Curriculum

Growing

For use after the AEPS®-3 Test, this activity-based, multitiered curriculum helps professionals support every child’s development with differentiated instruction in eight developmental areas: Fine Motor, Gross Motor, Adaptive, Social-Emotional, Social-Communication, Cognitive, Literacy, and Math. The AEPS®-3 Curriculum is divided into three levels—Beginning, Growing, and Ready—so that children with different developmental needs can participate in the same activity or routine. This Growing curriculum volume covers skills that typically appear during the toddler years (from 18 months to 3 years of age).

In this volume, professionals will find:

• A complete introduction to the curriculum’s foundations, content, and organization.
• Strategies for matching tiered teaching/intervention strategies—universal, focused, and specialized supports—with young children’s individual needs.
• Instructions on collecting progress monitoring data at each teaching/intervention tier.
• Evidence-based strategies for teaching specific developmental skills within 18 typical routines and activities, such as Meals & Snacks; Nap & Sleep; Diapering, Toileting, & Handwashing; Block Play; and Art.

The AEPS-3 Curriculum is ideal for both classroom and home settings and easily adaptable for each child’s schedule and family cultural context, this expertly organized curriculum is an essential part of the comprehensive, linked AEPS-3 system.

AEPS-3 Curriculum Foundations and Framework

The AEPS-3 Curriculum is grounded in established contemporary early childhood developmental theory as well as recommended practices in early intervention and early childhood special education (EI/ECSE). The AEPS-3 Curriculum is a core component of AEPS-3 and a key part of the AEPS-3 linked system. It is specifically designed to be used as part of a multi-tiered system of support in all early childhood settings.

The curriculum provides content for and guidance on what and how to teach individuals and groups of children (infants, toddlers, and preschoolers) who are learning at different levels and who acquire new skills and information in different ways. The curriculum content and procedures offer teachers, interventionists, and specialists detailed guidance about how to:

• Collect initial assessment information to establish children’s developmental skills.
• Use assessment data to make instructional/programming decisions about outcomes to teach within hierarchical sequences of developmental and content skills.
• Teach skills embedded within regularly occurring routines and activities at home and in classrooms, using a range of evidence-based practices.
• Monitor progress using the AEPS-3 Test to determine whether teaching/intervention efforts have reached goals.

AEPS-3 Curriculum GROWING ROUTINES AND ACTIVITIES

The AEPS-3 Curriculum focuses on teaching during regularly occurring routines and activities at home and in the classroom. It emphasizes play and young children’s successful participation in homes and classrooms. Practitioners use evidence-based strategies to teach specific developmental skills.

Selected Routines:

• Active & Outdoor Play
• Arrival & Departure
• Art
• Bath Time
• Block Play
• Circle Time
• Diapering, Toileting, & Handwashing
• Dramatic Play
• Meals & Snacks
• Music & Movement
• Nap & Sleep
• Science
• Writing

Evidence-Based Practices

The AEPS-3 Curriculum incorporates a variety of evidence-based teaching/intervention practices in ECE/ECSE, defined as practices and programs shown by high-quality research to have meaningful effects on student outcomes. Strategies include embedded instruction and data-driven decision making.

Multi-Tiered System of Support (MTSS)

The AEPS-3 Curriculum is organized as a multi-tiered system of support (MTSS) that provides specific strategies to meet the developmental needs of every child, regardless of the level of support necessary to promote effective learning. The tiered model provides increasingly intensive intervention/instruction to help ensure the level of support needed for each child to participate successfully.