Promoting Self-Determination

The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has proclaimed the basic right of people to make one’s own choices and have an effective participation and inclusion in society. The capacity to choose is the foundation for self-determination, which enables one to experience a quality of life consistent with one’s own values, preferences, strengths, and needs. To be self-determined, persons must have the ability to think for themselves and to take action consistent with that thought. They must be able to make things happen in their lives, to be causal agents, rather than have others do things to or for them. Self-determination is a critical life skill that drives success in education, employment, and independence. Studies show that students who included self-determination goals in their Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) were more likely to earn a higher income 1 year after graduation (Wehmeyer, 2004).

Neurodivergent people often experience challenges in exercising skills associated with self-determination and self-advocacy. The term neurodivergent is a broad, inclusive term that includes ADHD, developmental language impairment, intellectual impairment, dyslexia, autism, traumatic brain injury, and more. A neurodivergent neurological function diverges from what is typically considered to be “normal” or “typical.” When neurodivergent people gain self-determination, they are empowered. Often with neurodivergent children, parents advocate on their behalf for their needs and supports. Although this is initially essential, ultimately, parents, teachers, and SLPs need to teach children and adolescents the skills to self-advocate for themselves.

Self-determination ultimately incorporates self-advocacy or speaking up about what a person wants. It is about making certain that one’s wishes and needs are made clear to another person and ensuring that one has the same rights and choices as everyone else. Self-determination involves being able to ask for help when needed and being willing to ask for clarification and learn new skills. Self-determination has several foundational components or skills:

The booklet Fostering Self-Determination Among Children and Youth with Disabilities—Ideas from Parents for Parents (Weir et al., n.d.) offers specific strategies for parents on how to develop these component skills in self-determination. Self-determination curricula typically focus on middle school and high school students, but this booklet has suggestions for children and adolescents ages 5 to 21 years. The booklet can be downloaded from: https://web.waisman.wisc.edu/www/naturalsupports/pdfs/FosteringSelfDetermination.pdf. This booklet would also be quite useful for speech-language pathologists seeking an understanding of how to develop the components of self-determination in a wide age range of children.

Wehmeyer and Palmer (2000) developed a structure for teaching self-determination to students with a variety of disabilities, The Self-Determined Learning Model of Instruction (SDLMI). The program has three phases, each with a problem to solve:

Each phase has four additional questions that students address to answer the overall question for the phase. Each of these questions has one or more objectives for the adult to assist the child in solving the problem raised by each question. Free online training models that explain and demonstrate each phase of the SDLMI are available at the University of Kansas website: https://sdlmi.ku.edu/. A detailed teacher’s guide is available at: https://beachcenter.lsi.ku.edu/sites/default/files/TeachersGuide.pdf (Shogren et al., 2019). These materials are geared toward middle and high school students. The teacher’s guide describes the SDLMI and how school personnel can use the model to support students with or without disabilities to (a) learn and use skills that enable them to problem-solve, leading to goal-setting and attainment; (b) identify meaningful learning goals across multiple curricular domains; (c) and make progress toward goals across multiple curricular domains. The teacher’s guide provides templates that children can use to record their responses to each question in each phase. Several examples of students’ completed templates are provided. An example is provided of how the template can be modified with picture cues for a student who does not read. With these materials, a speech-language pathologist or teacher can readily implement the SDLMI. Detailed descriptions of how several students progressed through the process are included.

The Arc’s Self-Determination Scale is a student self-report measure of self-determination for adolescents designed to help students and educators identify student strengths and areas of support and instructional need in self-determination. The scale and procedural guidelines are available for download at: https://beachcenter.lsi.ku.edu/beach-self-determination.

The I’m Determined website (https://www.imdetermined.org/) is a state-directed project funded by the Virginia Department of Education that focuses on providing direct instruction, models, and opportunities to practice skills associated with self-determined behavior. This site provides materials that can supplement the SDLMI program. A primary intent of the I’m Determined website is to prepare students to advocate for themselves in IEP meetings. To develop personal goals and self-advocate, students need self-awareness of themselves and an awareness of what others need to know about them if they are to receive appropriate supports. The One-Pager template available on the website has students respond in four boxes regarding their Strengths, Preferences, Interests, and Needs. On the website, there are videos of four adolescents with different types of disabilities describing what they put in each of the boxes. Suggested questions are available to assist students in completing the One-Pager. See Chart 1 above for an example of a completed One-Pager.

OPEN IN VIEWER

Chart 1.

One-Pager Example

My Strengths ● I am learning how to deal with my stuttering ● I am making changes in my breathing and how I talk ● I’m a good reader	My Interests ● Gymnastics ● Drawing ● Camping with my family
My Preferences ● Don’t talk to me about my speech ● Working in small groups, not large groups ● Volunteer to talk, not be called on	My Needs ● Help from my speech therapist ● To be given time to answer questions

Both the I’m Determined website and the University of Kansas Beach Center website are extensive, with many materials and videos to explore and links to related sites. The materials on these sites can be used to teach specific foundational self-determination skills or to implement a comprehensive curriculum involving collaboration between speech-language pathologists and educators. Development of students’ self-determination and self-advocacy should be part of transition planning for students with disabilities. Transition plans are a required part of the special education process designed to help students with disabilities live as independently and self-sufficiently as possible after high school. Schools are required to include a transition plan in students’ IEPs when students turn 16 years old, but ideally, this transition process should begin much sooner. Teaching self-determination skills enables students to participate actively in their educational programs and development of their transition plans.