Exceptional Special Ed

In this episode, I’m joined by early childhood special educator and my dear friend, Jenn Lauriat, to hear more about “turning three” and transitioning to special education preschool services.  Jenn is a wealth of knowledge about preschool, as she’s worked in special education at this level for many years, across a variety of settings, and even in different states!  She spent quite a few years as an administrator for a special education preschool, so she really knows the ins and outs of transitioning from early intervention to public school special education.  In this episode, you’ll hear about:

• Referral from early intervention to public school special education
• Referral meetings
• Child outcome summaries (or COS)
• Evaluation for special education
• Eligibility meetings
• Social/emotional supports for both children and families/caregivers

Links:  

• Child Outcome Summary (COS) Overview
• COS ratings explanations
• Massachusetts-specific COS information
• Massachusetts information on transition from Early Intervention to public school

This is the third episode in our mini-series “How’d You Get Here”?!  I talk with my dear friend and colleague Jennifer Lauriat to hear more about her journey as an early childhood educator and administrator.  Jenn and I met when we were both fresh out of college and working at a private special education school for children with autism.  Jenn’s next job was at another private special education school where she helped develop a program for children with more significant special needs and put into practice many of the ABA skills that she learned in her previous placement.  From there, she moved through a variety of public school settings, working to provide special education services within the least restrictive “home school” environments.  Next, Jenn made the jump to administration where she worked as the preschool coordinator for a public school district in Rhode Island.  After working in that role for four years, she came back to her passion… teaching… and now works as an itinerant special education preschool teacher for a large district in Rhode Island.  

Jenn’s journey shows that your career may have twists and turns.  You may try new things, stay for a while, and then move on.  You may learn something at one job that helps you land a new job that you didn’t even anticipate.  Or your personal life (such as a interstate move!) may force you to look for something new.  Throughout it all, Jenn always found the right job for the right time in her life.  If you’re not sure about your current classroom or school, I hope Jenn’s story gives you hope that you can keep going, try new things, and find the right place for yourself as a special educator.  

In this week’s episode, we’re talking more about early intervention as I interview Allison Osipow, an early intervention occupational therapist. We talk about the evaluation and eligibility, the Individualized Family Service Plan or IFSP, and what service can look like.  We also touch on transition to public school and “turning three”.  Allison has a wealth of knowledge about both EI and OT so I’m sure you’ll enjoy the interview.  

Links from the show:  

• IFSP template for Massachusetts
• Early Intervention Transition Plan for Massachusetts
• Key Principles of Early Intervention 
• FAQs about transition from Early Intervention to Special Education in the public schools
• Tips for families transitioning from EI, from parents/families who have received Early Intervention

Today we’re here in our second episode in our mini-series “How’d You Get Here”?!  We talk with our own Erin O’Brien to hear more about her journey as a severe special educator at the middle school level.  Erin knew from an early age,  while she played in her mother's preschool classroom, that she was going to be an educator.  Her college degree covered the wide range of both special education and gifted education.  After graduation, she moved up to New England to attend graduate school at Boston College and studied deaf-blind education.  While at BC, she had a variety of professional experiences, including research and practicum work.  Erin then moved on to work at in inclusion preschool before jumping up to the middle school level where she worked for thirteen years.  In that position, she was able to develop and grow a school-based special education program. She also got involved in training new teachers through the teacher induction program and the mentoring program in her district.  Erin has a wide variety of professional experiences that are sure to inspire any special education teacher. 

This week we talk about Early Intervention (EI), as it is a program that nearly all of our students accessed, yet we did not learn about it in our teacher training programs. In this episode, we looked through our lens of veteran teachers to identify and explain the beneficial basics of EI for all educators. We give a little background about how EI started, then talk about what IDEA mandates and how children and families qualify for services. We discuss some differing state qualifications and implementation of the program. We review how an Individual Family Support Plan (IFSP) is different from an IEP and how services can be implemented across settings.  Stay tuned for our next episode when we’ll interview an EI provider to get the inside scoop!

Links:

• Wrightslaw and EI
• Understood’s article on EI
• Outline of minimum components of EI
• Individual state qualifications
• CDC’s Developmental Milestones Checklists
• Differences between an IEP and IFSP
• Digital note-taking template sample

Today we’re doing something new… our first mini-episode!  We’re calling this series “How’d you get here”?!  This series will profile different careers in special education.  We’ll talk with people in those careers about the paths that got them there.  Today we’re talking with our own Rachel Kuberry to hear more about her career as an Assistive Technology Specialist and how she got there.

This week we chatted with Amanda Lewitus, a Speech Language Pathologist with AT and AAC experience who has worked across a variety of settings. We define Augmentative and Alternative Communication, the role of the SLP and AAC Specialist, and how to start the decision-making process for an AAC device. We discuss the assessment process and expectations, trials, and tips for implementation. We also talked about many ways to build a culture of total communication and successful AAC implementation within a school or classroom. 

Links:

• MTSS versus RTI
• Gail Van Tatenhove’s website
• Sample AAC Trial Implementation Plan
• Books - Lucas the Lion and Just Ask Me

In this episode, we talk all about Assistive Technology. We discuss AT and the law, including the definitions of assistive technology, AT services, and AT consideration. We talk about how it’s integrated into the IEP including how it supports existing goal areas and the varied providers who support AT service. We introduce the SETT framework, developed by Joy Zabala, and how it is used as a student centered planning tool. We discuss starting with the student as the center of the framework, then collecting information about the environment, then the task and finally brainstorming about tools to meet AT needs.  

And handouts or worksheets that were mentioned in the podcast include:

• AT Consideration Checklist from the Georgia Project for Assistive Technology
• WATI Consideration resources
• SETT Framework worksheet
• Hey, Can I Try That workbook for engaging students in the SETT process
• Joy Zabala's article on the SETT Framework

In this episode, we talk to Board Certified Behavior Analyist (BCBA) Lydie DeFuria. We chat about what BCBA is and the tools that could be used for assessments. We discuss task analysis as a way to collect data about student progress for all or part of a task both academic and functional.  We also talk about the role of tracking accuracy, independence and both measures together to show growth. Finally, we reflect on the movement towards the most independence for a skill including thinking about how to best use environmental cues and sequences as prompts. 

This week’s episode we’re going to start a conversation about family engagement that we’ll likely continue across many episodes.  The example we’ll use to guide this particular episode will be a time relevant event for many of us - Back to School Night or Curriculum Night.  We’ll talk quite a bit about the work of Dr. Karen Mapp and a talk she gave on engaging families by linking those engagements (such as Back to School Night) directly to learning.  You can watch her video here:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KDPY1t8E6Cg. We also talk about the family guides that our state (Massachusetts) has made to help families understand what students are expected to know and be able to do by the end of each grade.  You can see them here:  https://www.doe.mass.edu/highstandards/.