Dr. Holdren: I think it's important to acknowledge that students are going to have needs in both areas and that should be a great starting place. They should be one or the other, and preferably both. My favorite sorts of goals are when there are common core standards that tie to things like using good judgment, like critical thinking skills. There are a lot of grade-level standards that are about being able to identify bias in a source and that's really important right now at a time when people are using social media and kids are trying to figure out what's real and what's not real. I think that is such a functional skill but also an academic goal that can easily be modified for students across all sorts of varying levels of need. That would be an example of a kind of high-leverage sort of goal that can be really useful.
Dr. Fedders: There are also goals that would be much more about the knowledge or the skills in a standard that can align with the student’s present levels and their functional learning, where there's a second grade reading goal and you adapt that for a student's functional reading.
Dr. Fedders: Are we planning with post school outcomes in mind? And the only way we can plan with that is working with the individual and the family.
Dr. Holdren: If you're teaching an IEP goal that doesn't align with the family's values or doesn't match with their hopes, research says that those goals aren't going to maintain, and so what would be the point of that?
I have plenty of interests that aren't age-appropriate, you know, I love those sushi erasers that break up into little pieces and my mom collects Barbie dolls from the 50s. So we just want to make sure that our goals aren't stigmatizing or alienating our students. Obviously, student choice should be huge in the IEP process, but sorting blocks when you're in high school is just completely inappropriate unless there's some very concrete reason for that to be a goal.
Dr. Holdren: As a mother, I would tell you that I want my child to be successful in school, but mostly I just want her to enjoy it. I think one of the beautiful things about working with students with extensive support needs is it is expected that we're going to care about things like communication, but communication needs to be considered in the context of the reasons why the rest of us communicate, which is to be members of communities and to engage with those communities. Students are learning all sorts of things. They're not only learning what is in the IEP and written down as goals. I think ensuring that these aspects get captured and elevated because they're in the IEP is really important for programming and friendship and membership in their community, whether their community is their elementary school or whether it's a community-based program and they're working in the community. Those are really the important things that most of us care about. It's like being engaged in our communities.
If there's an IEP goal that says that the student is going to be engaging with other students during recess, that's the only way that you are for sure going to know that people are going to be thoughtful about that time. I think of IEP goals as ways of elevating what’s important in that child's programming. Does it cheapen the friendship if you have a data sheet? I don't think the kids care!
Dr. Fedders: Overall we want parents to know about the proposed goals before the IEP meeting and have an opportunity to share goals that they might have for the student that the teacher could incorporate into their next round of annual IEP goals. But the other thing I would say to parents is to remember as part of your procedural safeguards that the IEP goals can’t be predetermined. In the old days we were supposed to write on the goal sheets in the meeting. As part of their procedural safeguards, and due-process and all these things, parents need to remember that these IEP goals shouldn't be predetermined. So if you didn't have an opportunity to meet with your teacher, then you still have those rights in the meeting. Of course, there's a power dynamic and all these things built into the IEP meeting and the IEP in general that can be a challenge for lots of different families, but know your rights and hold on to that right around predetermination and know that in the meeting, it is okay to change the goals and it shouldn't be any other way.
To read more about IEP goals (and how to write them), read our article A Parent's Guide to IEP Goals!
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