Vision Statement

I wanted to share with everyone how a vision statement should read for your child’s IEP. This was taught to me by our advocate that we just recently hired. Last year, our vision statement for Tyler read as follows:

                                 “We would like to enhance Tyler’s communication and have Tyler live up to the best of his ability.”

Sounds good. We thought that was kind of spot on as we are really trying to work on his communication skill. Well this is what his vision statement is for this year’s IEP:

“We look forward to Tyler’s continued progress over the next year as well as his transition to Kindergarten. Goals that we would love to see Tyler accomplish over the next year include:

• Communication: We would like to see Tyler develop skills to both initiate and reciprocate exchange of conversation. This will be accomplished through sign language, visual cues, and his communication switches. The ultimate goal, of course, would be verbal communication.
• Behaviors: Tyler will be more responsive to requests placed on him by parents and caregivers. The ability to express needs and desires will assist in lessening Tyler’s frustrations when he doesn’t understand or want to comply with requests.
• Walking: We would like to see Tyler get to the point of walking with his walker in the classroom setting under his own power.
• Social Skills: We would like to see Tyler continue to increase successful friendships with classmates and neighborhood children. This has been a joy to watch develop over the last year.
• Fine Motor: We would like to see Tyler return to using utensils during mealtime. We would also like to see Tyler independently hold a crayon and/or paintbrush.”

Quite a difference no??? The advocate explained to us that the vision statement and the list of parent concerns is what really drives the IEP. Can’t wait to drop this off at school tomorrow for them to see