Part 1: Present Level of Academic Achievement and Functional Performance
Students Strengths
Written and Spoken Language
Anna is able to maintain good conversations mostly with adults since she has a good vocabulary and the ability to speak fluently. She has outspoken and has the capacity to communicate what she intends to with the people that she prefers to speak to such as her teachers, counselor, her mother, as well as her grandmother. In addition, she is also capable of initiating comments to keep the conversation she has with adults going. Anna initiates conversations by asking questions, an effective communication strategy. Moreover, Anna is very skilled at developing complete sentences. Adherence to the basic rules of punctuation is evident in her sentences, which is one of her major strengths in language.
Behavior
In the case of behavior, a number of strengths are evident in the case study. In addition, she also answers the questions that she is asked and expresses herself fully. She also loves conversing with adults and even admits to liking her teachers and counselor. Furthermore, she enjoys interacting with adults since she feels that they understand her, as compared to her peers who perceive her as a freak.
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Evaluations
Performance in Classes
Anna’s performance is rather mediocre when it comes to classes. The student fails to complete her homework at the required time. She is also unable to keep up with class notes, and her grades continue to deteriorate in several classes. Both verbal (WISC) and non-verbal testing are done to test and evaluate Anna’s average intelligence rate. The tests indicated an average intelligence range since she has an IQ of 105.
Influences of Language, Culture, and Family Background
Anna’s mother has a significant influence on her life. Anna admits that she attends school so that she can make her mother happy. Anna’s inability to effectively interact with her peers and her self-esteem issues can be attributed to the lack of an intimate relationship with her biological father, as well as her mother, who works full-time. Other than this, language has a great influence on the students’ academic performance. Anna is unable to develop correct paragraphs following topic sentence, which deters her from expressing herself well in writing. The major weakness that is evident in the case study the perception that Anna has of herself, which deters her from reaching the greatest potentials in her personal life, as well as academics ( Laryea, Saani, & Dawson-Brew, 2014 ). For instance, despite the fact that she loves sports, she is unable to participate in any sport-related activity because she considers herself too small.
Part 2: Annual Goals
Behavioral Goal
Anna will engage in three positive or neutral four-word verbal communications with her colleagues on fourteen out of twenty occasions over a period of one month, as measured by weekly frequency reporting and curriculum-based assessment will be used to measure the attainment of this goal
Academic Goal
Anna will improve her school attendance and complete her homework in the given time, which will be longer than the deadlines given to the other students. The instructor will keep a portfolio of this student’s work to assess whether there is any improvement in homework completion after school attendance has been improved.
Part Three: Rationale
The established goals are highly reasonable and attainable based on PLAAFP. The behavioral goal is targeted at promoting the interactions between Anna and her peers. The use of four-word verbal interactions fourteen times a month will heighten Anna’s self-esteem and confidence, enabling her to converse and sustain good interactions with her classmates effectively. In addition, the four-word verbal interactions will take place over a considerable amount of time, enabling the student to develop gradually in terms of peer interaction. This way, Anna will be able to make friends and be more participative in group work, which is a critical determiner of success. The behavioral goal is measurable by use of curriculum-based assessment, which allows the instructor to determine the behavioral progress of the student since it is based on observation. In addition, this measurement strategy enables the teacher to gauge the effectiveness of the approaches used to meet the goal ( Tindal, 2013 ), fostering the implementation of necessary changes if the learning strategies are deemed ineffective for promoting the desired behavior.
The academic goal has been developed based on the major academic concerns highlighted in the case study. Improvement in school attendance is realistic since it is one of the major reasons for Anna’s poor performance. It is crucial for students to attend lessons maximally so that they can have a comprehensive understanding of the content. Masino & Niño-Zarazúa (2016) argue that students who are unable to attend classes lack the capacity to finish their homework since they fail to understand what is expected since most of the content is taught using the previously learned information. Improving school attendance would enable Anna to complete her homework during the specified time, and improve her academic performance. The measurement strategy is realistic and logical since it is highly dependent on observation. A student’s portfolio enables instructors to store a record of the student’s progress in terms of homework completion, and gauge whether increased school attendance has an influence on this activity. In addition, the portfolio allows the teacher to assess the learners understanding of the topic, and make clarifications where necessary. Most importantly, it fosters individualized learning which is critical for the academic success of special needs students such as Anna.
References
Laryea, J. E., Saani, A. J., & Dawson-Brew, E. (2014). Influence of Students Self-concept on their Academic Performance in the Elmina Township. European Journal of Research and Reflection in Educational Sciences Vol , 2 (4).
Masino, S., & Niño-Zarazúa, M. (2016). What works to improve the quality of student learning in developing countries?. International Journal of Educational Development , 48 , 53-65.
Tindal, G. (2013). Curriculum-based measurement: A brief history of nearly everything from the 1970s to the present. ISRN Education , 2013 .
Van Blerkom, M. L. (2017). Measurement and statistics for teachers . Routledge.
