Supports for Students w/Disabilities (adapted from Iris Center)

Scenario: Danica, a student with a learning disability (LD), struggles with writing. Her teacher assigns the following class project: research a planet using a minimum of three sources and then write a five-paragraph essay about that planet. Because Danica produces few complete sentences and ideas when given a writing task, her teacher implements several types of support to help her complete the assignment.

The teacher reminds Danica to use TREE (Topic sentence, Reason, Explanation, Ending), a mnemonic device students can use to organize their ideas.

• Accommodation

• Modification

• Strategy/intervention

Scenario: Danica, a student with a learning disability (LD), struggles with writing. Her teacher assigns the following class project: research a planet using a minimum of three sources and then write a five-paragraph essay about that planet. Because Danica produces few complete sentences and ideas when given a writing task, her teacher implements several types of support to help her complete the assignment.

The teacher highlights key information in the research materials that Danica collects.

• Accommodation

• Modification

• Strategy/intervention

Scenario: Danica, a student with a learning disability (LD), struggles with writing. Her teacher assigns the following class project: research a planet using a minimum of three sources and then write a five-paragraph essay about that planet. Because Danica produces few complete sentences and ideas when given a writing task, her teacher implements several types of support to help her complete the assignment.

The teacher shortens the writing assignment to one paragraph containing three facts.

• Accommodation

• Modification

• Strategy/intervention

Scenario: Brody, a 6th-grade student with ADHD, has difficulty organizing his time. His social studies teacher assigns a long-term project that involves researching the history of their town. The assignment includes the following requirements: visit the local library to complete a demographic information sheet, interview three people who have lived in the town since childhood, and create a presentation using that information. Because the teacher knows that Brody has difficulty completing long-term assignments by the due date, she implements several types of support to help him to do so.

The teacher breaks the assignment into smaller pieces or "chunks" the materials (e.g., week 1-visit the local library to complete demographic information sheet; weeks 2 and 3- interview three people who have lived in the town since childhood).

• Accommodation

• Modification

• Strategy/intervention

Scenario: Brody, a 6th-grade student with ADHD, has difficulty organizing his time. His social studies teacher assigns a long-term project that involves researching the history of their town. The assignment includes the following requirements: visit the local library to complete a demographic information sheet, interview three people who have lived in the town since childhood, and create a presentation using that information. Because the teacher knows that Brody has difficulty completing long-term assignments by the due date, she implements several types of support to help him to do so.

The teacher helps Brody to better schedule and monitor his time.

• Accommodation

• Modification

• Strategy/intervention

Scenario: Brody, a 6th-grade student with ADHD, has difficulty organizing his time. His social studies teacher assigns a long-term project that involves researching the history of their town. The assignment includes the following requirements: visit the local library to complete a demographic information sheet, interview three people who have lived in the town since childhood, and create a presentation using that information. Because the teacher knows that Brody has difficulty completing long-term assignments by the

due date, she implements several types of support to help him to do so.

The teacher allows Brody to complete a series of worksheets on the history of the town instead of the project.

• Accommodation

• Modification

• Strategy/intervention

Scenario: Aliyah, a middle school student with muscular dystrophy, often experiences physical fatigue. She is a highly motivated student and excels academically. Her language arts, mathematics, science, and social studies teachers typically assign homework that requires access to textbooks. Because her teachers realize that carrying heavy textbooks home each night is difficult for Aliyah, they implement several types of support to help her complete her assignments.

The teachers provide access to online textbooks.

• Accommodation

• Modification

• Strategy/intervention

Scenario: Aliyah, a middle school student with muscular dystrophy, often experiences physical fatigue. She is a highly motivated student and excels academically. Her language arts, mathematics, science, and social studies teachers typically assign homework that requires access to textbooks. Because her teachers realize that carrying heavy textbooks home each night is difficult for Aliyah, they implement several types of support to help her complete her assignments.

The teachers assign a different assignment that does not require the textbooks.

• Accommodation

• Modification

• Strategy/intervention

Scenario: Aliyah, a middle school student with muscular dystrophy, often experiences physical fatigue. She is a highly motivated student and excels academically. Her language arts, mathematics, science, and social studies teachers typically assign homework that requires access to textbooks. Because her teachers realize that carrying heavy textbooks home each night is difficult for Aliyah, they implement several types of support to help her complete her assignments.

The teachers allow Aliyah to keep a set of textbooks at home.

• Accommodation

• Modification

• Strategy/intervention

Scenario: Ahmed, a middle school student with an intellectual disability, reads at a 2nd-grade level. Because he has difficulty with decoding words, he is not able to read fluently enough to comprehend the grade-level text. His special education teacher has noticed that he typically understands and remembers the information that she presents orally. For this reason, his teacher implements several types of support to help him succeed in the classroom.

The teacher allows Ahmed to use text-to-speech software for grade-level materials, which allows the text to be read to him.

• Accommodation

• Modification

• Strategy/intervention