Emma is a fifth grade student at a local elementary school who is being referred to special education for the first time. Her fifth-grade teacher collected a variety of intervention data for her throughout the spring semester. From the best available data, it appears that Emma is reading at about the 1st-grade level. She seems to have a strong understanding of her alphabet and the sounds of the letters, but when she is asked to decode even the most basic words, she struggles. She appears to be operating at about the 3rd grade level for math. Emma has a strong understanding of addition and subtraction, is able to do single digit multiplication, but struggles with any problems dealing with division, fractions, or word problems.

Behaviorally, Emma is struggling. She talks out during instruction, gets out of her seat frequently during independent work, and has had a hard time relating to her peers. The only time Emma really seems engaged with school is when they are doing things related to art and music – Emma has natural gifts there! When she is asked to draw a picture for an assignment, she is usually the top scorer in the class. Her fifth-grade teacher is also concerned with speech problems and thinks this might be the reason that Emma is struggling with making friends. Emma’s parents are equally concerned with her academics, and really want Emma to receive as much help as possible. They report that Emma has started begging to stay home from school every morning.

Based on the information provided in this scenario, write a guide for the multidisciplinary team/IEP team to help them to support Emma’s education. This is meant as a guide for the team, meaning the steps the multidisciplinary/IEP team must take when looking at Emma’s situation. It is not an actual IEP. All guides should be based on information related to IDEA (2004), Chapter 1, and the materials read related to an IEP. Specifically, guides should address the following points:

1. The steps the team should take in assessing and determining Emma’s eligibility for special education 
   • This section is about the steps that must be taken by law (IDEA, 2004) to determine if a student is eligible for special education. It is the pre-referral, referral and identification process for special education. This also includes what takes place after a student is determined to be eligible for special education. 
2. The members of the IEP team and a discussion of why they should be invited 
   • According to IDEA (2004) law, certain individuals are required to be present, and there is a reason why each should be at the meeting. You need to identify and explain why each person should be there.
3. The main areas of educational need (areas of difficulty) that Emma has based on the data presented in this case study.
   • Here you need to indicate which areas Emma is demonstrating difficulty. You need to be sure to identify both academic and behavioral areas and clearly link areas of educational need to the case study. For instance, if you think she has difficulty in writing, indicate how you came up with that conclusion based on what you read in the case study.
4. If the team determines that Emma is eligible for special education, identify and briefly describe the main parts of an IEP
   • These are all the sections that make up an IEP. For instance, all IEPs must have an Annual Goals section. You DO NOT need to create an IEP for Emma.
5. Provide Annual Goals for the team to use in Emma’s IEP
   • These are the annual goals the IEP team might be able to use in Emma’s actual IEP based on Emma’s areas of educational need.
   • Please be sure to refer to the IRIS Module: IEPs, Developing High Quality IEPs for directions on writing IEP goals and make sure they are observable and measurable. These should be based off of Emma’s identified areas of need. 
     • For instance, if Emma had difficulty with reading comprehension, an Annual Goal could be “By the end of the school year, Emma will answer inferential questions from a 4.0-grade level passage with 85% accuracy.”