In-Home Services

What's Required

For a Texas student with autism eligible for special education and related services, the ARD/IEP Committee must consider all eleven peer reviewed, research-based educational programming practice strategies under §89.1055(e) of the Texas Administrative Code (TAC). In-home/community-based training is one of the eleven strategies or options an ARD/IEP Committee may choose for a student with autism in order for the student to learn or to reinforce social skills in a variety of settings. This practice is to ensure a student with autism who may have difficulty generalizing skills from one environment to another receives needed supports and services. In-home and community-based training (IH/CBT) is a related service that must be considered as one of eleven strategies on the Autism Supplement for a student with autism eligibility, and when needed, addressed in the IEP. While IH/CBT is used to generalize IEP-related social/behavioral skills across settings, such as school-to-home, school-to-community, home-to-community, and community-to-home, it is not an automatic service for a student with an autism spectrum disorder.

In-home training may also be considered for students with other special education eligibility, if the student is exhibiting social/behavioral needs as indicated above.

What We Do

The In-Home Community-Based Training (IH/CBT) consists of four levels:

Level 1 is identification.

Level 2 is intervention.

Level 3 is a formal evaluation.

Level 4 is direct IH/CBT services.

Level 1: Identification of the need for support: There are three criteria for viable alternatives or IH/CBT supports:

• • • a student is able to perform a critical social/behavioral task or skill identified on the IEP in one setting but not across settings. If this is the case, then tier 2 is recommended.

    • a student is working on a critical skill that can only be acquired if the skill is taught simultaneously in multiple settings. If this occurs, then tier 2 is recommended.

    • a student is demonstrating a serious safety deficit such as, but not limited to, persistent self-injurious behaviors or running after moving cars. If this is the case, then proceed immediately to Level 3...

Level 2: Campus-based interventions/viable alternatives:

• • • Gather baseline information and data on the critical skills that is not generalizing.

    • The campus level staff will identify the present level of performance, the current level of learning across settings

    • Implement necessary campus strategies or viable alternatives

    • The campus staff will identify appropriate strategies, determine who will implement each strategy, and decide on the frequency and duration of each strategy

    • Data is collected to determine if the interventions have been effective.

    • If the data show that the student is making progress and the interventions appear to be effective, then the supports remain in place and progress is monitored across settings.

    • If the data show that the interventions were not effective in helping the student perform a behavior/social skill previously learned in another environment or the student is not acquiring a critical skill, then proceed to Level 3.

Level 3: Referral for a formal IH/CBT and parent/family training and support evaluation:

• • • Before an evaluation can begin, the campus must submit, to the campus behavior or autism specialist, the following documents:

1. IEP with updated goals and objectives

2. FBA/BIP (if applicable)

3. Campus strategies/viable alternatives documentation (3-6 weeks of progress monitoring)

4. Contact information for teacher, school and parent/guardian including names, addresses and phone numbers

5. Parental Consent for Evaluation

• • • • An IH/CBT evaluation will be completed within 60 calendar days of the signed consent for evaluation.

      • If the evaluator recommends direct IH/CBT and Parent/Family Training services, the goals and objectives will be identified in the evaluation along with recommended time for direct services.

      • The ARD/IEP Committee will take the recommendations from the evaluation into consideration and determine the amount of direct service time and goals and objectives that need to be addressed during IH/CBT.

      • Although parent/family training and support is often incorporated into IH/CBT services, goals and objectives will not be written for parent/family training and support services.

...

Level 4: When an ARD/IEP Committee determines a student needs IH/CBT services:

• • • • A trainer/educator from the campus, who is familiar with the student, is assigned to provide services.

      • IH/CBT can take place in the home or in the community where the parent observes the trainer working with the student at least 50% of the time and the trainer observes the parent working with the student at least 50% of the time.

      • The trainer and the parent/guardian spend an equal amount of time observing each other and assisting the student on the identified IH/CBT goals and objectives.

      • The first session is primarily spent gathering information about the setting(s) where the sessions will be conducted.

      • This includes investigating needed materials and methods of instruction.

      • The parent Acknowledgement of and Agreement to IH/CBT direct services is reviewed with the parent and signed

      • If the parent refuses to sign the agreement, then services will stop and an ARD/IEP Committee must reconvene to discuss parental concerns.

      • Sessions will be cancelled if the student is ill or the trainer is absent from duty on the day of the session.

      • If a student is receiving direct IH/CBT services at the time of the annual ARD/IEP committee meeting, a summary report describing the progress on the objectives and time remaining will be provided to the ARD/IEP Committee

      • It is the responsibility of the special education case manager/teacher to notify the IH/CBT trainer of the ARD/IEP committee meeting date.

Related Information:

In Home Screener-English

In Home Screener-Spanish

In-Home Parent Agreement