Need help writing Goals & Objectives

You might want to write a goal for using comprehension strategies to improve readig comprehension- predicting, KWL charts, Previewing the requirements, knowing a purpsoe for reading-write questions for what he wants to get out of the reading.
you could also have him summarize what he has read, answer questions, define vocab in his own words
For writing I have kids write an organzied paragraph with introduction, supporting details, and a conclusion.
You might just want to focus on using the writing process, will write and revise his own work
If you need to focus on spelling, have him use spell check and identify the correct word from choices,
He could have to write complete sentences with accurate use of end punctuation, commas, etc.
If he is just having trouble with subject/verb agreement, that could be a goal
proofreading is low, you might have work on daily langauge sentences to improve his ability to edit his own work.
I hope these help

He scored so well on Writing Samples because he is able to construct a sentence. It is a single sentence task and not a good measure of overall writing ability.

This child needs some direct instruction in mechanical writing skills at the user level. His recognition- editing- skills are better- in the low average range- so he should probably have goals that focus on getting him to produce mechanically correct writing, as well as the use of an editing checklist. I would likely include dictation of phrases and sentences that have the target skills in them in my teaching and possibly as a part of my documentation. Isolate the ones he can’t do and build your goals from there. I might also think about word processing/typing instruction. Many kids are far more accurate writers when they are typing.

Relative to connected writing- start with organizing a paragraph- topic sentence and three supporting details and a concluding sentence. I generally move from the most structured to the least structured on this depending on the child. So… we might start with a frame of the paragraph that supplies the structure and vocabulary- and then gradually fade the frame as the student became more successful. Alternatively- you could begin with teaching him to web- fill in first and then begin to generate one on his own. When I use webs as a place to start I frequently use a paragraph template to scaffold from the web to the sentence. We plan everything on the web- including sentence order- before going to the template and then to the draft. You need to think about where this child is specifically on this continuum also and build your goals from there.

There are some good programs available commercially that address expressive writing with older students- Sue Jones has a list on her site- www.resourceroom.net. Does this help?

Robin

I suggest using criterion referenced measures to assess reading in more depth. He is well behind, those scores are quite low. You need to know EXACTLY what he can and cannot do so you can write IEP goals to address his needs. A good assessment of decoding skills is in order, then you can select important decoding skills he is missing to hone in on.

He also needs to learn to write a good paragraph. You might want this addressed. Essays are a sequence of good paragraphs that are related. Have the IEP this year focus on paragraph writing. Then you teach essay formats, persuasive essays, how to essays, finally (the most difficult) compare/contrast paragraphs. Writing skills often progress slowly for LD students, especially when reading skills are this low.

The writing subtest is just based on single sentence writing to prompt. I really don’t see how he can be expected to take notes with his reading skills so low. Why not go for having copies of notes provided, either teachers’ notes or getting xerox copies of notes from a super-duper (neat) classmate.

Anitya,
I didn’t think these reading scores were that low!?

His reading is sometimes a little slow, he make mistakes when reading out loud. He stops to take the time to sound out the word…or maybe he just guesses at it?

But I was told these reading scores precluded him from receiving any extra help. Can you elaborate on this?

I’m just a Mom….trying to get my Goals & Benchmarks for a little guy who is bright and has self esteem issues with this.
Thanks much,
Lori Janusch

Hi!

What test should I get to assess and hone in on his decoding skills?

He was given the Woodcock-Johnson Basic Reading skills AE: 16-11
Reading Comprehension AE: 17-2

Nick is 14 yrs. old: 14-2

So this is why they said he will not qualify for any reading or phonics instruction.
Is there another test that could accurately determine any areas of weakness in his reading skills?
Thanks much,
Lori Janusch

No, they are not. I was hurrying a bit and looked at them as standard scores rather than percentile ranks. Please accept my apology. His reading scores are high average on the test.

Writing suggestions still stand.

I personally have (and my daughter inherits) a complex of vision and coordination and spatial location problems. Nowadays we might be labelled as dyspraxic and/or NLD.

We were able to read (quite fluently) at ages four and two repectively, but both had to get to age seven and Grade 3 to write something more-or-less readable.(Our Grades 1 and 2 teachers tore their hair). Typing was a physical impossibility until college for me, late high school for her. She still isn’t fast. I still use six-finger hunt-and-peck, the most I can handle.

