Autism-World

Q:I’m doing an assignment where I have to write an IEP for a child with special needs for a Special Education unit. To do this I have to provide a profile of the student.

My student is a 13 year old boy classified as having high functioning autism ( with a mild intellectual disability). While in most circumstances you wouldn’t perform a WISC or woodcock etc with this child, for the purpose of the assignment I’d like to provide the scores, would anybody have an idea what they would look like?

I was hoping that he’s be around a grade 2/3 level in terms of reading / writing.

Answer:

The cognitive functioning component of your profile really would fall below a Full Scale IQ (FSIQ) of 70 to be classified as a “mild intellectual disability” according to Ch300. This would also classify the student as Mentally retarded. However, if by “mild intellectual disability” you intended a learning disability (LD), then a FSIQ of 71 to 110 would be apppropriate. 71 to 80 is Borderline, 81 to 90 is low-average with average being 91 to 109.

Actually, you should always perform a cognitve measure in order to determine the child’s ability in order as well as rule out Mental Retardation (MR). In this case you should also adminster adaptive behavior measures (Vineland II) and an autism rating scale (CARS, GARS). Observations of the child’s behavior in academic and non-academic settings are also a priority. You might find the DSM-IV TR useful in providing behaviors to describe the child in the profile.

Just remember in your IEP, the lastest version of the Wechsler is the WISC-IV, and the Woodcock is the WJ-III (woodcock has both a cognitve and achievement measure. Also, the IEP goals need to measurable and behavioral. These should be based on the child’s academic needs and NOT on diagnosis. Diagnosis simply leads to qualification for eligibility for special ed. After that, the needs of the child drive the IEP and program.

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This entry was posted on Friday, September 14th, 2007 at 8:29 pm and is filed under Ask and answer.