The Essential IEP Meeting Checklist: A Guide for Parents

Personal sharing time alert.  When my third child was 18 months old I took him to his pediatrician to receive his scheduled immunizations (which included 5 different shots!).  Later that day he suffered a traumatic seizure in which he fell unexpectedly, began jerking uncontrollably and then finally stopped only to become unconscious and quit breathing for a little over 2 minutes. That was the worst day of my life. He was airlifted to a hospital about an hour away. The doctors at the hospital sent us home with no answers saying that, “children and adults alike can have an unexplained, isolated seizure and be fine and never have one again.” Thank God he suffered no serious effects from the seizure that day, but as mother I sensed that something just seemed off with my son. He is 18 years old now and has never had another seizure. 

As he became a toddler it became evident that he had some developmental delays and behavioral disorders. He was a little behind hitting some milestones and more significantly behind on others…specifically talking.  I kept telling myself, oh he is just a boy, they don’t talk as soon as little girls (my oldest two children were girls) or he’s the youngest child, he doesn’t have to talk because his older siblings just do everything for him. When he did begin talking, it was as if he had his own little language that only we could understand. In addition, he began to have severe tantrums out of frustration that included inflicting harm to himself and others. The word defiant didn’t even begin to describe him.  Then things got real when his pediatrician referred us to have him evaluated by a state funded program that provided early childhood services.  He qualified immediately and started receiving speech therapy as well as occupational therapy.  He had an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) before starting school and continued to have one until his 5th grade year of elementary school.

Year after year I would attend biannual or annual IEP meetings and you would think I would have become a pro at it.  I didn’t.  I became a pro at sitting politely in the meetings and listening.  Listening as psychologists, teachers and therapists gave their reports and recommendations regarding my son but never speaking up myself and actually participating as a member of the IEP team.  Too uncomfortable to ask for something to be explained again or to ask what one of the 20 acronyms they used meant. Honestly, I always felt like I entered the school building before those meetings already emotionally charged up to begin with and just wanted to be able to get through the meeting without crying. 

I hated that feeling and it all built up inside me until one year when I had a disagreement with the IEP team and decided to never feel that way again.  I was already in the process of going back to college to earn my Bachelor’s degree in education and become a math teacher.  Even though it would take me a little longer, I met with my advisor and made the change that would put me on the path of graduating with a dual certification in middle school mathematics AND special education. I wanted to be a person in the IEP meetings that could relate to parents, understand what they were feeling and hopefully help them feel more comfortable.  Even though I cannot be there for your upcoming meeting friend, I do have some advice and tips for you in preparing for an upcoming IEP meeting.

{DOWNLOAD YOUR IEP CHECKLIST HERE}

What is an IEP Meeting?

There are different types of IEP meetings depending on the purpose and objective. Since Individualized Education Plans (IEPs) expire after one year, the most common type of IEP meeting happens once a year when the team must meet to approve a new IEP, frequently referred to as annual meeting or annual review. An “Annual IEP Meeting” is essentially a meeting of everyone involved in providing special education services to a student, (including their parent(s) or guardians, teachers, therapists, etc.), to discuss the student’s progress, needs and to develop and put in place either an initial IEP (if this is the first one), or a new IEP to replace an existing one that has expired. Additionally, other IEP meetings are held when it is time for re-evaluations, to make mid-year amendments to the IEP if needed or to terminate special education services just to name a few.

Who Attends an IEP meeting?

Educators (me included) have a bad habit of using an acronym as an abbreviation for our titles. Here is a list of common IEP team members and their acronyms along with a general description of what each person does. *Note - Each IEP meeting is unique to the student’s needs and eligibility. Not ALL of these members will be present at every student’s IEP meeting, and some may have all of these members and even more!

Gen Ed Teacher - General Education Teacher - These are grade level classroom teachers.  In some elementary schools these teachers are responsible for teaching all subjects to the same class while in others they are responsible for teaching one specific subject to the students in a grade level.

Sped. Teacher a.k.a. Case Manager - Special Education Teacher - This is the special education teacher that works with your student on their academic, functional and behavioral IEP goals and objectives as well as helps provide other support and accommodations as listed on their IEP.

LEA Representative - Local Education Agency - This is the meeting chair representing the school district and responsible for leading the meeting and ensuring that the correct processes are followed. School principals, assistant principals and special education directors frequently serve as the LEA Representative.  However, school districts also frequently designate other administrative level school district employees to serve in this role.

SLP - Speech Language Pathologist - The speech language pathologist provides speech therapy services to your student focusing on making progress on the speech and language goals and objectives listed in the IEP.

School Psychologist - Responsible for completing and reporting results of evaluations and reevaluations of your student’s academic, functional, cognitive, and social/emotional status, achievements, and deficits using various psychological diagnostic tests, standardized academic assessments and other norm-referenced assessments.

OT - Occupational Therapist - Provides therapy to your student that is focused on improving their ability to perform everyday tasks in school that they struggle with.  Areas an occupational therapist may provide services in may include fine motor skills (writing, using scissors, etc.), sensory processing, self-regulation, and self-care.

PT - Physical Therapist - Works with students who have functional limitations due to a condition that compromises their ability to equally participate in and access educational services.

