learning goals and reiterate them as needed to provide teachers with reminders about where they’d like their child’s learning to be headed.
  • Check-in: Yes, students receiving special education services already have formal documentation concerning learning goals, but it never hurts to remind the team of those goals along the way. Teachers can easily become overwhelmed throughout the quarter with IEPs, 504s, and numerous other learning plans for individual students. And while teachers are legally obligated to offer modifications and accommodations, the learning goals may receive less attention. This is why parents should make a point to check in regularly with their child’s teachers to ensure that everyone is aware of and working towards the child’s learning goals.
  • Reevaluation: These check-ins also allow for data updates, recent observations, and discussions about reevaluating or resetting goals if necessary. Be sure to ask for quantifiable updates, such as Lexile level, Map scores, attendance and participation, writing samples, etc.
  • Point person: To simplify the task of reaching out, especially with middle or high school students who have multiple teachers, parents can plan to send a weekly or biweekly email to their child’s counselor or special education case manager. This person will act as the point of contact and will be sure to disseminate all vital information to the teachers, while keeping you in the loop about all of the replies.
  • Student accountability: Bring your child into the collaborative effort by asking him to help track his own progress towards the goals set at the beginning of the year or quarter. It’s much more probable for a student to strive for success when he’s been part of the goal setting process. Involving your child in these discussions ensures that he’s taking ownership and feels invested in the effort he’s putting forth.
  • Positive reinforcementConsider small benchmarks or checkpoints along the way and make a point to acknowledge when goals are achieved. No matter your child’s age, kids benefit from positive reinforcement and thrive on recognition for a job well done.
  • Open communication: Another high leverage form of helpful collaboration is to connect your child’s teachers with any other “key player” on your child’s educational team. Teachers must have parental permission to correspond with pediatricians, therapists, psychologists, tutors, and even older siblings regarding a student. Therefore, if you want certain professionals to cooperate, you must first provide permission and then facilitate that correspondence. Remember, it takes a village, but you have to put all of the villagers in contact with one another, first.
  • Support groups: Another collaborative HLP that parents can modify for use at home is to facilitate a small virtual study group or neighborhood support group for certain ages, subjects, or classes. Reach out to neighbors about how their child is fairing with virtual learning. Ask if they are using any specific programs, tools, or methods that they find particularly helpful. During these times, many parents are finding that distance or virtual learning is all about trial and error. So why not collaborate with other parents in your neighborhood to help carry the load?

College Preparations for Juniors and Seniors during COVID

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Though virtual learning is in full swing, and all questions regarding next steps in the world of education are currently up in the air, one thing holds true—time stops for no one. For current high schoolers, especially the juniors and seniors, it may feel as though college preparations and post-secondary plans are hanging in limbo, so to speak. Compounding the issue is that many school-run programs, those designed specifically to help students mull through their options and arrange post-graduation plans, have been put on hold, perhaps indefinitely. Yet now more than ever students need to be proactive about planning for the future, regardless of what that future may be.

 

Questions to consider 

This pseudo-school year has likely caused some students to feel more inclined to simply coast on through—and it makes perfect sense. The “Senioritus” season will undoubtedly hit earlier due to virtual classes, lenient grading expectations, flexible time frames for assignments, etc. We can’t necessarily blame students for feeling a little bit more lax about their schoolwork right now. We can, however, make sure that they are using this “downtime” to their advantage by asking important questions and offering suggestions if their answers come up short.

 

What have you done to prepare for college?

If nothing rings a bell, these suggestions could help. Beyond the typical college visits and entrance exams, consider these recommendations:

