Secondary Curriculum and Transition for All Students: Standards-Based Reform, Self-Determination, and Universal Design for Learning

National Secondary Transition Technical Assistance CenterSecondary Transition State Planning Institute: Building for the Future

Michael L. Wehmeyer, Ph.D.Professor, Special EducationDirector, Kansas University Center on Developmental DisabilitiesSenior Scientist, Beach Center on Disability

Ruth’s History

Ruth incurred severe brain damage as a result of encephalitis at the age of five weeks. She has severe muscle spasms that affect her arms and legs. She has seizures that are only partially controlled by medication. Ruth has trouble breathing, eating, and swallowing. She has to either sit in a wheelchair or lie in bed. She has never spoken, but she makes sounds. She cannot feed herself or bathe or get dressed on her own. No one knows how smart she is because she cannot take the tests people use to measure intelligence.

Planning for Ruth’s Future

Where will Ruth live when she leaves school?

With whom should Ruth live? In what day activities could Ruth take

part? What types of services will Ruth need?

Ruth’s Plan For Her Future

Ruth Sienkiewicz-Mercer & Steven Kaplan

I Raise My Eyes to Say Yes

Ruth’s Plan For Her Future

Where will Ruth live?Ruth lived independently in her own home in Northampton, Massachusetts, after living in two different apartments. She moved from Belchertown State School in 1978 after living there for 16 years. In 1989 she was the keynote speaker at the closure of Belchertown.

Ruth’s Plan For Her Future

With whom should Ruth live?Her husband, Norman. After securing her freedom, Ruth married a longtime friend. They lived together and enjoyed occasional, though not too frequent, visits from their in-laws.

Ruth’s Plan For Her Future

In what day activities could Ruth take part?Ruth traveled extensively as a speaker and lecturer and continued to write. She was a frequent keynote speaker. On Saturdays she liked to grocery shop and do her laundry. Sundays were her day of rest.

Ruth’s Plan For Her Future

What types of services will Ruth need?Most of all Ruth needs people to support her and listen to her. These people are called her friends. She needs the assistance provided by a personal care attendant employed by Ruth and Norman. She needs a little luck to win the lottery. She needs more money than SSI provides. She needs phone and utility services. She needs the State of Massachusetts to repair the potholes from the winter storms.

Personal(In)Competence

Environment

Changing Expectations: Changing Understanding

Personal(In)Competence

Environment

Changing Expectations: Changing Understanding

Implications of Changing Understandings of Disability

Focus on environment/context, not fixing individual;

Strengths-based Emphasizes supports, not programs

Person

Family & Friends

Nonpaid Supports

Generic Services

Specialized Services

An Array of Supports

Implications for the Education of Students with Disabilities

Access to the general education curriculum and Universal Design for Learning.

A focus on self-determination and student-directed learning

Assistive technology and accommodations. Supported employment, supported living. Response to Intervention Positive Behavior Supports A Third Generation of Inclusive Practices

First Generation Inclusive Practices

Focused on basics of inclusive practices. Efforts were instrumental in changing prevailing

educational settings for students with disabilities from separate, self-contained settings to inclusion in the regular education classroom.

These basics included: Students should receive their education in the school they would

attend if they did not have a disability; Educational placements should be age and grade appropriate; Special education services should exist within the general

education classroom. First generation inclusion was additive in nature. That is,

resources and students were “added” to the general education classroom.

More generative in nature, in that instead of focusing on moving students from separate settings to regular classroom settings, the second-generation practices focused on improving practice in the general education classroom.

Research and practice during this phase emphasized aspects of instructional practices that promoted inclusion, such as: Collaborative teaming and team teaching; Differentiated instruction; Developing family/school/community partnerships.

Second Generation Inclusive Practices

Nothing about the first or second generations of inclusive practices is either obsolete or unimportant. Both remain critical to ensure high quality educational programs for students with disabilities.

The most salient characteristic of the third generation of inclusive practices is that the focal point for our efforts switch from advocacy and supports with regard primarily to “where” a student receives his or her educational program, to a focus on “what” the student is taught.

This is driven by, and consistent with current school reform efforts, and aligns with educational implications for new ways of thinking about disability. Universal Design for Learning Must consider the “context” with which the student interacts.