How to Prepare for an IEP Meeting

Make sure you know when the meeting is and make plans ahead of time to be there. You should receive notices in the mail and/or sent home with your student well in advance notifying you of the meeting date and time. Once you have those basic details covered, use these tips and our free IEP Meeting Checklist to collect your thoughts so you can be prepared to participate in the discussion:

Step 1: Write down any concerns you have regarding your child. It's often helpful to organize your thoughts around these major areas:

• Health concerns (physical or mental) or changes. The IEP team should ask you for a medical update regarding your student so be sure to include any medical diagnoses received since the last meeting, medication changes, or other medical information you would like to share.
• Academic concerns, such as concerns related to reading, spelling, writing and math.
• Social, emotional or behavioral concerns. Are there certain situations that cause social anxiety for your child? Do they respond better to certain types of motivation? Do they struggle with executive dysfunction? Again, the IEP team should ask for your input in this area as these types of concerns can impact your child's learning as well as their overall educational experience. 

Step 2: Involve your child if they are old enough. At a certain age, usually around 3rd or 4th grade, kids become mature enough to have meaningful conversations with you regarding their special education placement. I think too often parents steer clear of these conversations for fear of causing emotional stress. However, these kids walk the walk of receiving special education services daily. They are usually very aware of their strengths and weaknesses and most likely have valuable input regarding their special education experience. Talk to your child about the upcoming meeting and explain to them what it is for and ask them if they have any questions or concerns that they would like for you to bring up.

Step 3: Write down your top 3. Reflect on everything you have just written down. Pick 3 things that you feel are the most important for your student to make progress on and write them down. 

During an IEP Meeting

Before the meeting begins you should be introduced to all of the team members. Make sure you understand what each person’s role is in your child’s education and life. That way you feel more comfortable addressing the appropriate person with questions. Remember, you are an important member of the IEP team! During the meeting, use these tips to maximize your participation:

Tip 1: Ask for a copy of the draft IEP. You should be provided with a copy of the draft that has been prepared for the meeting so that you can follow along as each section is presented to you. SPOILER ALERT: 99% of the IEP is already completed before the meeting even starts. However, the IEP team (which, again, includes you!!) must approve it in order for it to become official and the IEP can absolutely be edited during the meeting. Until all team members sign off on the IEP it is just a draft.

Tip 2: Remember to ask what you can do at home to support your student. Pay close attention to the goals and corresponding objectives that have been set for your student.  Remember that over the course of the year it will be each service provider’s primary objective to help your student achieve these goals (the special education teacher: academic goals; Speech therapist: speech and language goals; etc.). Ask if there is anything you can do at home to help reinforce what they are working on at school and write down any advice you receive.

Tip 3: Listen closely to the IEP goals and make sure you agree. Some advice from me as a special education teacher I want you to know and understand is that while we try to always offer support to whatever your student is working on in their general education classroom, our ultimate responsibility is to the IEP goals.  When developing these goals, we are supposed to make them reflect a critical skill area that your student has not mastered and write the goals and corresponding short-term objectives to reflect what the student should be able to accomplish in one year’s time. For example, if your 6th grade student has an IEP goal for math that reads something like, “By April 3, 2025, John will solve 10 multi-step word problems involving operations with fractions with 80% accuracy on 2 out of 3 trials (a 5th grade skill),” then when that special education teacher sees John for math services, he/she will be working with him on skills related to that math goal. However, in John’s 6th grade general education math class, they may be learning about expressions and equations.  Sure, the special education teacher can and probably will try to spend some of the time they have with your student helping them better understand what they are learning in their general education math class, BUT this can’t and doesn’t always happen because our job is to close the gap and work on those critical skills from previous grade levels your student is missing. 

The point I am trying to make in saying all this is that you need to closely look at your student’s goals and objectives and make sure you agree that they 1) are critical skills and 2) are not something that you could and would be willing to accomplish at home.  If you are about to have an IEP meeting and your student’s math goal is centered on learning their multiplication facts and you will commit to making sure your student learns them fluently over the summer, then that should not be an IEP goal. However, if you speak up and make these commitments then DO YOUR PART! Am I making sense here? I hope so.  I say all this with the love of a parent and the concern of a teacher.

Tip 4: Speak up about your big 3. Bring up those 3 important things you wrote down when preparing for the meeting and speak up!  Your perspective and input are just as important as the other team members, if not more. It may be that after discussing one of your concerns a new goal is written OR it may be that you feel confident in the concern being addressed through other means.  The bottom line is if you thought it important enough to your child’s success and happiness in school to write it down as one of your top 3 concerns then you should bring it up.

After Your IEP Meeting

Walk out of that school with your head held high knowing that you prepared and participated like a boss! Reflect on any commitments you made and/or advice you received and write down 1 thing you can do for each item to start working on it immediately with your student.  For example, if you made a commitment to help your student learn their multiplication facts then you could write down your next step to getting started on this at home would be to download and print out our FREE Multiplication Practice Guide and our FREE Multiplication Game 😊.

You can also brush up on other ways to help your student by checking out our math tips & strategies for students with IEPs. 

Feeling a little overwhelmed?  Wish you had a way to follow through with and organize all of the tasks I have assigned you?  We thought you might!  Download your FREE IEP Meeting Checklist and thank us by sharing this article and free resource with someone you know!  I wish I would have had this resource back when I was the parent sitting in those meetings feeling unsure of myself.  If I got through those meetings without a resource like this, then you are going to rock it!

And if you are wondering….I did become that special education teacher that still attends IEP meetings remembering what it was like to be the parent and I always try to participate in each meeting advocating for my student needs and making their parents’ feel comfortable and included.

As for my son….he is the pride of my life.  For the sake of his privacy, I will not go into details, but he faced setbacks that most kids are lucky enough not to understand. He faced them and fought through them.  He is now 19 years old and is a freshman in college after completing a combination of basic training and AIT training in the U.S. Army.