Essential Practices for Diverse Learners

Emotional Disturbance (including anxiety, depression, schizophrenia)

A condition exhibition one or more of the following characteristics over a long period of time and to a marked degree that adversely affects a child's educational performance. 1. An inability to learn that cannot be explained by intellectual, sensory, or health factors. 2. An inability to build or maintain satisfactory interpersonal relationships with peers or teachers. 3. Inappropriate types of behavior or feelings under normal circumstances. 4. A general pervasive moods of unhappiness or depression. 5. A tendency to develop physical symptoms or fears associated with personal or school problems.

Individualized Education Plan (IEP)

A detailed description of the instruction and services a student with disabilities needs in order to receive a meaningful education. The IEP is a document that describes the specific special education services that a child will receive. An IEP should be tailored to a child and his or her educational needs, and it can include creative strategies for delivering services. Governed by the Department of Education. Both IEP's and 504's must include a special education teacher.

Autism Spectrum Disorder

A developmental disability significantly affecting verbal and nonverbal communication and social interaction, generally evident before the age of 3, that adversely affects a child's educational performance.

Explicit Instruction (EI)

A direct approach to teaching that includes both instructional design and delivery processes. This is characterized by scaffolding. An HLP used to provide SDI (specially designed instruction); an approach to instruction that is systematic, direct, engaging, and success oriented.

Planning Pyramid

A frame work for unit planning aimed at meeting diverse student needs.

Total Physical Response (TPR)

A language-teaching method developed by James Asher. It is based on the coordination of language and physical movement. In TPR, instructors give commands to students in the target language, and students respond with whole-body actions. 1. Listening precedes speaking. 2. Listening comprehension develops through an intimate relationship between language and bodily movement. 3. The development of listening comprehension produces in the child a "readiness" for speaking. Speaking should not be rushed and attempts to advance its development may be futile.

Least Restrictive Environment (LRE)

A legal requirement that children with special needs be assigned to the most general educational context in which they can be expected to learn.

Affective Filter (Krashen)

A number of affective variables play a facilitative, but non-causal role in second language acquisition. These variables include: motivation, self-confidence, anxiety, and personality traits. Krashen claims that learners with high motivation, self-confidence, a good self-image, a low level of anxiety and extroversion are better equipped for success in second language acquisition.

504 Plan

A plan developed to ensure that a child who has a disability identified under the law and is attending an elementary or secondary educational institution receives accommodations that will ensure their academic success and access to the learning environment. Governed under a civil rights law. Both IEP's and 504's must include a special education teacher.

Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS)

A schoolwide systems approach aimed at establishing positive student culture and individualized behavior supports necessary to create a safe and effective learning environment for all students. All students are taught how they are expected to behave.

High Leveraged Practices (HLP)

A set of practices that are fundamental to support K-12 student learning, and that can be taught learned, and implemented by those entering the profession. There are 22 practices under the 4 domains of Collaboration, Assessment, Social/Emotional/Behavioral, and Instruction. Criterion for selecting HLPS's specify that each must A) focus directly on instructional practice B) occur with high frequency in teaching in any setting C) be research based and known to foster student engagement and learning D) be broadly applicable and usable in any content area or approach to learning E) be fundamental to effective teaching when executed skillfully

Culture

A set of values, beliefs, and behaviors shared by a group of people.

Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA)

A special education law that requires schools to educate students with disabilities in least restrictive environments to the greatest extent of their abilities using plans tailored to the individual needs of the students. Governed by a special education law.

Understanding by Design (UbD)

A system of lesson and unit planning that starts with key objectives for understandings and then moves backwards to design assessments and learning activities.

Twice-Exceptional Students

A twice-exceptional (or 2e) student is formally identified as having a learning disability, emotional disorder, communication disorder, physical disability AND is formally identified as gifted in one or more areas including: intellectual ability, specific academic ability, or is recognized for extraordinary talent in creative and/or artistic, psychomotor areas or leadership.

Acquisition-Learning (Krashen)

Acquired: Requires meaningful interaction in the target language (natural communication) Learned: The product of formal instruction. According to Krashen, learning is less important than acquisiton.

Equal system

All students are given the same resources

Tier 1 (MTSS)

All students in the general education classroom are in this tier. The high-quality classroom instruction that all students receive. This tier encompasses best practices, differentiated instruction, and is constantly refined by what is working at MTSS Tier 2 and MTSS Tier 3.

Interaction Hypothesis (IH)

The Interaction Hypothesis (IH) is concerned with negotiating meaning in spoken language. This refers to the strategies speakers use to prevent communication breakdowns and to fix actual breakdowns when they happen. When speakers are trying to negotiate meaning, they make interactional modifications and input modifications. The former type involves changes to the structure of the conversation to prevent actual or potential problems of understanding, whereas the latter type is specifically made to language learners.

