Individual Education Plan (IEP) is a detailed program for particular educational needs of a certain child and identifies the basic services that need to be provided in order to meet these particular needs (La Salle, 2013) . The individual educational plan comprises of six major components: it details the abilities as well as the skills of the child at the beginning of the plan, it explains unique objectives, goals and achievement expected at the end of the first year of implementation, it identifies the manner in which the progress will be evaluated and measured. The plan also defines the special equipment, curriculum or services that are needed to achieve the objective of the plan, it goes further to define how the child will get the services and where they will be delivered.
The individual Transitional plan (ITP) is a very detailed program designed for children who require special education that will enable them to set objectives and targets that will help in their successful transition into life after high school (Ronzanski, 2014) . It is part of the Individualized Education Program (IEP), which is simply a program developed for all the children identified as being in need of special education curriculum and services in a classroom setting. Individual education and the individual transition program are both mandated through the set of laws known as IDEA or Individual of Disabilities Education Act. The IDEA highlights and explains each and every consideration that should be keenly observed when teaching children with special educational needs. Although an Individual Education Plan is developed as soon as the child has been identified to be in need of special education curriculum and services, the ITP is not incorporated into the individual education program until the students gets to the transition age (Friend, 2010) .
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The transition age of a student varies from one school district to another. Some learning institutions decides to begin planning for the transition with children as early as they start high school, and incorporate the Individual Transition Plan in all the high school Individual Education Programs (Friend, 2010) . Nevertheless, under the IDEA rules, the Individual Transition plan has to be embedded in the first Individual Education Program after the child turns 16 years of age. These transitional program must incorporate several components. The first component comprises of a statement of the objectives as well as plans the student has after completing high school education. These may include the student going to college, undertaking a vocational program or even a plan to start working and perfecting life skills after completing high school education. The next part of the transition plan is how the child is planning to accomplish the stipulated goals as well as what are the services the learning institution is going to offer in enabling the child to achieve these respective goals.
Individual Family Service Plan (IFSP) is a detailed written treatment program plan that describes the early intervention services a child will receive, how as well as when the EI services will be delivered (Hallahan, 2009) . It outlines the current functioning levels, unique needs as well as the objectives of the treatment known as outcome of the child. The Individual Family Service Plan considers a family-based program to these services, because the main concept that supporting the family of a child goes a long way to supporting the child. This implies that the individual family service plan is created with significant input from the whole family of the child, and it comprises of features that are established to help the whole family. As much as IDEA is a federal law, every particular state has the mandate to implement its own early intervention programs. Procedures as well as regulations are different from one state to another, the needed period for implementing the individual family service plan can vary.
The Individual Family Service Plan specifically applies to children from birth to 3 years of age. After the child reaches three years old, the individual education plan is effected into place (Hallahan, 2009) . The program comprises of; an evaluation of the present development level of the child, a statement of objective and goals, support early intervention services to be implemented to accomplish the goals, the date these services will start as well as the name and the credentials of service coordinator. The individual family service program revolves within the family because it is a constant factor in the children respective life. While an individual education plan majorly revolves around the student, since it is the education of the child that is being considered. Hence, the objectives stipulated within the Individual Family Service Plan are targeting the family while the objectives around individual education plan are specifically targeting the student. The individual family service plan comprises of locations of natural surrounding like home, child care, gym and parks. This allows the creation of opportunities for interventions in learning in normal day activities as well as routines.
According to (Katsiyannis, 2011) , every Individual Family Service Plan should contain particular main elements, different states have different specific IFSP components. Elements that are generally found in the plan include; people and the organizations involved, the plan must list the name of the early interventions services personnel coordinator who is working with the family. It can also list the specific professionals who will offer services and the individual responsible for payment of the services. Present levels of functioning is also another element of IFSP, it will include medical conditions as well as the results from hearing and vision evaluations. It also involves cognitive evaluations as well as the communication abilities of the child and social development.
Another element is family information, information regarding the family is a critical element of the individual family service plan. It may include information on the concerns, priorities as well as the strengths of the family, the specific needs of the child and their respective families. IFSP also contain a detail of the particular services that the child will be able to get (Katsiyannis, 2011) . The other element of Individual Family Service Plan is outcomes, the objectives or outcomes are crucial elements of an individual family service program. They should be specific, relevant as well as measurable. These goals are not accomplishments for the entire life of the child, but not short-term objectives. The specific services offered will work on achieving these specific outcomes.
The IDEA law requires the following individuals to participate in writing and documenting an Individual Education Plan for a child, they include; the parents of the child, at least one of the providers or special education teacher of the child, at least one of the regular teachers of the child, one representative from the school system, a professional who can properly interpret the assessment outcomes, the student, representative of any relevant organization that is responsible for payment or for provision of transition services and lastly any other parties who have special knowledge or expertise concerning the child (Kupper, 2013) . These members are supposed to work together as a unit to develop the individual education plan for the child. A meeting to create the IEP should be conducted within the thirty days of identifying that the child is qualified for special education and services.
The meeting should start by evaluating the present individual education program of the child as well as the annual objectives (Kupper, 2013) . Followed by the special education teacher asking the student his or her objectives and goals after completion of high school, for instance, their plans to further their studies, begin working, where they want to reside as well as how much independence they would wish to have. While the members of an Individual Transition Plan include; parents or family members , the student, the school administrator, teachers in charge of special education, occupation and overall teachers, specialist in transitioning, counselling teacher, job coach and developer, experts from adult service agencies, community leaders as well as the employer.
Individual Family Service Program team members are; the early intervention officer responsible for early intervention programs with the location of the family residence, evaluators who will assess the particular child, providers including therapist who are in charge of delivering services to the child and their families, the service coordinator as well as the parent or the caregiver of the child (Friend, 2010) . The team will make decisions on the services that should be availed to the child and the family. This is the main reason why the early intervention program asks the parents to participate in their child’s program services.
According to (Knoblauch, 2015) , parents of children who require special education have a significant role in their children education. This right of involvement is guaranteed by the federal law that clearly stipulates the parental rights of involvement in the IEP and ITP education process. A basic provision of the IDEA laws is the right of parents to be involved as equal partners in the process. They include; a parent has the right to agree or disagree to the plans and the process, a parent should be informed whenever the learning institution wishes to assess the child for special needs education, wishes to change the educational placement of the child or rejects the request for the assessment or change in education placement, a parent should be asked by the school to offer informed consent, this consent is voluntary and can be withdrawn at any moment. Another provision in the law regarding parents is that the parent should be informed by the institution on all the rights provided to the child and the parent under the law. A parent must be kept informed on the progress of the child more often and he or she has the right to be involved in the development of the IEP and IFSP in the case of a young child.
References
Friend, M. (2010). Speicial Education: Contemporary Perspectives for School Profeesionals. New Jersey: Prentice Hall.
Hallahan, K. (2009). Preparation for Individual Family Service Plan (IFSP). International Journal of Education , 12-18.
Katsiyannis, A. (2011). Educational Methodologies . Legal and Practical Considerations , 31-37.
Knoblauch, B. (2015). Rights and Responsiblities of Parents of children with Diasbilities. Individulas with Diasbilities Act .
Kupper, L. (2013). The IEP Team Members . Individual Education plan .
La Salle, T. (2013). The Relationship of IEP Quality to Academic Achievement for Students with Disabilities . International Journal of Special Education , 28(138).
Ronzanski, L. (2014). What is an Individual Transition Plan (ITP). Journal of Special Education .
