When you have a child with special needs who attends public school, you usually negotiate an IEP for your student with the school. The IEP, Individual Education Plan, outlines the special services your child will receive during the school year. For example, some children go to another class for reading, math, and spelling. Some children receive speech therapy, occupational therapy, or physical therapy during the school day. Some children even have a one-on-one aid who goes through the school day helping a single student. There are children who have so much difficulty with typical education that the school focuses more on teaching these students life skills. Special education students require additional assistance from teachers and support staff to be successful in school. They may also require additional time to complete assignments or a reduced workload.

They may have difficulty retaining knowledge. Others can learn but they do it much slower than average students do. Some struggle with verbal and written language comprehension or skills. Each child has unique abilities, which is why an individual plan is created for each special education student. An IEP isn’t the only plan available for special needs students, though.

Students with serious behavior issues may have an IBP, Individual Behavior Plan. This details what actions, consequences, and interventions will happen for each specific behavior. Students who require individual accommodations for a documented medical condition that affects the student’s ability to learn may negotiate a 504c plan. Another plan used by some public school districts is the LSP, Life Skills Portfolio.

The Life Skills Portfolio (LSP) contains six specific goals to be achieved by the end of the school year. It contains written procedures for evaluating the student throughout the school year and record keeping procedures. Each specific goal must have three unique learning outcomes identified. After identifying these three outcomes, programming data needs to be outlined for scoring the student’s progress. This helps each member of the team to maintain consistency in reporting. These are due by June 1 of each year so they can be evaluated over the summer and ready for students in the fall.




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