Levels of Processing Model

The Levels of Processing model describes memory recall of stimuli as a function of the depth of mental processing. Depth of processing falls on a shallow to deep continuum. · Shallow processing leads to a fragile memory trace that is susceptible to rapid decay. · Deep processing results in a more durable memory trace.

Intensive Instruction (II)

An HLP that refers the the intensity of instruction or intervention; Decisions about increasing instructional intensity are based on progress monitoring.

Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)

An acquired injury to the brain caused by external physical force, resulting in a total/partial functional disability, psychosocial impairment, or both, that adversely affects a student's educational performance. This term does not apply to brain injuries that are congenital or degenerative, or to brain injuries induced by birth trauma.

Response to Intervention (RTI)

An educational strategy that uses early intervention to help children who demonstrate below-average achievement. Only children who are not helped are designated for more intense measures. This provides increasing levels of support to help students catch up.

Hearing Impairment

An impairment in hearing, whether permanent or fluctuating, that adversely affects a child's educational performance but is not included under the definition of deafness.

Visual Impairment (including blindness)

An impairment in vision that, even with correction, adversely affects a child's educational performance. This includes both partial sight and blindness.

I Do, We Do, You Do

I Do: explanation of why and how, modeling and "think aloud" We Do: guided practice You Do: independent practice/application

Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency (CALP)

Refers to formal academic learning. This includes listening, speaking, reading, and writing about subject area content material. This level of language learning is essential for students to succeed in school. Students need time and support to become proficient in academic areas. This usually takes from five to seven years. Recent research has shown that if a child has no prior schooling or has no support in native language development, it may take seven to ten years for ELLs to catch up to their peers.

Equitable System

Resources are given to students based on their individual needs.

Orthopedic Impairment

Severe orthopedic impairment that adversely affects the child's educational performance. The term includes impairments cause by congenital anomaly, disease and impairments from other causes.

Intellectual Disability

Significantly sub average general intellectual functioning, existing concurrently with deficits in adaptive behavior and manifested during the developmental period, that adversely affects a child's educational performance

Pullout Instruction

Small group strategies in which students leave the general education classroom to work with other students of similar ability or interest.

Speech Emergent

Speech becomes more frequent, words and sentences are longer, but the individual still relies heavily on context clues and familiar topics. Vocabulary continues to increase and errors begin to decrease, especially in common or repeated interactions.

Beginning Fluency

Speech is fairly fluent in social situations with minimal errors. New contexts and academic language are challenging and the individual will struggle to express themselves due to gaps in vocabulary and appropriate phrases.

Scaffolded Instruction

Students are guided through the learning process, with clear statements about the purpose and rationale for learning the new skill, clear explanations and demonstrations of the instructional target, and supported practice with feedback until independent mastery is achieved.

Gifted Students

Students who are unusually talented in some aspect of intellectual performance. The student must demonstrate exceptional cognitive abilities through evaluations and his or her social, emotional, and behavioral skills.

English Learners (EL)

Students whose primary language is not English and who have yet to achieve proficiency in English

Accomodation

Supports provided so that students with disabilities can access and complete curriculum requirements and tasks. Accommodations such as reading content aloud, allowing the use of a laptop, or providing extra time to ensure students can access the task but do not change workload or curriculum requirements.

Input (Krashen)

The Input hypothesis explains how the learner acquires a second language. It is only concerned with acquisition, not learning. According to this hypothesis, the learner improves and progresses along the natural order when they receive second language input that is one step beyond their current stage of linguistic competence.

Universal Design for Learning (UDL)

The design of curriculum materials, instructional activities, and evaluation procedures that can meet the needs of learners with widely varying abilities and backgrounds.

Tier 2 (MTSS)

The evidence-based supports provided to students who are identified as struggling. Tier 2 interventions are typically implemented in small group settings, based on a similar need identified through assessment and for the sake of systematic efficiency.

Early Production

The individual begins to speak using short words and sentences, but the emphasis is still on listening and absorbing the new language. There will be many errors in the early production stage.

Advanced Fluency

The individual communicates fluently in all contexts and can maneuver successfully in new contexts and when exposed to new academic information. At this stage, the individual may still have an accent and use idiomatic expressions incorrectly at times, but the individual is essentially fluent and comfortable communicating in the second language.

Inclusive Practice

The instructional and behavioral strategies that improve academic and social-emotional outcomes for all students, with or without disabilities, in a general education setting. May work in conjunction with a DCAP.

