Summer is gone and school has started again. It's time to prep your caseload and get everything ready for this school year. We aren't talking about scheduling, though.
Before I even start scheduling, I make a spreadsheet of all of my students. This is where Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets will be your best friend. You can group them by grade or alphabetically (or both), it's up to you. In this spreadsheet you will want to include the following:
- Name
- Grade
- IEP dates - expiration date
- re-eval dates (is this their 3 year re-eval year?)
- service frequency
- area(s) of service (language, articulation, fluency, voice)
I gather this information directly from the source - in Tennessee, that's TN Pulse (their statewide IEP system) but in other states they may use SEAS or another program to write their IEPs. It's best to get this information directly from the source as it keeps errors from happening. Don't go based upon your memory. Yes, it's tedious to have to click on each student's IEP and look for all this information, but I find it refreshes my memory and you make sure that you are meeting their IEP frequencies.
Hopefully, all of the students that you will see have already been assigned to you or you are tagged as a team member. This is also a good way to find "new students" that may have transferred to your school. It's good to periodically check the database to make sure no new students have popped up, especially at the beginning of the year. It is the absolute worst when you find out a student has been assigned to you in the system but no one told you in person or via email.
Once I have all of this information in the big spreadsheet, I make a separate spreadsheet with a list of students whose IEPs are due each month along with the date. The second spreadsheet will be for students who have their 3 year re-evaluation coming up this year. Lastly, another spreadsheet will be for me to track my completion of progress monitoring each period. You can separate the students by grade or just do alphabetically. It's very satisfying to check off a list.
So, by the end you will have the following spreadsheets:
- big overview spreadsheet with a list of all students
- monthly IEP due dates list
- re-evaluation list
- progress reporting completion list
You can print out the spreadsheets and have them in a sheet protector in a safe place for you to quickly reference or you can keep it on the desktop of your computer so you can quickly check. It would be best utilized if you check it monthly to see what is coming so you can plan out what meetings you need to schedule and prepare for.
Katelynn Gibson, M.S., CCC-SLP
