Appropriate Education – This governing principle of IDEA requires that each student will have an individually designed plan or IEP, with specific, measurable goals that will be based on objective and subjective evaluations.
Autism – A developmental disability generally evident before age three that significantly affects verbal and nonverbal communication and social interaction, adversely affecting a child’s educational performance.
Categories of Disability under IDEA – These 14 disabilities are autism, deaf-blindness, deafness, developmental delay, emotional disturbance, hearing impairment, mental retardation, multiple disabilities, orthopedic impairment, other health impairment, specific learning disability, speech or language impairment, traumatic brain injury, and visual impairment including blindness.
Child Find Service – A comprehensive system required of all states by the IDEA to assure that all children who are in need of early intervention or special education services are located, identified and referred.
Child Study Team – Prepares the IEP. Members include: the parents, teacher, social worker, school psychologist, the specializing therapist and a school administrator.
Deaf-blindness – Simultaneous hearing and visual impairments, the combination of which causes severe communication, developmental and educational needs that cannot be accommodated in special education programs solely for children with deafness or children with blindness.
Deafness – A severe hearing impairment that causes a child to be impaired in processing linguistic information through hearing, adversely affecting that child’s educational performance.
Developmental Delay – A delay in one or more of the following areas: physical development; cognitive development; communication; social or emotional development; or behavioral development.
Early Intervention Services – Specialized health, educational, and therapeutic services designed to meet the needs of infants and toddlers, 0 – 3 years of age, who have a developmental delay or disability.
Early Intervention Specialist – Works with the family of a child under three years of age who is diagnosed with a disability to create an Individualized Family Service Plan (IFSP).
Developmental Pediatrician – Evaluates and diagnoses children who seem to be developing slowly or differently than their peers to determine whether they may need an early intervention referral.
Emotional Disturbance – A condition exhibiting one or more characteristics over a long period of time, and to a marked degree that adversely affects a child’s educational performance, including an inability to learn that cannot be explained by intellectual, sensory, or health factors; an inability to build or maintain interpersonal relationships; inappropriate behavior/feelings under normal circumstances; general mood of unhappiness or depression; a tendency to develop physical symptoms or fears associated with personal or school problems.
FAPE – Represents the specific rights protected by IDEA, which include a free, appropriate public education.
General Education – Refers to academic curriculum, extracurricular activities, and even nonacademic activities like recess and transportation.
Goal – A specific and measurable achievement that is performance level appropriate and that the child should be able to reach in one year’s time.
Hearing Impairment – A hearing impairment that adversely affects a child’s educational performance not included under the definition of deafness.
IDEA – Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act – When first enacted in 1975, this law was called the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. It ensured that all children, including those with disabilities, have the right to receive a free, appropriate public education. Following several revisions, the most recent occurring in 2004, the IDEA sets the standards for 14 categories of disabilities.
IEE – Independent Educational Evaluation – An educational evaluation of the child conducted outside of the current school system when the parents disagree with the findings of the initial evaluation.
IEP – Individualized Education Plans – Required under the IDEA Appropriate Education principle, an IEP is a written document developed by a child study team that lists the special educational services a child will receive, and how those services will be implemented.
IEP Team – Team composed of parents or guardians, general ed. teacher, special ed. teacher, public agency representatives, psychologists, therapists, other stakeholders, and sometimes the children themselves, all of whom come together to design can act upon the IEP.
IFSP – Individualized Family Service Plan – This document that highlights family involvement and specifies the early intervention services provided to infants and toddlers with disabilities. The IFSP is altered to become the child’s IEP when they enter school.
Inclusion Facilitator – Assists regular and special education teachers to include their students with disabilities into regular education classrooms, and within the regular education curriculum.
Inclusion into General Education – Operating in the least restrictive educational environment, students learn alongside their typically developing peers to the maximum extent that is appropriate. Previously known as “mainstreaming.”
LRE – Least Restrictive Environment – To meet this IDEA governing principle, the school is to provide a learning environment that is as inclusive as possible, one that is the most beneficial for both students with and without disabilities.
Mental Retardation – A 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.
Multiple Disabilities – Simultaneous impairments that together cause such severe educational needs that they cannot be accommodated in a special education program designed solely for one of the impairments. The term does not include deaf-blindness.
Nondiscriminatory Evaluation – This governing principle of IDEA has two parts: First, schools are required to determine whether or not a child has a disability. Second, if the evaluation shows that a child HAS a disability, then the school’s child study team or special education team will determine appropriate services that the student will receive.
Objective – A specific skill that can be practiced in order for the child to reach an overall goal. Occupational Therapist – This therapist assesses the level of a child’s ability to function in activities of everyday living, and helps them to learn to manage their daily tasks.
Orthopedic Impairment – A severe orthopedic impairment, including those caused by a congenital anomaly, disease, other causes, that adversely affects a child’s educational performance.
Other Health Impairment – Refers to those children having limited strength, vitality, or alertness, including a heightened alertness to environmental stimuli, due to chronic or acute health problems resulting in limited alertness in the educational environment, which adversely affect those children’s educational performance.
Parent and Student Participation – This IDEA governing principle describes the rights of the parents and students to have access to and control over who may view the student’s records, the opportunity to participate in special education advisory committees, and the right to have an Independent Educational Evaluation (IEE) for the child.
Pediatric Physical Therapist – This therapist helps infants and children with special needs, such as developmental delays or chronic physical conditions, to improve their gross and fine motor skills, balance and coordination, strength and endurance, as well as cognitive and sensory processing and integration.
Procedural Due Process – This governing principle of IDEA describes procedures that make the school and parents accountable to each other and describe how disputes should be handled.
School or District Psychologist – This type of social worker conducts parenting workshops, counsels teachers and parents, and assesses students with special needs.
Specific Learning Disability – A disorder in one or more of the basic psychological processes involved in understanding or using language, spoken or written, manifests itself in a reduced ability to listen, think, speak, read, write, spell, or to do mathematical calculations.
Speech or Language Impairment – A communication disorder such as stuttering or a language or voice impairment that adversely affects a child’s educational performance.
Speech Therapist – This type of therapist helps students develop their articulation or speaking patterns.
Transition Services – Coordinated set of activities that help youth with disabilities make the transition from high school to the outside adult world.
Traumatic Brain Injury – An acquired injury to the brain caused by an external physical force, resulting in total or partial functional disability or psychosocial impairment, or both, that adversely affects a child’s educational performance.
Visual Impairment, including Blindness – An impairment in vision that, even with correction, adversely affects a child’s educational performance, including both partial sight and blindness.
Zero Reject – This governing principle deems that IDEA was designed so that no children, ages 3 – 22, are denied a free public education due to a disability.
