Embedding IEP goals into routine activities

     Embedding learning opportunities into the routine daily activities is an important method of instruction for early educators, particularly those with students with special needs (Cook, Klein, Tessier, 2008).  Although special activities and games are fun ways to learn new skills, the daily practice that is embedded into routines and procedures gives the children a more functional way to learn the desired skills.  For example, if a child has a social skills goal in which she is to greet her peers with eye contact and a verbal or  gestural greeting, then it makes sense to practice this each day when she and her peers arrive at school. Role playing during morning meeting or group times is valuable, but the best time for daily practice - when the greeting makes most sense, is during arrival time.  The same is true for other social skills goals, self care goals, classroom behavior goals and motor development goals.  Specifically teaching these skills during the natural times when these skills would occur will offer the students the best opportunities for successfully learning the skills.
     Other learning opportunities can be embedded into  play centers as the text book suggests.  The dramatic play center is a great venue for practicing dressing skills, manners, turn taking, multi-step play schemes, cooperative play, problem solving... the list is endless.  Generating and expanding language can occur at any center.  If the teacher is in the center playing with the children, she can work on IEP goals relating to social communication, vocabulary and sentence expansion.  Many students have IEP goals relating to problem solving and conflict resolution.  Any center provides a good opportunity for the teacher to facilitate the development of these skills.  
     With my own students, I have found that students socialize and generate language much more on the playground than in the classroom.  It may be because there is less structure and fewer restrictions on the playground.  This gives the teachers many opportunities to facilitate language and social skills.  There are many opportunities for the teacher to help students with self-advocacy skills.  Of course getting ready to go outside is when everyone is working on self-care skills such as putting on coats and buttoning and zipping. And for those students working on gross motor skills, the playground may offer the best place to move freely without barriers and obstructions.
     I have a class of 12 students with developmental delays.  Nearly every moment of the day is an opportunity for these children to practice the skills they are developing.  From the moment they get off their transportation and greet the teacher,  to the moment they get back on their transportation and say goodbye,  the children are practicing daily living skills that come naturally to the rest of us.

Cook, Ruth E., Klein, Diane M., Tessier, Annette.  Adapting Early Childhood Curricula for Children with Special Needs (7th edition).  Upper Saddle River, New Jersey, Columbus, Ohio:  Pearson Merrill Prentice Hall, 2008.