Your suggestion that typing makes many students write more easily — well, maybe. Now we are a minority of a minority, I guess. But our kind of problem does exist out there, and it is most frustrating (I speak from experience) to go for help and find the “help” offered insists you use exactly the skills you’re weakest on. I ask people to take care. Thanks.

but it is always worth a try. When I suggest interventions- especially here because I don’t know these folks well:) ,I try really hard to move from the least intrusive to the most intrusive. Motorically, typing is a lot easier to retrieve than handwriting when you learn to do it well. It is just less to remember. The difference it makes in editing and revising is always huge.So it is usually a good thing to investigate with accommodations while the student is learning. If it doesn’t work- well that’s okay- you try something else. Thanks for reminding me:)

Robin

You say typing is motorically easier — I’m not sure about that. And I speak from very close observation and experience, namely myself.

Typing “properly” requires all ten fingers and thumbs, something I’ve never been able to coordinate in my 50 years of life, and don’t think I’m going to get much better now. Even typing with the self-invented system I use requires six or seven fingers and thumbs, and it took me until my mid-twenties to get anywhere with it. I still have a constant problem of spastic muscles; I aim at one direction but tense up and hit something else (computer correction is a godsend). On the other hand, writing really nicely in the copperplate Mrs. Ross taught me in Grade 3 (Thank you Mrs. Ross and thank you God for sending her) requires mostly my arm muscles; I hold the pen fairly steady in my hand, calligraphy method, and move the arm freely. I also have never been able to use quite a “standard” pen grip, but do quite nice calligraphy and watercolours in a modified two-finger grip (between first and second, with thumb to grip in). In fact, Mrs. Ross had us do all the training in Grade 3 but my muscles wouldn’t control well so she gave me an F in writing, but the skills and habits stuck with me so by age 10 or so I could write legibly if very large and by age 14 I was almost up to speed at writing, while I was physically incapable of typing (the aim was still too inaccurate.)

One thing I’ve noticed over the years is that whatever you learn first is the “easy” way. In my youth, back in the dark ages, we were taught to swim using the “resting” strokes first, breast stroke and elementary backstroke, and then crawl came after. So we all thought breast stroke was easy and crawl stroke hard. Nowadays they try to hurry kids into racing at age seven so they teach crawl first and breast stroke later as a kind of sideline (for those who don’t race crawl, I guess) and the kids say crawl is easy and breast stroke is hard.

Typing on a computer is “easy” if you’ve been exposed to it as your first writing experience, but motorically it takes an awful lot of fine hand control that some of us don’t have.

so handwriting has always been torturous and tiring even though my handwriting (Palmer method from the nuns, bless them) is actually indistinguishable from a righty. But boy did I have dirty hands for years and college notetaking- I am a compulsive notetaker- left me with terrible cramps in my left hand. I am not an efficient typist- and while I write pretty quickly under normal circumstances I type much more quickly and use a bout seven fingers also.

Take care!

A note- your youth and mine are closer than you think:)

I beg to differ (also speaking from personal experience). I didn’t learn how to type “correctly” until I was in 6th grade. In fact I spent most of elementary school dictating to the resource teacher. Now I type around 40-60 wpm. It is *much* easier for me to type than it is for me to write longhand. Perhaps it was the early start (it definitely wasn’t what I learned how to do first). For a lot of kids, although there is a lot of coordination involved in typing, it is motorically simpler than forming each letter by hand

Too many variables to make a specific pronouncement in general, or even for each person.

I don’t know what your particular motor difficulty is, so can’t say what does or would work best for you.

My particular difficulty involves problems in guiding finer motor control, spastic-type twitches which of course are worse under stress (as when trying and failing), and a crossover with poor eye tracking, astigmatism, amblyopia, no depth perception, etc. In *this* particular situation, an overlearned hand motion forming the letter is very much easier than making repeated aims at tiny keys. I can write quite adequately and readably in the dark with my glasses off (as in night phone messages), because the letter forms are now automatized. I can only type by focusing my entire vision and attention on the keyboard.

And it only took a year or so to learn to use the mouse accurately (got real funny looks from a university colleague when I couldn’t double-click the first time I tried a mouse).

The reason I keep being difficult here is that this kind of thing, although yes a minority of a minority, does occur among children. And it’s really hard on a child (or adult) who is already fighting to reach peak performance to be told they are “lazy” or “uncooperative” or “doing it all wrong”. Since this weird motor disability is tied to good scholastic ability in our family heritage, it’s even harder to explain why you or your child, as a *good* student, are/is not living up to expectations in written work etc.