assignment A

ESE645: LESSON DESIGN FOR STUDENTS WITH MILD TO MODERATE DISABILITIES

Instructor Guidance

Week 1

A warm welcome to ESE645: Lesson Design for Students with Mild to Moderate Disabilities!  Please be sure to review the Week One homepage for this course to see:

1. The specific learning outcomes for the week

2. The schedule overview

3. The required and recommended resources

4. The introduction to the week

5. A listing of the assessments

Next, be sure to read this entire Instructor Guidance page.

Overview

This guidance begins with a few words about the importance of reading the weekly Instructor Guidance pages. Next, this overview provides a section about the course learning outcomes and their relationship to the weekly outcomes and program outcomes. It concludes with helpful information about career goals using the Master of Arts, Special Education (MASE) degree and monitoring student progress.  Finally, this section provides an overview of the assessments (discussions and assignments) for this week, which can a beneficial part of your study plan for the week. Each week before beginning your assignments and initial discussion board post, it is necessary that you review the Instructor Guidance. The Instructor Guidance is an integral part of the course because it is intended to supplement the required and recommended readings, videos and multimedia webpages for each week of material and also provides important and required resources for your success in this course and beyond. Supplemental resources are also included in the Instructor Guidance. You are encouraged to consider using these resources to support your completion of the weekly assessments beyond using the required and recommended resources provided on the weekly unit homepages and in the consolidated list of resources on the Course Materials page.  Not only does the Instructor Guidance offer you insights and assistance with the weekly topics and activities, it models effective academic writing, which is expected of you in all of your coursework in this graduate-level course. Additionally, the Instructor Guidance can be considered a scholarly resource for your own work in this course. The Scope and Outcomes of ESE645 The MASE program has been designed to develop your capacity as a leader in the field.  In this course and the program as a whole, you will focus on the process of instructional planning, including the design of lesson plans that are in alignment with a student’s present levels of performance and their individualized education program (IEP) document for the purpose of creating differentiated instruction. The summative, or final project, in this class is a lesson plan portfolio, which can be a wonderful tool in your current work or a resource from which to build. As you may recall, the MASE program is founded on the following assumptions a) all children can learn; b) children have diverse learning styles; c) and the teacher’s belief in each child’s abilities supports the child’s success. As with all of your courses, it is imperative that you embrace the premise that, regardless of ability level, cultural background, or learning differences, in physically and emotionally safe environments, all children can learn. In this course the practical applications are found within the scenarios and introduction in each week. This information is equivalent to what is presented in a face-to-face learning environment where the Instructor presents new information.  The Instructor Guidance should be used to support your discussion posts, responses, and other required assignments. The course learning outcomes guided the design of this course and all align to one or more of the weekly outcomes, which are more specific about what you will do each week and are listed on the weekly unit homepages. The course and weekly outcomes are aligned to the Master of Arts in Special Education Program Learning Outcomes. If you have questions about the scope and outcomes of ESE645, please contact the instructor in the Ask Your Instructor discussion. Next, please continue reading to learn about several of the key concepts in this week’s work.

Intellectual Elaboration

The focus for the week is the foundation for designing meaningful and relevant lesson plans.  You will be introduced to the concept of assessment as it relates to monitoring student progress and in the incorporation of specific accommodations or modifications.  Understanding the differences between accommodations and modification is important to your overall application when developing lesson plans.  Also, the topic of Common Core State Standards will be explored.  This is an action packed week, so let’s begin! Twenty-first century special education and general education classrooms include diverse student needs and thus the challenges of working in the special education profession are significant.  Many students not only demonstrate learning differences but may also be bilingual and represent different cultural backgrounds.  As you have learned in ESE634 Education-Based Collaborative Relationships and other previously completed courses, instruction for students with disabilities can take place in a variety of settings necessitating the educators to be knowledgeable and prepared to support all students. Monitoring Student Progress and Present Levels of Performance One important aspect of supporting students in the educational setting is to engage in frequent informal assessment of student performance.  As previously discussed in this program, the individualized education program (IEP) team is charged with the responsibilities of determining the student’s present level of performance in a variety of academic and non-academic areas that have been identified as areas of need.  These areas provide the justification for the development of individualized goals that become part of the written document, which is required for every student who qualifies for services under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (Polloway & Polloway, 2013). The IEP is the “primary document that outlines specific plan for services, placement, transitional planning” and provides many other assurances for the individualized program designed for an eligible student (Polloway & Polloway, 2013, p. 33). Technically, this document is a type of written contract, renewable at least once per year, to ensure that the student is receiving the most appropriate support in order to make sufficient progress. It is a blueprint for the educational support that is designed for the student.   Special educators, who may also be called, “Case Managers”, or “Case Carriers” have a special responsibility to frequently monitor student performance in an informal manner so as to support the determination of the present levels of performance and subsequent development of goals.  The required textbook for our course provides a discussion of this process in Chapter 5:  “Linking Assessment and Instruction.”  This section mentions formative assessment, which is a type of informal monitoring of student performance to measure ongoing progress or in some cases, a lack of progress.  It is focused on content and performance. Observations and checklists are effective methods of informal evaluation. Informal evaluation procedures actively involve the student in learning tasks and other activities as part of the assessment process.  The chart presented in the online article, “Informal Methods of Assessment (Links to an external site.)” is a helpful tool in providing many options for additional informal regarding assessment methods and offers specific guidelines for implementation.  Be sure to take a look at this resource.  You may also elect to add this to your link-library.

