Family & Community Special Communities
Special Education

CSPD Training Project
Module One: The Massachusetts IEP Process

Introduction - IEP Cautions and Connections

The goal of this unit is to draw attention to the components of the IEP that continue to be problematic. Areas of concern have been highlighted, and the elements of each component identified. The IEP Writing Guide and the IEP Rubric are tools that have been developed to assist IEP Team members to better understand the elements of each component, and to evaluate their response in each component of the IEP.

The activity associated with this unit requires several complete IEPs from your district. The participants will work in small groups, with each member of the small group working with the same IEPs (each group should have at least three IEPs).

Using the PowerPoint presentation, the trainer will introduce the unit, go over the data collection sources (see talking points slide #1), review areas of lesser concern (see talking points slide #1) and identify the areas of CAUTION! (slide #2):

1. IEP 1 - Student Strengths and Key Evaluation Results Summary
2. IEP 2, 3 - How does the disability(ies) effect progress (PLEP)
3. IEP 2 - Accommodations/Specially Designed Instruction
4. IEP 6 - Non-participation Justification
5. IEP 7 - State and District-wide Assessment

After introducing the unit, the presenter will go over the information on slide #3 A) IEP 1 - Student Strengths and Key Evaluation Results Summary. Using the district IEPs, each group will choose an IEP from their collection, and review the responses against the expectations. They will ascertain what is there and what is missing. They will then repeat this process with the other IEPs (depending on the time constraints). Each group will report out their findings. The final task is for the large group to look for trends.

This process is repeated with each area of concern, using the same set of IEPs.

1. BEWARE: Commonly Found IEP Errors PowerPoint Presentation