Tara Troy

Assessment Project
Functional Life Skills Curriculum
April 2013
When this project was originally discussed at the beginning
of the course, I had immediately thought about using behavioral
data more efficiently in our building. While this would have been
a great project in some ways and did meet the syllabus
requirements of, observing and applying at a classroom/school
level, I did not feel that project idea aligned with my overall EDL
Spring practicum goal, which was for me to get out of my role as
a teacher and expand my knowledge of the district personnel,
curriculum and assessments. For that reason, I chose to go in
more of a district level way with classroom/school level
implications.
In late February, Dr. Fundus, Lincoln Public Schools Special
Education Director, chose me to take part in the Functional Life
Skills Curriculum Committee. Along with around 15 or so
colleagues we met for a full day in early March. Dr. Fundus
explained that our role would be to create a Kindergarten through
age 21 curriculum for students in functional classes. We were
given the following outline:
Domains:

1. Independence
Common Core: Standard number 11: Attends to personal and financial
well being
Strand A: Personal well-being
*Hygiene
*Nutrition
*Exercise
*Social/Emotional
Strand B: Home Living Skills
*Cooking (grocery
shopping)
*Laundry
*Budget
*Home routines
*Home maintenance
Strand C: Community Access
*Transportation
*Personal Information
*Community Resources
*Emergency services (hospital)
2. Career Development
Strand A: Personal Development
*Goal Setting
*Personal strengths, interests, weaknesses
Strand B: Career Exploration
*Role and function of various jobs
*Job Shadowing
*Job responsibilities, titles, and skills
Strand C: Career Preparation and Readiness (Middle and High)
*Job applications
*Interviewing, resumes
*Matching skills and strengths
*Post-secondary
3. Developing Self
Strand A: Self-Advocacy
*Asking for help
*Sharing information about themselves with others
*Following routines and schedules

Strand B: Communication
*Greeting
*Initiating conversation
*Accepting consequences
*Reciprocal communication
*Being clear when communicating
*Using the phone
*Social Media
-Consequences
*Situational awareness communication
Strand C: Social Skills
*Leisure/Recreation Activities
*Peer relationships
4. Academics
Strand A: Reading
Strand B: Math
Strand C: Writing
Strand D: Science and Social Studies

Dr. Fundus explained, that our job in this committee would

essentially be creating a curriculum, that would define the
individual skills needed to teach to those specific domains, create
activities and resources that would support those skills and
find/create assessments that evaluate student progress. In doing
so we were also instructed to tie these learning objectives to the
general education curriculum. To say the least, this was an
overwhelming undertaking with an incredible timeline. Dr.
Fundus wants this to be able to be rolled out to special education
teachers across the district, in the fall of 2013.

I accepted this opportunity, as I felt it was a very important

task with implications far beyond my classroom or school, which
would most definitely benefit from the aligned curriculum. I also
thought that it was a great opportunity for me to grow as a leader
in the area of assessment. Examples of that are, that every skill
would require some type of formative assessment whether it is
rubrics, task analysis, checklists, etc. Besides the formative
assessments, summative assessments to NeSA and Common
Core also needed to be made.
I felt this tied directly to this assessment project, in that the
goal of our impending work this summer is to eventually create a
card/sheet much like those in general education reading and
math classes. This would be an ongoing assessment of student
progress, that would follow the student throughout his/her years
in school and be a running record of what skills that student has
mastered.
As a special education teacher, such a card/sheet would be
highly important in programming for a student. It would help
eliminate wasted time over evaluating and re-teaching current
skill, which is the reason for assessment! The staff would be
able to see which areas needed work and which areas were

mastered. I also think, this would be great for parents to see

progress and the overall trajectory of instruction. For example,
we talked about report cards in class and the frustration of
teachers, parents and students in special education as standard
based report cards do not adequately show student progress with
students participating in a functional curriculum. Making
curriculum consistent across the district would also help reduce
some of the deficits students experience because of transition
and mobility.
Like I said, this is an on-going project with much of the work
still to do. However, we have put in many hours these last two
months. After initially giving us our instruction and timeline, Dr.
Fundus divided us into grade level groups. I was part of the 9-12
group. We have met three additional times since that initial
meeting for four hours each time as well as working on this for
multiple hours on our own. We have several upcoming times
scheduled to meet and many hours proposed this summer.
In class we talked a lot about standards and unfortunately,
in special education, there are currently no standards. Student
programming is left up to parent and teacher judgment. While
this does allow for individual programming which can be helpful,

it does not provide a consistent education building to building or

across grade level.
As a teacher in a transitional building, one where high
school aged students are designed to go for more of a short term
stay and then be transitioned back into their designated home
school once their behaviors are in check, such a curriculum and
assessment would be incredibly valuable. For one reason,
students who come to us are often in crisis and are therefore
difficult to accurately assess and program for. Some schools
provide great written or verbal documentation of the students
present level of performance, some schools do not mainly
because of poor programming documentation or insufficient time
with the student. A card/sheet would be incredibly helpful, as it
would help tell what skills they have acquired throughout their
years in education. This would most definitely help eliminate
wasted time on previously mastered curriculum as well as
decrease student frustration with duplicated learning.
On the other hand, some students begin or return to the
district after time away and this would be a great assessment to
be able to discuss with colleagues in the transitioning school. If
schools were able to see what skills they have worked on while

with us, the students transition back into a regular building could
be much smoother, consistent and ultimately, more successful for
the student. This would also make our program more
transparent, in that schools would see that students were still
focused on academics even while out of their home school.
For this reason, I felt that this would be perfect for my
assessment project. Unfortunately, in early March, I thought we
would be farther than we are. We found that this is a highly time
consuming project. Because of that, I do not have the required
bibliography for this project. At this point I have not used any
resources other than from curriculum and from experiences.
The scope of this undertaking is enormous and intimidating
but has been an incredible learning experience. Not only do we
need to address the skill and assessment requirements of student
learning in the functional life skills curriculum, we need to
organize, compile, and then present this information in a series of
staff development sessions to our colleagues throughout the
district. This is where I wanted to be able to use more resources.
I do not know if you want to put a hold on my grade and I can get
this to you this fall but we are just not at the place to create this
staff development yet. It is coming though!

Overall, this project has tremendously helped me to develop

my understandings/skills as an assessment leader. I understand
and can better reiterate learning goals and curriculum to
colleagues and parents. I have a better grasp on using
assessments and their data to inform parents and staff and make
appropriate changes. I feel these things were personally
strengthened through this project and truly believe that the ties
between curriculum, assessment and data with this population of
students will increase exponentially across the district as a result
of the work of this committee.
In closing, I wish I had the PowerPoint of the staff
development that I could send you. I wish I had a totally
completed binder with curriculum that I could flip through and
show you. I am only at the beginning stages of both, not for lack
of hours, dedication and learning, but from the shear volume of
this task. However I have learned more and made better
connections throughout the district than I could have imagined
and I hope that has come through. I have included the Google
doc that shows the committees work in creating skills,
curriculum, assessments and connections to the general
curriculum. I will definitely invite you to the staff development I

will be presenting this fall in the hopes that you can see my
learning in full circle. Please let me know if you have any further
questions.