[michelle_she_her]:it's michelle and dana marie from empowered to advocate and we are back for part four of our five part series on the importance the power student voice in the iep process in the education process we are today we've already focused on fourteen to twenty two year olds and our middle school friends and today we're going to really think about our friends who are pre kindergarten through fourth grade so our little friends which is really exciting so um here we go

[dana_marie]: here we go and i think last time we had talked about just to kind of get us started we had talked about how in our conversation about middle school or how that sometimes the lost grades those middle school grades and that we actually do a decent job so i want to say up front we we typically in our experience have seen that we do a decent job of including younger kids little kids in understanding their disability understanding other people's ability s and disabilities understanding differences um through read aloud through different characters and books or on shows and things like that so we have a pretty good base line pretty good starting point with little kids because we do open up those conversations in different ways then we might open up those conversations in like middle School or in high school so even though today we're talking specifically about how include them in their special education process in the iep process know that we see people all the time teachers and

[michelle_she_her]: yeah

[dana_marie]: school teams and parents and caregivers having conversations with three year olds four year old five year old about differences abilities their own disability even maybe as a starting point and that's a great great starting point so i guess michelle the next thing that i would want to know on our next question or my next question would : be when it does come time though for an actual iep meeting or getting

[michelle_she_her]: yeah

[dana_marie]: ready a school team or parents getting ready for an iep team meeting how can we include those littlest of students who might not be able to do some of the things that we've we've given recommendations

[michelle_she_her]: yeah

[dana_marie]: for our middle school and high school students

[michelle_she_her]: so i think it's you know we have like second third and fourth graders and then we have pre school kindergarten first graders and like first and second grade kind of overlap a little bit in this mind set but style that works really well for this is almost a very casual like interview style and it doesn't have to be all right dana marie we're going to sit down now and i'm going to ask you a bunch of questions about your iep it's more of you see the child during choice time or out on the playground and you might just ask them like hey um what do you want to do when you grow up we start asking kids that question

[dana_marie]: all the time

[michelle_she_her]: when they're so young right so there really isn't anything silly or ridiculous about this and just getting an idea they might tell you they want to do five different things those five different things can be put into the iep right and kids know more about themselves than we give them credit for they absolutely do asking them what's your favorite thing to do in school what's your favorite school lunch do you like what do you do after school do you kids are playing sports kids are um playing musical instruments they're doing dance class ere in swim class they have favorite tv shows when they're young and one of the things that you see kids doing even in kindergarten probably even in prek is those about me posters and there's usually a student that's highlighted every week and so you : can even do something like that with a student before their meeting or just as part of the general curriculum and then that's going give you a lot of information to bring to the team meeting um and it doesn't necessarily have to be this like very rigid very when they're fourteen to twenty two right developing that really formal transition planning form this doesn't have to be so formal um and can be even just fun to gain their insight here

[dana_marie]: yeah and i think that whether you are a parent or caregiver listening or you're somebody who works in a school may be your teacher or a : special education liaison you can also just observe what the child is doing in your classroom or at home or like michelle said in the lunch room on the playground and that can be a really good starting point hey i noticed that you like to play with leg is it's your favorite toy that you pick out every single day why do you like to play with legos maybe it's no i only noticed that you love when we go to music class you don't really love when we go to gym but you love when we go to music is there an instrument that you want to play when you get older you know are you interested in music things like that so just really being aware observing that child in their setting what you're doing all the time any ways but in kind of a way that you're making a mental list or even making a physical written list of things that you notice about what they gravitate toward what their interests are what are the things that they go for quickly what are the subject areas that they get the most excited about right as early as price and kindergarten we see some students get more excited about reading and letters and you know things like that but other kids might get excited about them hands on experiments or science or things like that so really just being aware and taking note observing those things is a great place for either a parent or a tea to start when thinking about developing that iep at that really early age

[michelle_she_her]: and another thing to make note of is when you are reading doing or read aloud or anything like that making note of when a particular student seems to really feel engaged with a particular book or subject area or um always gets the same book or talks about the same movie or anything like that those are all things to make note of and include in the iep as interests and things that they like to do

