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Hello everyone and welcome again to the What in the World is Dyscalculia podcast.

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I'm Dr. Honora Wall, your host for the podcast and the show is sponsored by

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EduCalc Learning. You've probably already been to visit

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educalclearning.com to get a lot of information, resources, and advice about

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the math learning disability. If you have not, you really should get over there.

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Or you can visit the DTRI.org. Make sure you grab the free brochures and

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infographics on there that you can share with colleagues, teachers, admin,

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friends, family, or students who have dyscalculia. It can also help you decide

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whether or not dyscalculia is the right terminology, diagnosis, name for your

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math difficulties. But then different types of math difficulties aside. That's

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another podcast. Today's episode I want to talk about something that came up in

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a session at the case conference, which I am enjoying very much, and that is

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talking again in the world of accommodations. And in the world of

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goal writing for IEPs and 504s. In the last episode I talked about generalizability

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the importance of a goal that's written to impact multiple areas of a person's

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life. And today I want to talk about the idea of having those goals be written

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for appropriate achievement levels. Without going too far down the rabbit hole.

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The quick way to understand this topic is to know that the goals that are written

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in an IEP or a 504 document are supposed to help outline exactly what we're

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going to do to help students support their learning challenges and how we're

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going to measure and address what worked and how effective they were. We also put

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into those goals what we expect a student to be able to do by the end of a

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school year after certain interventions and accommodations have been put into

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place. And in the last session I was in there was a lot of discussion about that.

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Namely the idea of when we write those goals related to academic achievement

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and progress, what is achievable? What's happened in the past in a lot of states

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and has led to quite a few lawsuits is that the goals were not challenging

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enough and especially if you're working with SLDs, the specific learning

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disorders, any kind of neurodivergence. But listen people, it's true for people

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with any learning disability. We tend to give goals that are just not appropriate

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because they are not challenging and they don't help students get to grade level

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and beyond and that is really what we're supposed to be doing. Well that always

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brings into the conversation the very legitimate question how exactly do we do

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that especially for students who are two sometimes three grade levels behind

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their peers. How do we help a student who needs to learn fifth grade math let's

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say who still doesn't have basic adding and subtracting or multiplying and

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dividing facts memorized and how do we write a goal for grade level content

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when we have these gaps in those foundational pieces. So the quick answer

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is write the academically challenging goal students should and could be doing

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grade level work period end of conversation and I see this happen over

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and over I've seen it for years I'm telling you it is proven to be true

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that students with dyscalculia can do grade level work. Here's how you're

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going to do it. You've heard me talk a lot about using support tools for your

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accommodations depending on grade level using a 1 to 100's chart using a times

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tables list the old-fashioned multiplication list if your student has

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really strong visual spatial skills and you want to give them the multiplication

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chart go right ahead but make sure you use what's best for that student and

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then especially in fifth grade and beyond training students how to use their

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calculator requiring them to use it for precision and accuracy and using it for

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those parts and pieces of a problem you don't need to put 1.37 times 2.89 in a

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calculator and just get a final answer. You can show the student how to use the

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standard algorithm for multiplying starting with the ones place and then

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doing all the multiplication next line and a zero start with the tens place you

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can do each of those individual parts with a calculator or with the

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multiplication list that's going to help the student focus on grade level work

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without being inhibited or impaired by the challenge of their learning

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disability which with dyscalculia makes their mind literally lose math

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information once they've learned it so that piece of fluency and automaticity

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can be very hard the parietal lobe is working against the student so you

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support that part with that accommodation now you can have grade level

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conversations about perimeter area volume working with formulas understanding

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word problems because we've removed the piece that's the actual struggle once

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you remove that piece now we're doing grade level work I can assure you because

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I've seen it with almost all of my students I would say all to some degree

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when you require precision and require checking they work immediately hey we

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need to multiply nine times eight grab that list or grab your calculator put in

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nine times eight tell me what you get look up the nines on that multiplication

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list find nine times eight tell me what it says now you're only having exposure

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to the right answer that's the only thing the brain can code it's the only

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neurological connection that can be formed you're not having the student

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guess you're not having them do the work without checking because now we have no

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idea what went wrong and what went right the brain doesn't know what to

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confirm or deny now we have a train wreck so use those tools you will find that

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fluency can increase over time does that mean your student with dyscalculia is

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going to memorize all of the basic facts and know them forever probably not but

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there are times I got to stop and think about nine times eight myself and I

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don't have dyscalculia I have a brain that's full of lots of other knowledge

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and sometimes those math facts float around in the back and it takes a minute

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so for any student using these accommodations can increase fluency

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and increase performance and achievement in turn that increases

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engagement that increases mastery that increases self-confidence and our math

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identity etc etc all of those trending keywords that we talk about so much in

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education it can all be done by using the right accommodation put that into

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your IEP goals that you're going to track if the student uses their tools

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appropriately and with consistency 85% of the time they're going to see the

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results of that work and they're going to continue because now they want to be

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precise and when that pressure is off now they can engage with you in the

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conceptual understanding and in the new vocabulary of the grade level work so

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quick and easy way get everybody doing grade level work put it into your IEP

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and 504 goals and go ahead and make them academically challenging because these

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students are capable of it and they wish someone would show them exactly what to

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do so that they can show you exactly what they are capable of if you want more

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information about that visit either website

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educalclearning.com or the DTRI.org or email me Honora H-O-N-O-R-A

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at either of those educalc learning.com or the DTRI.org thank you

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very much for listening to the what in the world is Dyscalculia podcast I'm

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going to hop into another session at this great conference and bring you some

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new information in the next episode see you then