Basic Interpersonal Communication Skills (BICS)

The language ability needed for casual conversation. This usually applies to the interpersonal conversation skills of CLD students (i.e, playground language). It's everyday, straight-forward communication skills that are helped by contextual supports such as gestures.

Co-teaching

The methodology where two teachers use their expertise through equal responsibility with regards to students in the classroom.

Tier 3 (MTSS)

The supports implemented for students not responding to Tier 2 supports or who demonstrate a more intense need. Tier 3 supports provide more frequent, intense, and individualized interventions.

Parallel Teaching

The teachers are both teaching the same information, but they divide the class group and do so simultaneously.

Cultural Identity

The unique way an individual person weaves together aspects of the multiple overlapping cultures to which they belong.

Dual-Language (Two Way) Immersion

Two types of students are in the same classroom- ELs and native language speakers. Instruction is presented in two languages.

Inclusion

When students with disabilities are placed in the same general education setting with their non-disabled peers, with appropriate accommodations and supports to allow for better access to the curriculum.

Specific Learning Disability

a disorder in one or more of the basic psychological processes involved in understanding or in using language, spoken or written, that may manifest itself in the imperfect ability to listen, think, speak, read, write, spell, or to do mathematical calculations. E.g.) Dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia, auditory processing

Multiple Disabilities (MD)

concomitant [simultaneous] impairments (such as intellectual disability-blindness, intellectual disability-orthopedic impairment), the combination of which causes such severe educational needs that they cannot be accommodated in special education programs solely for one of the impairments. The term does not include deaf-blindness.

13 Categories of Disabilities under IDEA

1. Autism spectrum disorder 2. Intellectual disability 3. Hearing impairment 4. Deafness 5. Speech/Language Impairment 6. Visual impairment (including blindness) 7. Emotional disturbance (including anxiety, depression, schizophrenia) 8. Orthopedic impairment 9. Traumatic brain injury (TBI) 10. Other health impairment (including ADHD) 11. Specific learning disability (dyslexia, dysgraphia, dyscalculia, auditory processing) 12. Deaf-blindness 13. Multiple disabilities

Collaboration (II)

1. Collaborate with professionals to increase student success. 2. Organize and facilitate effective meetings with professionals and families. 3. Collaborate with families to support student learning and secure needed services.

16 Elements of Explicit Instruction

1. Focus instruction on critical content. 2. Sequence skills logically. 3. Break down complex skills and strategies into smaller instructional units. 4. Design organized and focused lessons. 5. Begin lessons with a clear statement of the lesson's goals and your expectations. 6. Review prior skills and knowledge before beginning instruction. 7. Provide step-by-step demonstrations. 8. Use clear, concise language. 9. Provide an adequate range of examples and non-examples. 10. Provide guided and supported practice. 11. Require frequent responses. 12. Monitor student performance closely. 13. Provide immediate affirmative and corrective feedback. 14. Deliver the lesson at a brisk pace. 15. Help students organize knowledge. 16. Provide distributed and cumulative practice.

Key Principles for English Learner Instruction

1. Instruction focuses on providing ELs with opportunities to engage in discipline-specific practices, which are designed to build conceptual understanding and language competence in tandem. 2. Instruction leverages ELs home language(s), cultural assets, and prior knowledge. 3. Standards-aligned instruction for ELs is rigorous, grade-level appropriate, and provided deliberate and appropriate scaffolds. 4. Instruction moves ELs forward by taking into account their English proficiency level and prior schooling experiences. 5. Instruction fosters EL's autonomy by equipping them with the strategies necessary to comprehend and use language in a variety of academic settings. 6. Diagnostic tools and formative assessment practices are employed to measure student's content knowledge, academic language competence, and participation in disciplinary practices.

Three Principles of UDL

1. Multiple means of Representation 2. Multiple means of Action and Expression 3. Multiple means of Engagement

Principles of Effective Instruction

1. Optimize engaged time/time on task. 2. Promote high levels of success. 3. Increase content coverage. 4. Have students spend more time in instructional groups. 5. Scaffold instruction. 6. Address different forms of knowledge.

Six Stages of Second-Language Acquisition

1. Pre-production 2. Early production 3. Speech emergent 4. Beginning fluency 5. Intermediate fluency 6. Advanced fluency

6 Teaching Functions

1. Review 2. Presentation 3. Guided Practice 4. Corrections and Feedback 5. Independent Practice 6. Weekly and monthly reviews.