[dana_marie]: yeah for sure and we mentioned this at the beginning and we mentioned at last episode as well but michelle just said a read aloud during a class or even at home is a really great place to start and it's like i said things that you're already doing if you're reading could think of some of my favorite children's books a twist scientist

[michelle_she_her]: yah

[dana_marie]: iggy peck architect those are great books that just come to the top of my head that talk about what children want to do in the future and what they may be want to do for career or for a job in the future and so using something like that that is specifically talking about goal setting and what you need to do in order to become an architect or in order to become a scientist when you're older and using that as a jumping off start like michelle said for sort of casual conversation not a formal conversation necessarily going through a check

[michelle_she_her]: is it

[dana_marie]: list or an inventory but would you want to do that when you get older you know why do you think she wants to be a scientist why do you think they want to be a politician a doctor or whatever the case may be and having that as sort of an opening to a conversation. and a child is in preschool or kindergarten or first grade and as late as juniors and seniors who i worked with for many many years they're going to change their mind and that's not the point at all it's not that they have to be committed to whatever at three years old or four years old they decide they want to do when they get older but a lot of times it can tell us it can give us a little bit of information at least about what : they care about and what their interests are in what activities they like to do whether or not it's their career path for the rest of time you know who knows but it gives us some insight into depth he gives us some information in a place to start

[michelle_she_her]: and i think that this is also a good place to have conversations with students about perseverance and like working on that kind of growth set with them because it's not unusual to see students um even as young as kindergarten first grade feel a certain way about them or about a subject area when they're not good at it like right away kind of that perfectionists mind set that i think a lot of us still carry with us because of certain society and educational norms that are in particularly american schools american public schools where you need to sit for a certain period of time and like you need to able to write out your thoughts or you need you know expand on your ideas and writing or where other types of learners may learn and express their learning in different ways that is not always recognized or given credit in the same way for whatever reason in the school systems so being able to have a conversation with students develop mentally appropriately for their age on you know i see that you feel upset when you aren't able to do this when what could you do differently to feel more successful or to be able to show what you know what would be helpful for you to do this differently or do this quote unquote better right just having that conversation with them and i think it's actually super important to have this conversation about perseverance and growth mind set with students as young as possible knowing that there isn't only one way of doing things that oftentimes there are multiple ways of showing what you know and having that conversation with them that um you just learn in a little bit of a different way and this is

[dana_marie]: yeah

[michelle_she_her]: how we're going to work on those skills that maybe are more difficult for you but we know that you're really good at this so we're going to use what you're really good at to help bring these other skills that maybe you need a little bit of support with up so that everybody can see and know what you know i don't know i that makes sense

[dana_marie]: which is the whole point of having these individualized education programs right is the whole point of an iep for children with disabilities

[michelle_she_her]: yeah

[dana_marie]: who require specialized instruction in any area or in multiple areas right this is why we bring this team together in the first place to have these conversations to make a plan to set some goals for the future for the current school here it's for this reason exactly we're teaching student in a lot of cases the strategies to help them With whatever challenges they have whether they're academic or communication behavior and a number of different areas it's the whole point of this process in the in the beginning and so why not bring the student in as early as possible

[michelle_she_her]: yeah

[dana_marie]: to be part of that conversation whether informally at the younger grades or formally the older grades so in the older grades we talked about actually inviting those fourteen to twenty two year olds inviting them to their meeting having them maybe even prepare something at the beginning having them write a statement having them deliver may be a presentation or a powerpoint presentation about who they are and what their goals are in what their vision is et cetera but what are the tangible ways you might be asking that you can make sure that a child as young as three or four is a part of that meeting that they're not attending they're not going to their iep meeting at three or four years old but how can you insure that they are part of it i think that one