Third Generation Inclusive Practices

Designing a Student’s Educational Program

General Education Curriculum

What supplementary aids & services promote student progress in the general curriculum?

Universal Design for LearningAssistive and Educational

TechnologiesOther Supplementary Aids

And Services

What specially designed instruction will students need to progress in the general curriculum?

What other educational needs of the student are not addressed by the general curriculum?

What related services will the student need to progress in the general curriculum and

achieve other educational needs?

•Access•Classroom Ecology•Assessment/TaskModifications•Teacher/Para/PeerSupport

Universal Design

Universal design is the design of products and environments to be usable by all people, to the greatest extent possible, without the need for adaptation or specialized design.

Universally designed environments and products are designed to be used by all people, not designed for use strictly to mitigate the impact of an impairment.

Universal Design for Learning The basic premise of universal design for learning is that

a curriculum should include alternatives to make it accessible and applicable to students, teachers, and parents with different backgrounds, learning styles, abilities, and disabilities in widely varied learning contexts. The "universal" in universal design does not imply one optimal solution for everyone, but rather it underscores the need for inherently flexible, customizable content, assignments, and activities (CAST, 1998 – 1999).

“the design of instructional materials and activities that allows the learning goals to be achievable by individuals with wide differences in their abilities to see, hear, speak, move, read, write, understand English, attend, organize, engage, and remember (Orkwis & McLane, 1998).

Digital Talking Books

A Digital Talking Book (DTB) is a multimedia representation of a print publication. Thinking Reader from Scholastic/Tom

Snyder Productions CAST Literacy by Design DTB Route 66 Literacy Instruction from

Benetech.org

Smart Transportation Systems

AbleLink Web Trek Internet Browser

UDL via Curriculum Modifications

Curriculum Adaptations Curriculum Augmentations

Curriculum Adaptation: any effort to modify the representation or presentation of the content or to modify the student’s engagement with the content (CAST, 1998 – 1999). Representation: Modifies way curriculum content is represented

(changing font size or using graphics). Presentation: Modifies presentation of curriculum (oral verses

written presentation). Student Engagement: Modifies how student responds to curriculum

(oral vs. written, role play, tape record). Does not change the curriculum in any way, just the way

the curriculum is represented or presented and how the student responds.

Curriculum Adaptations

Curriculum Adaptations

Graphic organizers Types: Flow chart, Semantic Maps, Webs,

Computerized program Chunking Mnemonics Summarization Outlining

Curriculum Augmentation: efforts to augment or expand the curriculum to provide students with additional skills or strategies that, in turn, will enable them to succeed within the general curriculum. Cognitive (or learning to learn) strategies; Self-regulation or student-directed learning strategies; Self-Determination

Does not modify the general curriculum, but instead expands it.

It is here where, I think, we need to infuse instruction to promote some critical transition outcomes, including promoting self-determination.

Curriculum Augmentations

What is Self-Determination

Self-determined behavior refers to volitional actions that enable one to act as the primary causal agent in one’s life and to maintain or improve one’s quality of life.

What Do We Know About Self-Determination? Higher self-determination status predicts more

positive adult outcomes for students with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

There are, now, a wide array of instructional strategies, methods, and materials available to promote self-determination.

Promoting student-directed learning is a particularly important strategy for students with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

Self-Determination and Standards-Based Reform Component elements of self-determined

behavior are found in virtually all state, provincial, and local standards across multiple content areas.

Students who are self-determined are more likely to be able to successfully engage with the curriculum: Learning-to-learn or self-regulation strategies. Goal oriented, problem-solving focused. Study skills, organizational skills.

Student-Directed Learning Strategies

Student-directed learning strategies, alternatively referred to as self-regulated learning or self-management strategies, involve teaching students to modify and regulate their own behavior.

Student-mediated (vs. teacher-mediated, peer-mediated or technology-mediated) learning.

Self-instruction Antecedent cue regulation Self-monitoring Self-evaluation Self-reinforcement

Student-Directed Learning Strategies

Student-Directed Learning Strategies

Students with severe disabilities can learn to self-direct learning in general education settings: Promotes student involvement in the classroom; Linked to attainment of educationally-valued goals,

including goals linked to the general education curriculum;

Changes expectations of teachers, other students.