Instruction (II)

11. Identify and prioritize long and short term learning goals. 12. Systematically design instruction toward specific learning goals. 13. Adapt curriculum tasks and materials for specific learning goals. 14. Teach cognitive and metacognitive strategies to support learning and independence. 15. Provide scaffolded supports. 16. Use explicit instruction. 17. Use flexible grouping. 18. Use strategies to promote active student engagement. 19. Use assistive and instructional technologies. 20. Provide intensive instruction. 21. Teach students to maintain and generalize new learning across time and settings. 22. Provide positive and constructive feedback to guide student's learning and behavior.

Assessment (II)

4. Use multiple sources of information to develop a comprehensive understanding of a student's strengths and needs. 5. Interpret and communicate assessment information with stakeholders to collaboratively design and implement educational programs. 6. Use student assessment data, analyze instructional practices, and make necessary adjustments that improve student outcomes.

Social/Emotional/Behavioral (II)

7. Establish a consistent, organized, and respectful learning environment. 8. Provide positive and constructive feedback to guide student learning and behavior. 9. Teach social behaviors. 10. Conduct functional behavioral assessments to develop individual student behavior support plans.

District Accommodation Plan (DCAP)

A DCAP provides a framework for each school to establish a process to ensure all efforts have been made to meet students' needs in regular education by supporting the needs of all learners. It provides an accounting of resources and accommodations available to students and classroom teachers.

Multitiered Systems of Support (MTSS)

A broader approach to intervention that includes response to intervention as one component. In a well designed MTSS system, students receive the supports they need when they need them, from the staff members who are best able to support them, regardless of whether or not they have a documented education plan. It is intended to meet the needs of all learners, including students with disabilities.

Speech/Language Impairment

A communication disorder such as stuttering, impaired articulation, a language impairment, or a voice impairment.

Title 3 of ADA

Access for goods and services in public & commercial facilities

Krashen's Theory of Second Language Acquisition

Believed that regardless of age or home language, all 2nd-language learning progress through the same language acquisition states & each has an approximate time frame. Has 5 main hypothesis: 1: Acquisition-Learning 2: Monitor 3: Input 4: Affective Filter 5: Natural Order

Natural Order (Krashen)

Based on research findings which suggested that the acquisition of grammatical structures follows a 'natural order' which is predictable. For a given language, some grammatical structures tend to be acquired early while others late.

Deaf-Blindness

Concomitant (simultaneous) hearing and visual impairments, the combination of which causes such severe communication and other developmental and educational needs that they cannot be accommodated in special education programs solely for children with deafness or children with blindness.

Modifications

Changes mad to the curriculum requirements or tasks to meet the needs of students with disabilities. Modifications often reduce the workload or change demands placed on students.

Intermediate Fluency

Communicating in the second language is fluent, especially in social language situations. The individual is able to speak almost fluently in new situations or in academic areas, but there will be gaps in vocabulary knowledge and some unknown expressions. There are very few errors, and the individual is able to demonstrate higher order thinking skills in the second language such as offering an opinion or analyzing a problem.

Intrapersonal Interaction

Communication that occurs within an individual's own mind, viewed by Vygotsky as a sociocultural phenomenon.

Interpersonal Interaction

Communicative events and situations that occur between people.

Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act

Declared a person cannot be excluded on the basis of a handicap alone from any program or activity receiving federal funds. Governed under a civil rights law.

Specially Designed Instruction (SDI)

Describes the types of specific instructional services needed by a child or youth with a disability to accomplish IEP goals and objectives. These enable them to access and make progress in general education.

Differentiation

Differentiated instruction is a set of beliefs about the classroom that recognizes the individualized needs of learners and encourages educators to react to individual needs and develop approaches to teaching that will positively impact student learning.

Home Language Survey (HLS)

Form completed by parents/guardians that gives information about a student's language background. Must be on file for every LEP student.

Engagement

Give students choices to fuel their interests and autonomy. Help them risk mistakes and learn from them.

Action and Expression

Give students plenty of options for expressing what they know and provide models, feedback, and support for their different levels of proficiency.

ESSA Title III: English Learners

ESSA allows ELs to test in the language that will provide the most accurate results. Students can do this for up to three years after enrolling in a language instruction program. Parents must be brought into the English language instruction process sooner. ESSA requires parent notification within 10 days of identification, or 14 if enrolled mid-year. ELs with significant cognitive disabilities can take computer-based assessments to monitor progress.

Achievement Tests

Either general academic testing or specific to particular academic areas (such as math and reading). Gifted and talented students often score one or more grade levels above their current grade.

Monitor (Krashen)

Explains the relationship between acquisition and learning and defines the influence of the latter on the former. The monitoring function is the practical result of the learned grammar. According to Krashen, the acquisition system is the utterance initiator, while the learning system performs the role of the 'monitor' or the 'editor'. The 'monitor' acts in a planning, editing and correcting function when three specific conditions are met: i. The language learner has sufficient time at their disposal. ii. They focus on form or think about correctness. iii. They know the rule.

