Do IEP goals have to contain language directly from curricular standards or have an indication to which standard, benchmark or indicator is being addressed?
There is no legal requirement to use indicators from the standards for development of IEP goals. The alignment of the IEP and the standards (both general and extended) needs to occur at the level of classroom instruction. Students need to receive instruction on the indicators used for the their state assessment so that they can show proficiency on those assessments. If teams want to use the skills described within the indicators as the behavior for the goals, that’s great, as long as they add the other components needed to make the goals measurable.