Figure 1.  Performance gap derived from assessment data. This visual demonstrates the range of present levels of performance, desired level of performance, and how to establish a reasonable goal.  Source: http://performancexpress.org/0802/ (Links to an external site.)

The results from these activities will provide information that will support the present levels of performance (PLOP) statements that are a required part of the IEP.  The purpose of the PLOP is to identify the child's needs and establish the student’s performance in appropriate activities  ("Present Levels of Academic Achievement and Functional Performance," n.d.)  Further, this same source states the following:

The PLAAFP statement is a brief and understandable narrative accurately describing the child's performance in all areas of education and functional activities that are affected by the child's disability. It is an objective synthesis of all information relevant to the child's development and educational performance, and serves as a bridge between the evaluation process and the measurable annual goals….By summarizing the data, and establishing a baseline, a solid framework is established from which measurable annual goals can be created (para 2).

Identifying specific needs begins the process of developing meaningful and measurable goals.  We will explore the development of goals later in this course.

Accommodations and Modifications   Any student who has an active IEP will have as part of this document the required accommodations or modifications that must be provided.  These concepts are common in education and sound similar but they serve very different functions.  Accommodations may be changes in the classroom environment that do not fundamentally change the curriculum but enhance student learning. Alternatively, modifications may be changes that lead to differences in the curriculum. Neither accommodations nor modifications lower expectations.  Instead, these changes address the student’s learning needs that cannot be met within the regular curriculum or instruction.  The authors from the text used in ESE601, Henley, Ramsey, and Algozzine (2009) state, “effective teachers need to know what each of these terms means so that the accommodations, modifications, and strategies can be successfully utilized with students in whatever educational setting they are being taught” (p. 271).  The following website (Links to an external site.) provides a simple chart demonstrating the differences between accommodations and modifications.  This can certainly be a useful tool now and in the future! Figure 2.  Common Core State Standard Initiative. Source: http://education.vermont.gov/common-core

Common Core State Standards An educational standard provides guidance as to what students should know and be able to demonstrate in each subject and in each grade.  The Common Core State Standards (CCSS) are rigorous expectations that have been adopted in most states and are designed to prepare students for college and the workplace (Common Core State Standards Initiative, 2015).   Lesson design requires the use of standards in which to base the instruction.  Lesson plans focus the educator to identify what will be taught and how.  A typical lesson design is included in this course so that you have a systematic format in which to develop your plans.  It is required that you use this document for this week and all subsequent weeks.

Assessment Guidance

Assignment: Designing Lesson Plans:  Common Core State Standards The Week One assignment is an opportunity to demonstrate your ability in developing accommodations or modifications for lesson plans that are aligned to the Common Core State Standards.  Here, you will use the lesson plan template to revise an existing lesson plan and to incorporate specific accommodations or modifications.  Then, you will provide a justification explaining the reasons why you selected the particular accommodations or modifications.  This is good practice for what you will actually do in a real-world work environment such as a classroom setting!.

Reference

Common Core State Standards Initiative (Links to an external site.). (2015). Retrieved from http://www.corestandards.org/ Henley, M., Ramsey, R. S., & Algozzine, R. (2009). Characteristics of and strategies for teaching students with mild disabilities. Upper Saddle River, N.J: Pearson Morrison, G. S. (2013, July 7). Informal methods of assessment (Links to an external site.) Education.com. Retrieved from http://www.education.com/reference/article/informal-methods-assessment/ Polloway, E. A., & Polloway, E. A. (2013). Strategies for teaching learners with special needs. Boston: Pearson. Present Levels of Academic Achievement and Functional Performance (Links to an external site.). (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www2.ku.edu/~kskits/ta/Packets/CreatingIEPs/KITSecIEP2.html