Teacher has her arms crossed on top of a stack of textbooks.

Are these textbooks accessible to all students?

Written in Partnership by:

Skip Stahl and Chuck Hitchcock
NIMAS Development and Technical
Assistance Centers

Bonnie D. Jones
Office of Special Education Programs
U.S. Department of Education

Theresa Rebhorn and Lisa Küpper
NICHCY

  • English only slideshow
  • Handouts for Participants in both English and Spanish

Module 8 focuses on NIMAS, the National Instructional Materials Accessibility Standard, a new element in IDEA that is going to revolutionize getting accessible materials to students with print disabilities in time for them to actually learn with their classmates! We love this module–and NIMAS!

NIMAS is a high priority and a “giant leap forward” for a great many students with disabilities: those with print disabilities that prevent or seriously limit their ability to use standard print materials—such as textbooks, for pity sakes! If this describes a student you know and work with, or if this describes your son or daughter, then you may be very interested in knowing more about NIMAS and how it strikes to the heart of access to the general education curriculum and learning.

Module 8 is available in English only (except for the handouts for participants, which are also available in Spanish). The module includes:

  • a slideshow presentation;
  • a Trainer’s Guide explaining the content of the slides; and
  • handouts for participants.

Please help yourself below, and download the components you need to learn on your own and/or to train others regarding NIMAS.

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Component #1: The Slideshow
English only

Learn about NIMAS and share with others through these 38 slides.

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Component #2: Trainer’s Guide

The Trainer’s Guide illustrates how each slide operates and provides detailed discussion of the content on each slide. It’s available in both a nicely laid out PDF file with thumbnail graphics of the slides and as an accessible Word file (from which you can freely copy and paste content to other documents). Which would you like?

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Component #3: Handouts for Participants | Folletos para Participantes
In English and Spanish

Module 8 falls under Theme B, IDEA and General Education, for which handouts in English and Spanish are available. If you’ve downloaded handouts for any of the other Theme B modules (5, 6, or 7), you already have what you need for Module 8 (provided you’re still working in the same language!) and don’t need to download the handouts again. BUT—If you do need to download the handouts for Theme B, here they are, in two different formats and two different languages:

English Handouts, Theme B

PDF | Handouts for B

Word | Handouts for B (Accessible Word file)

Spanish Handouts, Theme B

PDF | Folletos para Tema B

Word | Folletos para Tema B (Accessible Word version)

Note about the Spanish Translations:
In preparing the handouts in Spanish, we chose to use a certain vocabulary set for the terminology most frequently used in IDEA. IDEA itself is extremely and purposefully consistent about its terminology, and we felt it critical to do the same in Spanish. However, we fully recognize that there are many ways to say the same thing, and Spanish is rich with alternatives from country to country, region to region. So we’ve also prepared a glossary of the terminology used in IDEA, how we’ve rendered that terminology in Spanish, and other ways of rendering it that families may also hear. Share this with participants as you see fit or use it to guide your own translations. The glossary of terminology is available in two formats, PDF and Word:

There! You’re all set to go for Module 8.

Please remember that these materials are designed to be thorough and authoritative sources of info on IDEA 2004. That’s why they are so detailed. As a trainer, you are free to adapt the info we’ve offered to serve the purposes and needs of your audiences and the amount of time you have to spend with them.

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Quick-Jump Menu to Other Modules
1: Top 10 Basics of Special Education
2: Key Changes in IDEA
5: Disproportionality and Overrepresentation
6: Early Intervening Services and Response to Intervention
7: Highly Qualified Teachers (withdrawn with the reauthorization of NCLB as the ESSA in 2015)
8: NIMAS (you’re already here!)
9: Introduction to Evaluation under IDEA
10: Initial Evaluation and Reevaluation
11: Identification of Children with Specific Learning Disabilities
12: The IEP Team
13: Content of the IEP
14: Meetings of the IEP Team
15: LRE Decision Making
16: Children Enrolled by Their Parents in Private Schools
17: Introduction to Procedural Safeguards
18: Options for Dispute Resolution
19: Key Issues in Discipline

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Updated May 2024