Keywords

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Overview: This chapter provides more details that assist with the activities that are described in Chaps. 7 and 8. The consultant facilitates the consultation by guiding the participants in using all the available information about the student to select objectives in communication, social, and work skills. Objectives must be well written using suggestions provided in this chapter.

In this chapter we describe the following:

  1. 1.

    Best practices in educating students with autism using the National Research Council (NRC) recommendations and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act mandates

  2. 2.

    How to write good IEP objectives

  3. 3.

    How to apply the concepts of maintenance and generalization of skills and include activities that address these concepts in a teaching plan

  4. 4.

    How to use an IEP checklist

  5. 5.

    Various ways to use the IEP checklist

According to the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), autism is defined as a developmental disability that significantly affects verbal and nonverbal communication and social interaction, is generally evident before age 3, and adversely affects a student’s educational performance. Other characteristics associated with autism are engagement in repetitive activities and stereotyped movements, resistance to environmental change or change in daily routines, and unusual responses to sensory experiences (American Psychiatric Association, 2004).

Although students with autism share the label, they vary from one another according to intellectual ability (Chakrabarti & Fombonne, 2005; Jonsdottir et al., 2007), communication and social interaction skills (Castelloe & Dawson, 1993; O’Brien, 1996; Prizant & Wetherby, 2005; Wing & Gould, 1979), and other developmental domains (Beglinger & Smith, 2001) such as fine and gross motor skills, academic skills, and sensory processing abilities. Further, the characteristics of autism tend to change with age (Lord & Risi, 1998). Children, who were nonverbal at age 4, for example, may be verbal at age 10, but still not be able to engage in reciprocal conversation. Children who could not imitate the action of others at age 3 may be able to play with objects appropriately at age 7, but not cooperatively with other children. Although the core impairments of autism—social and communication skills—are shared across all children with the diagnosis, due to the unique blend of strengths and weaknesses of students with autism, teachers must tailor educational interventions to individual students rather than rely on the label to guide individual program development (Ruble & Dalrymple, 2002; Ruble, McGrew, Dalrymple & Jung 2010b).

To facilitate individualization of educational programs, schools are required to follow the mandates of IDEA that each student with a disability receives an Individual Education Plan (IEP) (USDOE, 2004). The IEP is the keystone of a successful program and has several goals. First, it puts in writing a commitment of resources to the student. Second, it serves as a management tool to ensure the identification of specialized interventions and need for ancillary services such as speech and language therapy and occupational therapy. Third, the IEP is a compliance and monitoring tool and acts as an evaluation device that facilitates measurement of student progress (Armenta & Beckers, 2006). Fourth, the IEP process mandates regular and systematic reviews of progress in order to promote general education curriculum participation (Burns, 2001). Fifth, IEPs can also be used to evaluate educational progress by providing a description of short-term objectives that lead to the attainment of larger and more comprehensive goal attainment (Rodger, 1995). Finally, IEPs provide a direct connection between teaching objectives and classroom ­activities that are evident and observable (Smith, Slattery, & Knopp, 1993). If IEP objectives are written specifically enough for observational coding, then data can be utilized to evaluate the success of intervention methods within the school setting. If it is determined that the student is not making progress toward the short-term objective (usually lasting one grading period), then the intervention can be changed without losing an entire year on a plan that is not working (Smith et al., 1993).

Best Practices

NRC Recommendations

According to the NRC, at a minimum, educational programs of students with autism should target social skills, communication, developmentally appropriate tasks/play activities that include a motivation system, fine and gross motor skills for age-appropriate activities, cognitive and academic skills, replacement skills for problematic behaviors, and organization skills that underlie success in a general education classroom. In essence, the NRC (2001) recommends comprehensive IEPs that target a range of social/communicative, adaptive, functional, academic, and cognitive abilities. These areas for IEP planning are summarized in the forms section in Chap. 7 (Overview of Best Practices for Individualized Education Plans (IEP) for Young Students with ASD).

Federal Law

Examples of required elements in the IEP as mandated by IDEA (2004) include a description of (a) the student’s present levels of academic achievement and functional performance, (b) measurable goals that include benchmarks or short-term objectives for students who take alternate assessments based on alternate achievement standards, (c) measurement of student progress, (d) related services, and (e) program modifications and supports for school personnel.

