APPENDIXAGLOSSARYOFTERMSANDABBREVIATIONS.pdfVIP

APPENDIX A GLOSSARY OF TERMS AND ABBREVIATIONS GLOSSARY OF TERMS AND ABBREVIATIONS Special Education Terms/Legal Terms Annual Goals – Educational performance to be achieved by a student within one year. Annual Review – Student with disabilities is required by law to have an educational program that is reviewed each year. A review involves an updating of the student’s progress and planning his/her educational programs. Assistive Technology – Services and equipment that enhance the ability of students to be more efficient and successful. Audiologist – A specialist who is concerned with studying the nature of hearing, administering hearing tests to detect possible hearing loss, and giving information about hearing aids, training programs, and medical treatment. Autism – A developmental disability significantly affecting verbal and nonverbal communication and social interaction, generally evident before age three, that adversely affects a child’s educational performance. Other characteristics often associated with autism are engagement in repetitive activities and stereotyped movements, resistance to environmental change or change in daily routines, and unusual responses to sensory experiences. The term does not apply if a child’s educational performance is adversely affected primarily because the child has emotional disturbance, as defined in IDEA (Individual with Disabilities Education Act). Behavior Modification – A technique of changing human behavior, based on a system of positive and negative reinforcement. Emphasis is on observable behaviors and what events precede and follow them. Cerebral Palsy – A group of conditions caused by brain damage usually occurring before or during birth or during the developmental years. Marked especially by impaired muscle control, language, speech, psychological, or learning problems. There are many types of cerebral palsy and it expresses itself differently in each pe