[michelle_she_her]: yeah

[dana_marie]: really tangible strategy

[michelle_she_her]: yeah

[dana_marie]: that i've seen but not as often as i would like to see is that the teacher or even the parent : bring some samples of the work student has done to start the meeting right let's show what they've done whether it's something they've written a picture that they've drawn maybe an art project they're artistically inclined that something that interests them to kind of get the conversation going about what the students strengths are what they like to do in class every day what are the activities that they made gravitate towards if you want to kind of ramp that up a little bit if you're a teacher listening a thing that you might be able to do or want to do before an iep meeting that's pretty simple but could make a big impact is actually ask that child to draw yourself draw yourself doing something that you like doing or draw yourself doing a job that you might want to do in the future or draw yourself while you're at home with your family or with your friends doing something that you enjoy and that might be a good starting spot as well for a child who's really young and might not be able to obviously attend their meeting but a good way to get them included right from the beginning we have parents who

[michelle_she_her]: yeah yah

[dana_marie]: bring photographs of their kids to iep meetings to kind of show right really illustrate here's what they do when they're at home with us here the activities they like to do here their friends that they're playing with them

[michelle_she_her]: yeah

[dana_marie]: be siblings really personalizing it from the beginning

[michelle_she_her]: yeah

[dana_marie]: making sure that we're developing the iep that the whole team is developing the iep around that child's individual needs their voice what they want what they enjoy doing 

[michelle_she_her]: yeah i love that idea of having a photograph or a couple of photographs to show you know examples including also the Work samples i'm even thinking it might be beneficial to do a video recording or an audio recording of the student

[dana_marie]: yeah

[michelle_she_her]: speaking talking about what they like to do and how they like to do things and to hear from them what they might think that they have some trouble doing right or things that they think are helpful for them and these are again different ways of expressing like not everything has to be written right um
[dana_marie]: yeah

[michelle_she_her]: and i think in the traditional school sense were always like oh well if they can't write out their information then it's you know not not as valid but being able to express in a variety of different ways are all valid ways of communicating whatever that looks like for the student and we'll dig into some of that in part five a little more but i think that that makes a really good kind of segue into part five because when we're thinking about younger students who maybe don't have the literacy skills the reading and writing skills quite yet um they're being able to express in drawings or um pointing or whatever are all also valid ways of expressing and we should be respectful of that way of communicating right

[dana_marie]: and like michelle said in the next part which is actually our last part we talk about students at all ages from three all the way up to twenty two who might have difficulty participate in their iep meeting for any number of different reasons and like michele said that could be communication that could be behavioral that could be any number of different reasons that would make it difficult social emotional for a child to be that involved in

[michelle_she_her]: oh

[dana_marie]: their meeting and that involved in the process we have some tips and strategies next week for you to kind of implement for that specific group of students for whom participating may be more of a challenge um and so with that take away let's give folks one take away something that they can do right away with three and four and five year olds all the way up to like we said maybe fourth graders or so michelle what's one take away that we can have people implement kind of right right now?

[michelle_she_her]: i think the biggest take away is that students as young as three have interests have opinions have likes have dislikes have um they know what they like and they know what they don't like right so

[dana_marie]: yeah

[michelle_she_her]: providing an opportunity for students in whatever way is the best way for them to express that gives them autonomy and then also gives them that opportunity to have voice in their educational process and it doesn't need to be this big formal we're going to sit down and talk about your students strength interests and vision statement for your iep it can be a more casual interactive sort of conversation where you're gathering some information and then bringing it to the team for that child to give their voice in that meeting

[dana_marie]: awesome

[michelle_she_her]: yeah

[dana_marie]: excellent well thank you so much everybody for joining us up to this point this

was part for if you have not go back and listen to the first three parts as well and we will finish

up next week with part five of our series on student voice in the meantime as always reach out to us if you have any questions if you want to schedule a free consultation with us and find us through email on instagram Facebook linkedin

[michelle_she_her]: all the places

[dana_marie]: everywhere

[dana_marie]: all the places

[michelle_she_her]: everywhere

[dana_marie]: we love hearing from you so so reach out to us and we look forward to our final conversation in this series next friday thanks everyone