Identifying Students with Special Needs During the School Years

Buy this book »

Most students with special needs are not recognized as requiring special education and related services until they are in elementary school. In this article we provide a detailed look at the process by which these children are identified and how they are served during the school years. As we present this information, keep in mind that while federal laws apply to all school districts and schools in the United States, state and local laws may also be applied, and they may vary. Therefore, as a new teacher, whether in special education or general education, you should familiarize yourself with local policies that address referral and placement procedures for students with special needs.

Identification through Parents, Teachers, and Screening

During the early elementary school years, school officials might recognize a child as a possible candidate for special education services in different ways. In many cases, parents may feel their child is having difficulty and discuss this issue with the teacher. This discussion might lead to a formal evaluation that may confirm that the child is eligible for special education services. Even without input from a parent, the teacher may recognize that the child is having learning or behavioral difficulties and request a formal evaluation. If this occurs, the school notifies the parents to ask for their consent to allow the evaluation process to begin.

Additionally, most school districts use screening tests to find children who might have special needs. These screenings look for academic or learning problems, behavioral problems, or sensory or physical needs of young children. It is important to note that large-scale screening procedures are only intended to help identify students who potentially have special needs. The testing instruments used for screenings do not possess the technical qualities that would allow a definitive determination to be made about a student's eligibility for special services. For this to occur, only an individual evaluation procedure can be used.

Early Intervening Services

Historically, regardless of the source of concern about the child—parental worry, teacher observation, or a screening process—most school districts would not refer a child experiencing academic or behavioral difficulties for an initial eligibility evaluation until after attempting a prereferral intervention. The child would continue in the general education classroom while this special effort was undertaken to address academic or behavioral needs.

Prereferral interventions have never been required under federal law, and they still are not; but over the years many states have required their school districts to use them, and most of the other states have strongly recommended them to their school districts (Buck, Polloway, Smith-Thomas, & Cook, 2003). Under IDEA 2004, school districts may use a portion of their federal special education funds (up to 15%) to "develop and implement coordinated, early intervening services … for students in kindergarten through grade 12 (with a particular emphasis on students in kindergarten through grade three) who have not been identified as needing special education or related services but who need additional academic and behavioral support to succeed in a general education environment" (U.S. Department of Education, 2005, italics added). This means that the U.S. Department of Education would like school districts to successfully serve students in general education rather than identify them as eligible for special education services.