The program objectives promote normalization, self-sufficiency, and serving the IEP (Individualized Educational Plan) needs of students with disabilities. Emphasis is on providing secondary students with appropriate and effective instruction so they can successfully meet the demands of the secondary school setting. High school adolescents are proceeding from a stage in which they are totally dependent on the direction and protection of adults to a stage in which they will be independent and responsible for themselves. The secondary special education teacher will help in this process. Compensatory services as well as remediation are provided in the resource setting.

The special education staff has modified materials and course work for students in most of the required classes and popular electives. This is an on-going effort. Material modifications include study guides, books on tape, lecture notes, review materials, and adaptive computer programs. Elective credit is available through a learning strategies program for those students who are eligible through their IEP.

Successful programming techniques in special education are: parallel instruction, remediation, adaptive testing, compensation, role-playing, small group instruction, student progress reports, self-contained instruction via IEP classes, class-within-a-class instruction and learning strategies programming.

Support programs in special education include: school staffings, annual IEPS, technical, Transitional and Vocational assessment and programming, periodic one-on-one teacher contact for all SSD students.

What are Learning Strategies?
In almost every educational setting there are some students who are low achievers. The causes of low achievement are quite varied, but in many instances students perform poorly because they have not learned "how to learn". Research has shown that students can be taught how to learn by teaching them learning strategies. Learning strategies are defined as "techniques, principles, or rules that will facilitate the acquisition, manipulation, integration, storage, and retrieval of information across situations, and settings." (Alley and Deshler, 1979). Learning strategies instruction focuses on both how to learn and how to effectively use what has been learned.

As students progress through the educational system, the curriculum places increasing demands on them for acquiring and maintaining large amounts of information. It also stresses that a demonstration of their knowledge and command of this information be performed. The Learning Strategies Curriculum has been designed to enable students to cope effectively with such curriculum demands and to teach them how to generalize their use of these skills to a variety of settings. The goal of the Learning Strategies is to enable students to learn skills and content and to perform tasks independently.

What are Self-Contained Classes?
Several courses are offered at Lafayette in all of the core academic areas. Courses vary from year to year based on student need. These courses include the following: Math, English, American History, Government, World History, Biology, Physical Science, Health, Computer Skills, Social Skills and Pre-Vocational Education.

The classes integrate individualized instructional goals and objectives from the students' IEPs with the Rockwood Curriculum and Missouri's Core Competency Objectives. Students are prepared to deal with situations in their daily lives that require knowledge of Math, English, Science and History. Problem solving strategies and real world applications are used throughout to make learning relevant and practical.

What is Class-Within-A-Class (CWC)?
Special School District teachers and Lafayette teachers work collaboratively to service special educations students in a general education setting. This service delivery model primarily focuses on students with mild to moderate disabilities. Each Class-within-a-class site goes through a specific development and approval process and a extensive training program prior to implementation.

The types and number of classes offered, varies from year to year based on student need and the availability of trained staff.