  • Develop a personal note-taking system and practice it regularly during your Zoom classes. Students may think, “What is the point? All lessons are recorded and posted, so why waste time with notes?” Well, the likelihood of having recorded lectures to view at leisure from their dorm rooms is not guaranteed. Therefore, note taking, as has always been the case, will be a crucial skill for college and career readiness. Their personal note taking process, whatever it may look like, is something that they can develop and hone right now while virtual learning is occurring. It’s about being able to actively listen, decipher and record new information, make connections to prior knowledge, and synthesize material all at the same time—critical skills for life-long learning.
  • Do some real soul searching about what students may want to study after high school. Beyond desired salaries, childhood dreams, and suggestions from others, what types of things do they enjoy reading about, learning about, exploring? Use those ideas as starting points for looking into potential college majors and plans of study.
  • Similarly, be sure to have an array of thoughts about what they may want to study—it is important to keep options open, fluid, and flexible to ensure that students are not pigeonholing themselves, only to realize that they’ve wasted a semester on courses that don’t lead them in their desired direction.
  • Broaden the repertoire of leadership skills—this not only makes students’ applications more appealing to admissions boards, but it also gives them a leg up in learning cohorts and in the workplace. Contrary to what many students think, getting into their desired school is not the hard part—they must also be prepared to “earn their stay.” Leadership experience undoubtedly boosts an application and resume, but more importantly, these skills are functional—they facilitate the ability to take charge, vocalize opinions, ask questions, and investigate opportunities, all of which contribute to college success.
  • Need more leadership experience? Think outside the box and don’t let virtual learning be an excuse. There are numerous opportunities for students to get involved within their own homes.
    • Reach out to their religious organization about creating and leading a youth group.
    • Look into volunteer options to provide online homework help, reading assistance to elementary students, tutoring programs, etc.
    • Join their school’s or community’s newspaper or magazine publication; ask about editorial opportunities or freelance fact-checking for the school’s newspaper club.
    • If working a part-time job, talk to the manager or boss about boosting hours or opportunities for advancement, specifically any roles that involve leadership/managerial skills.
    • If involved in a volunteer program, seek out opportunities to assist with planning their events, helping to coordinate a benefit or fundraiser, chair or co-chair a meeting, etc.
  • Students need to be able to speak about how they have been using their downtime during the pandemic. Are there new skills or hobbies that they have picked up during quarantine? Have they set any specific goals to work toward while they’ve been limited to staying home? Consider things like studying a new language/culture, tracing the family’s ancestry, taking any online courses or classes, following or helping out on a local political campaign, creating and selling goods online, starting a blog or Instagram about one of their interests, learning sign language, etc. The real purpose of this is to be able show not only what interests them, but also how they choose to manage their time as a life-long learner.

High Leverage Practices for Special Education

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High leverage practices, or HLPs, are recognized as critical practices that can be implemented deliberately by educators to support student learning in an effort to meet specific learning goals. In order for an instructional practice to be considered a high leverage practice, it must meet certain criteria:

  • The strategy must focus on an instructional technique.
  • It must be a technique that is used routinely in the classroom.
  • It must be a method that is proven to increase student engagement and academic success.
  • The practice must be able to be utilized cross-curricularly; it should exemplify a functional approach to teaching and learning, regardless of the content or content area.

 

This is all technical teacher-speak for a research-based instructional strategy that can be used frequently by teachers in any classroom to achieve specific learning goals. Now, what does this look like in practice for students with special needs? HLPs are typically categorized into four types: collaboration, assessment, social/emotional/behavioral, and instruction.

 

Collaboration, as it sounds, involves a cooperative effort among a child’s entire educational team, from parents and teachers, to occupational therapists, pediatricians, to cognitive behavioral specialists. Sometimes referred to as “wraparound services,” the goal of collaborative HLPs is to ensure that all members of the child’s support system are on the same page, working towards the same goals. One HLP is to plan, organize, and facilitate routine meetings between support systems. During these meetings, the child’s learning goals are established, evaluated, and revisited as needed. Another aspect of collaborative HLPs involves networking, so to speak. Too often, families can feel lost or overwhelmed by a child’s unique learning needs. Therefore, it is critical that support services, resources, and guidance be provided in a collaborative effort to ensure that each child’s academic needs are met.

 

HLPs that fall under the assessment category are used to identify and capitalize on a student’s unique strengths. For instance, one practice involves using several various sources of information and data to evaluate a student’s full realm of capabilities and needs—educators cannot simply rely on standardized tests and rote assessments in order to determine a child’s abilities. When it comes to assessments, another HLP involves the use of assessment data as a means for modifying content, reestablishing learning goals, and reteaching. Teachers are not just scoring tests and moving on—we use this data as a checkpoint on the road to student growth.

