IEP DATA

One of the most important part of a special education teacher's job is collecting data. I have worked doing Discrete Trials and love DATA!! But getting it within the classroom setting is difficult. I prefer to work one on one with the children, but some days that isn't possible. I do my best to do class projects and lessons that work for many IEP goals. Using Read It Once Again has given me many tools to make that happen.
 
 But once I do the activities I have to take data that it was done. I have kept many types of data sheets and they have worked okay, but once I was given an iPad by my district, I started researching apps that may help. 

I have found IEP PAL!! I have been using it for a couple of weeks, and have fallen in love with this!! The cost was $95 that I used from my classroom account. (I AM NOT BEING PAID TO WRITE THIS :)I played with it some over the summer, but finally took the plunge and put all my students goals, etc. in the system a few weeks ago. It took some time, but since our student's IEPs are computer based I was able to cut and past from one program to another. If you do purchase this, I highly recommend printing the manual and taking the free online training. Since vocabulary across districts for IEPs can be different some of the things were a bit confusing, but everyone within the company is AMAZING!! They take feedback and use that to make improvements to the program. 

Things it does that are WONDERFUL!
-you can collect prompt data and within that you can keep data on what type of prompts you are using
-Voice recording-you can make audio notes, or even record a child's response to use as data
-note taking-you can type up notes about progress and information about the session
-reports to show growth that are more understandable to parents 
-make notes on behavior/attention for the sessions
-have several students at a time within a session
-it is very customizable that you can make it work any way you wish! Use prompts or not, use benchmarks or not, 
-you can put data in after a session if that is needed. (once I left my iPad at home and was panicking trying to take data the old way.)
 

I am looking forward to writing my first IEP based on the data collected with IEP PAL.