True or False At a minimum, an IEP must contain goals, testing accommodations, and family supports.

False

Other health impairments (including ADHD)

Having limited strength, vitality, or alertness, including alertness to environmental stimuli, that results in limited alertness with respect to the educational environment that-- a) Is due to chronic or acute health problems such as asthma, ADD, ADHD, diabetes, epilepsy, a heart condition, hemophilia, lead poisoning, leukemia, rheumatic fever, sickle cell anemia, and Tourette's syndrome.

Alternative/Differentiated Teaching

Provide students with different approaches to learning the same information. The learning outcome is the same for all students; however, the instructional methodology is different.

High Leverage Practices (HLP)

Instructional approaches educators in K-12 can use to teach different types of learners and content, to provide effective SDI. There are 22 practices under 4 domains. The 4 domains are collaboration, assessment, social/emotional/behavior, and instruction.

Subjective Assessment

Measurement that relies on interpretation by the individual making the assessment. Often classroom observations or rating scales, such as behavior checklists, completed by parents and teachers.

One Teach, One Assist

One teacher manages the instruction of the entire student group while the other circulates through the classroom, providing assistance.

One Teach, One Observe

One teacher teaches and another observes to collect data. Afterwards the two teachers review together.

Differentiated Instruction

Practice of individualizing instructional methods, and possibly also individualizing specific content and instructional goals, to align with each student's existing knowledge, skills, and needs. Responsive teaching.

Representation

Present content and information in multiple media and provide varied support. Use graphics and animations, highlight critical features, activate background knowledge, and support vocabulary.

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)

Prohibits discrimination against people with disabilities in several areas, including employment, transportation, public accommodations, communications, and access to state and local governments' programs and services.

Station Teaching

Teachers divide content and students. Each teacher then teachers the content to one group and subsequently repeats the instruction for the other group. If appropriate, a third "station" could require that students work independently.

Team Teaching

Teachers share the responsibility for two or more classes, dividing up the subject areas between them. Both teachers have different but equally active roles in the lesson.

Equity Pedagogy

Teaching techniques that facilitate the academic success of students from different ethnic and social class groups.

Cognitive Ability Tests

Tests designed to measure such mental abilities as verbal skills, quantitative skills, and reasoning ability. Frequently known as IQ tests, some of these tests are nonverbal in nature.

Pre-Production

The "silent period" where the student takes in the new language but doesn't speak it. Often lasts 6 weeks or longer, depending on the individual.

School Discipline and IDEA

When a student with a 504 or an IEP needs disciplined, there are a few other rights as well: · The IEP or 504 team needs to meet · If it is determined that the student committed the act and it was a violation of the school's code of conduct, the IEP/504 team meets and determines whether what the student did was manifestation (when a child's misbehavior is caused by their disability). If that is the case, students cannot be suspended for more than 10 days, unless there was a weapon or drugs involved, or someone got injured. o The school needs to reexamine the 504/IEP to make sure that it's appropriate and being followed o They have to do a functional behavioral assessment of the student and interpose a behavioral intervention plan

IEPs must include...

· A statement of the student's current levels of educational and functional performance · Annual educational goals based on students' academic needs · A statement of how a child's progress will be measured and when periodic reports on the child's progress will be provided · Descriptions of all of the services a child will receive both in the general education classroom setting and in the special education setting · A description of "related services" the student will receive such as speech and language therapy, transportation, and counseling · A description of all program modifications to be provided, such as modified reading materials, a reader for exams and other assignments, a tape recorder for lectures, etc. · A determination of whether the student needs assistive technology devices and services. Assistive technology means equipment or systems that enhance or maintain the capabilities of the student and can include commercially produced items such as a computer or custom keyboard · A decision on eligibility for adaptive PE, and if eligible, how it will be provided · A description of how the student will participate in general education classes and activities, and if not, why · Any accommodations the student will have for taking extended school year services, if determined necessary by the IEP team · Aversive interventions, if any, required for the student · The location, duration, and frequency of services to be delivered · Dates on which the services begin · Beginning not later than the IEP to be in effect when the student turns 16, or younger if determined appropriate by the IEP team; 1) Appropriate measurable postsecondary goals 2) Transition services needed to assist the student in reaching those goals In addition, students who take alternate assessments must also have the following included in their IEP · A description of benchmarks or short term objectives · A statement of why the student cannot participate in regular assessment · A statement of why the particular alternate assessment is appropriate for the student