Question
How do I ensure that the language skills I target are educationally relevant?
Answer
The litmus test for eligibility for speech and language services in the schools is whether the identified areas of weakness have a substantial negative impact on the attainment of the student’s educational goals. In other words, school-based SLP services exist to support academic success. So, we need to be sure we are targeting skills that support classroom learning and grade level expectations.
Fortunately, regardless of the state in which you practice, you can easily access a consistent framework for what students should know and be able to do at the end of each grade. The Common Core State Standards (CCSS), which have been adopted by a majority of states, define the knowledge and skills students are expected to develop during their K-12 education to ensure success after graduation (National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, 2010). Alternately, some states have chosen to create their own set of standards, which provide a similar set of expectations for each grade. Consistently linking assessment and intervention to Common Core or state-specific standards ensures that therapy goals are matched with the communication needs, grade-level curriculum expectations, and specific demands of the classroom (Power-deFur & Flynn, 2012, Ehren et al., 2012).
Even though school-based SLPs are super heroes, it can be time-consuming (and a little daunting) to sort through all of the standards for each grade level to determine appropriate targets for your students. Consequently, it can be helpful to use a resource such as the Skills-Based Assessment of Core Communication Skills (Schultz, 2016; 2017) to identify relevant knowledge and skills and monitor progress across grade levels.
This Ask the Expert is an excerpt from the course, 20Q: Efficient and Effective Language Intervention in the Schools - Embrace Your Superpower, by Shari Robertson, PhD, CCC-SLP, BCS-CL, ASHA Fellow.
