Distance Learning with an IEP
Distance Learning with an IEP | Outfit Details
Jackie's Dress // Dress // Earrings // Necklace // Necklace // Bracelet // Bracelet // Bracelet // Bracelet // Bracelet // Bracelet // Shoes
Distance Learning with an IEP | Having An IEP
When Jackie was evaluated by the county and determined to fall under the Autism category, this qualified her for an Individualized Education Plan (IEP). In collaboration with her teachers and school administrators, we came up with goals for Jackie to work on for the year. Jackie blew threw that first set of IEP goals in a month. You can read more about that here.
In the middle of February, we met with her teachers to decide on new IEP goals. She was also moved to a different classroom where she would get more peer interaction.
Having an IEP isn't the solution to Jackie being on the Autism Spectrum but it can be helpful for school. Her IEP will be used no matter where we live in the US, as it is a federally mandated thing. With social distancing and distance learning, having a child with special needs and an IEP can be daunting because it's not as simple as having teacher instruction and working on group projects.
Distance Learning with an IEP | Distance Learning
We were reassured from the beginning, when school was first cancelled, that students with special needs and IEPs would still receive some kind of distance learning. I was really anxious about this. One of the things Jackie's teachers had emphasized during our last IEP meeting was that she needed peer interaction, she was seeking it out. As her parents, we can't provide her peer interaction.
We started receiving a packet from our county in the mail at about week 3. In this packet were activities we could do with Jackie along with different levels of how we could do the activities. I wasn't impressed with the first packet and we didn't do much in it. But the following week, we received an individualized lesson plan for Jackie from her teacher, based on her IEP goals, using the packet from the county. Using this plan and the activities, I was able to do more with Jackie and it seemed to go better.
We also had a video call with Jackie's teacher. After not seeing her for 4 weeks, I thought maybe Jackie would be uninterested but she was so excited to see her teacher! We talked about how things were going, our schedule and an individualized learning plan (more on that in a minute). We have the opportunity to sign up for up to two video calls with Jackie's teacher each week.
Distance Learning with an IEP | A Temporary Learning Plan
Because Jackie has an IEP, the county is required to find a way to ensure she receives the help she needs during this time. While it's not an ideal situation, we know it could be a lot worse so it's hard to complain. Since we can't work on her IEP, it has been replaced by a Temporary Learning Plan. This is a plan for us to use in order to help Jackie work on whichever IEP goals can be worked on at home. Luckily for us, every one of Jackie's IEP goals can be worked on at home!
Along with working on her IEP goals, we have access to her teachers up to 40 minutes per week and the individualized lesson plans they send each week. Once we return to school, which will not be this academic year, we will revert back to the IEP.
Distance Learning with an IEP | How It's Going
Like I said, I was really nervous about how this was going to go. The first few weeks were a hot mess and I know we weren't the only ones going through that. Now that we have been doing distance learning for 3 weeks, starting week 4 today, I feel like we are starting to get into a routine and a groove. I have learned that while the activities in the packet sent by the county are great, I need to do them with physical objects and not the paper cut outs from the packet. The activities last week were some that we have already been doing, like BINGO, so that has been nice.
We have also seen that Jackie is starting to meet some of her IEP goals, even during all of this. I was so worried about regression and while there are good days and bad days, Jackie is generally progressing. One of her IEP goals is to use two words to make requests for 10 items. Jackie has actually surpassed this goal! She will ask for things in sentences and include a specific person to do it. For example, we have been looking at zoo and aquarium live feeds a lot. She was ask "check animals with mommy (or daddy)". Or when she wants to go outside she will say "go outside with daddy (or mommy).
Another one of her goals is to make a choice when given two options. We have been working on this daily, mostly when she gets dressed. Where I would usually just pick an outfit for her, I pick two outfits and have her pick which one she wants to wear. It's been going really well!
Distance Learning with an IEP | Things I Would Change
To be honest, I have been pretty happy with how things have been going so far. Especially in comparison to how distance learning has been going in our county (not well), I feel like things could have been a lot more confusing. As I have said, we have a lot of advantages because we can work on all of Jackie's IEP goals at home.
It would be nice if we could do a video call with her classmates because she really misses them, but I can see how that would be really hard with a class of special needs kids! Jackie usually only lasts a few minutes on a video call and can be really loud sometimes.
Overall, I am so proud of Jackie. She has continued to surprise us and blow her goals out of the water. Recently Jackie started watching Spanish videos on Youtube again and has been speaking in Spanish. It's been fun to watch her switch between English and Spanish while connecting actions in English to actions in Spanish.
