The terms accommodations and modifications are often used interchangeably. However, while they sound similar, they mean different things.
Let’s think of some life examples outside of school….
Examples of accommodations can be preferential parking or seating on public transit, using virtual reality technology, closed captioning or subtitles in movies, enlarged text on cell phones, using technology such as Google Voice or Alexa, Voice To Text, or bumpers on a bowling alley. These accommodations allow the person to do the same activity or objective.
Modifications outside of school can be things like a kids menu at a restaurant (they have food like chicken tenders and pasta instead of caviar and calamari, yuck!), kiddie cocktails instead of a cranberry vodka cocktail (VERY different outcome), the kiddie table at a family holiday (different activities and conversations), teaching someone to just roll a ball instead of the entire game of bowling, separate children activities during Sunday church, and different scoring if you have a golf handicap.
Check out this chart below of examples of accommodations and modifications we can use in a school setting for the environment, instruction, student participation, and student assessment.
EL & SPED ACCOMMODATIONS & MODIFICATIONS
Make the difference between Presence and Participation
Written by Rebecca Pikula, M.Ed., BCBA