Writing Good IEP Objectives

One of the biggest challenges for teachers of students with ASD (and for other students too) is writing social and communication skills objectives that are measurable and clear to the outside observer. See Table 5.1 for examples. IDEA (2004) stipulates that the IEP must include benchmarks or short-term objectives in the IEP for students who are on the alternate assessment route based on alternate assessment standards. We would expect that all students with ASD (there may be some notable exceptions) have IEP goals that are broken down into benchmarks or short-term objectives. Essential features of well-developed objectives include the following:

Table 5.1 Examples of IEP objectives
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  • Has a description of intermediate steps that indicate how progress toward meeting the annual goal will be measured.

  • Is able to be attained within a year (target dates can be less than a year, such as by quarter or semester).

  • Has identified the specific behaviors to be performed, criteria for attainment, evaluation/measurement procedures, and timelines for progress measurement (more detail on these features is below).

  • Is sequenced developmentally (e.g., play with five toys in a functional manner; play with five toys using pretend play), incrementally (complete an independent work task within 5 min; complete two independent work tasks within 20 min), or by level of proficiency (e.g., from 25 to 50%; five out of eight opportunities).

Table 5.2 provides more details on the components of a well-developed IEP objective (Fig. 5.1).

Table 5.2 Components of a well-developed IEP objective
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Fig. 5.1
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Template for writing a well-developed IEP objective

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Maintenance and Generalization

Maintenance and generalization refer to what happens when the teaching plan is stopped or when the student is in a different classroom, home or the community, working with different teachers, using different materials, or interacting with different peers. Without plans in place, the student may lose the skills that he once learned. Helping the student maintain the skills once the specific teaching plan is no longer in place is a necessity. Further, developing specific teaching plans that include teaching the student to transfer the skills to another situation is necessary. For ­students with ASD, generalization does not happen without intention and specific teaching.

COMPASS consultation is designed with generalization in mind. At the outset, teaching objectives are identified with parent and teacher input so that important skills that have meaning for home and school are targeted. Also included is the development of specific teaching plans that are shared with parents. Still, this is not enough to ensure maintenance and generalization. Other suggestions from Zirpoli and Melloy (1993) are:

  1. 1.

    Teach skills in natural settings

  2. 2.

    Share teaching plans with other adults and caregivers

  3. 3.

    Implement teaching plans in a variety of settings

  4. 4.

    Use natural reinforcers; if a reinforcer such as food is being used, fade to more natural consequences

  5. 5.

    Shift from continuous reinforcement to intermittent reinforcement

  6. 6.

    Gradually shift from immediate reinforcement to delays in reinforcement in the natural environment

  7. 7.

    Reinforce when you see the student display behavior in untrained settings or generalized activities

  8. 8.

    Focus on behaviors that will be reinforced by others

  9. 9.

    Ensure that the skill is within the student’s skill set before working on generalization

  10. 10.

    Utilize environmental supports that will facilitate the occurrence of skills

IEP Evaluation Checklist

To assist with the development of a high quality IEP, we have provided an IEP Evaluation Checklist. This checklist was used in a study to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of IEPs and to provide recommendations for improving IEPs (Ruble et al., 2010b). Our research showed that students with IEPs that contained objectives that were more sensitive to the needs of students with autism (i.e., IEPs that had social, communication, and work/learning skill objectives) and were more measurable made more progress on their selected objectives at the end of the school year.

Ways to Use the Checklist

There are many ways the IEP checklist can be used. The first purpose is for ­conducting a review of the quality of current IEPs. The IEP checklist can be used to identify weaknesses in the IEP, such as a lack of measurable objectives or a lack of social skills, communication, or learning skills objectives. The identification of weaknesses can be used as a way to establish goals for COMPASS consultation, in-service training, and other professional development efforts to improve IEPs.

A second purpose of the IEP checklist is to monitor the effects of COMPASS consultation. Recall in Chap. 4 the COMPASS Mediation Model tested. We have provided it again here (Fig. 5.2).

Fig. 5.2
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COMPASS mediation model tested

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In the discussion of this model, we reported the results of two elements that act as active ingredients of COMPASS consultation. One of the elements was IEP quality. We expect COMPASS to result in better IEPs because the consultation ensures that (a) objectives sensitive to the needs of students with autism and described by the NRC (2001) are included in the IEP and (b) the objectives targeted as a result of COMPASS consultation are measurable and added to the IEP. The questions in the IEP checklist that have an asterisk beside them are the areas we expect to change as a result of COMPASS consultation. The other questions are also important but are not expected to change as a result of COMPASS consultation. Thus, the tool can be used to measure IEP quality before and after COMPASS to ensure that those who receive COMPASS are making changes to the IEP.