 

Social/emotional/behavioral HLPs begin with the idea that consistency and mutual respect are essential to providing a positive and enriching learning environment. Providing children and teens with constructive, positive feedback and opportunities to grow in their social abilities are additional high leverage practices frequently utilized by educators. Finally, behavior support plans and interventions also qualify as high leverage practices. These plans are designed and created in an effort to curb negative behaviors by providing students with positive reinforcement, coping strategies, and alternative methods for working through emotions.

 

Instructional HLPs encompass a vast array of strategies and techniques that many teachers simply deem “best practices.” One involves short and long-term goal-setting, an HLP that helps to prioritize a student’s learning needs by aligning ability level to grade level-specific benchmarks. Adapting and/or modifying learning materials within the curriculum is another beneficial practice—this is usually accomplished with the help of the special education team and with a student’s IEP or 504 accommodations in mind. Repeated, explicit instructions in multiple forms, including written and verbal, are also instructional HLPs that help to ensure students know what they are expected to do—and how to do it.

In part two, we will share specific instructional techniques that fall under the category of HLPs. In addition to using these in the classroom, we will provide tips and tricks for how to utilize these educational methods at home for virtual learning.

Zoom Differentiation and Accommodations

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Virtual learning certainly has its challenges, especially when it comes to differentiating in the virtual classroom. For students with special education accommodations, teachers will need to get creative in order to account for every student’s unique needs and optimize learning opportunities. Thankfully, there are strategies and methods for providing special education accommodations in Zoom—we just need to think outside the box and modify what each accommodation looks like in the virtual realm.

Zoom Chat: Since we are no longer physically in the classroom, proximity, prompting, and cueing accommodations pose a bit of a challenge for instructors. Yet, nothing has changed in terms of the student’s needs. In fact, students who struggle to focus and/or stay on task may need the prompting and proximity accommodations even more now that they are sitting in front of a screen. Online learning does not allow for physical proximity; however, teachers can utilize the chat function to maximize student engagement and provide an alternative form of proximity, prompting, and cueing.

  • Reaching out: The Zoom chat can be used to individually reach out to specific students with prompting accommodations to spur participation and to rephrase a question when necessary.
  • Clarifying: The chat also allows teachers to check for understanding by providing a platform for asking clarifying questions, follow-up questions, etc.
  • Advocating: Teachers should remind students of their chatting capabilities so that students with accommodations can advocate for themselves and speak up when they need assistance.
  • Tracking: The chat also acts as a data tracker; teachers can modify their settings in Zoom so that chats are saved. This allows for teachers to review correspondence with students and share questions and check-ins with parents. Teachers can also use saved chats to track the number of times a student initiates a task, asks clarifying questions, responds to polls or exit responses, etc.
  • Reminding: Teachers can use the Zoom chat as a method for reminding students of their extended time or reduced workload accommodations as well. This allows teachers to discreetly remind a certain student that his due date is extended without drawing attention to the student’s accommodations in front of the whole class. **Just be certain that, when chatting with specific students about these accommodations, you have selected the student’s name from the dropdown so that the chat remains a private, 1:1 conversation.

Breakout Rooms: The grouping function in Zoom can also be beneficial when ensuring certain special education accommodations are offered. Teachers have the option to manually assign groups, which means that students with special education services can be grouped with a para educator or with other students who have the same accommodations.

  • Variance: Teachers should try to avoid always grouping special education students together, however, as to avoid drawing attention to certain small groups or stigmatizing students who need additional support.
  • Oversight: Teachers can randomly assign groups using the “automatic” option when creating breakout rooms. Then, while students work, the “host” can pop in and out of groups to act as a “check-in” for students with that accommodation.
  • Mobility: Teachers can also move the para educator from group to group during breakout room sessions so that every student receives supports throughout the collaborative activity.
  • Discretion: Breakout rooms also offer opportunities for differentiation. Teachers can modify assignments and link adapted materials in the chat to send to specific breakout rooms. From the chat link, students can click on the shared Google doc to access the modified material. This function can provide students with resources such as word banks, sentence starters, outlines, graphic organizers, glossaries, etc. The key is that each student who receives these accommodations will have access in a discreet manner and can choose to use the materials as needed.