Ohio’s Learning Standards-Extended

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (2004) requires students with disabilities, including students with the most significant cognitive disabilities, to be provided access to and make progress in grade-level general education curriculum, not an alternate curriculum (CFR 34 § 300.320). The Ohio Learning Standards are the achievement targets used for the general education curriculum. The Ohio Learning Standards-Extended, sometimes referred to as “the extended standards,” are specific statements of knowledge and skills linked to the expectations of the achievement targets within the Ohio Learning Standards. In other words, the Ohio Learning Standards-Extended offer entry points to access grade level learning for students. The extended standards do not replace the Ohio Learning Standards, they are aligned to them. 

The purpose of Ohio’s Learning Standards-Extended is to build a bridge that provides grade level access to the content of the Ohio Learning Standards and to ensure students with the most significant cognitive disabilities are provided with multiple checkpoints to demonstrate knowledge and skills aligned to the achievement targets within Ohio Learning Standards. 

A committee comprised of special educators, general educators, parents, administrators, and other stakeholders in Ohio came together to develop the extended standards to be used for eligible students participating in Ohio’s Alternate Assessment for Students with the Most Significant Cognitive Disabilities (AASCD). 

On September 18, 2018, the Ohio State Board of Education adopted the revised grade level Ohio Learning Standards-Extended.  

Documents and Resources for Ohio’s Learning Standards – Extended (OLS-E)

OHIO LEARNING STANDARDS-EXTENDED 

Ohio Learning Standards - Extended with Learning Progressions

Ohio English Language Proficiency Standards - Extended

Understanding Ohio’s Learning Standards-Extended 

The Department developed the following resources to assist the field in understanding the OLS-E

Ohio’s Learning Standards-Extended FAQs: 

1. What are Ohio’s Learning Standards?
The Ohio Learning Standards (OLS) explain the knowledge and skills Ohio students should know and be able to do in pre-kindergarten through grade 12. The OLS define what all students should know and be able to do, not how teachers should teach.
 
2. What are Ohio’s Learning Standards–Extended?
Ohio’s Learning Standards–Extended (OLS-E), commonly referred to as the “extended standards,” make Ohio’s Learning Standards accessible to students with the most significant cognitive disabilities. The extended standards begin with grade 3 ensuring students who are eligible to participate in Ohio’s Alternate Assessment for Students with the most Significant Cognitive Disabilities (AASCD) are provided with multiple ways to access, learn and, demonstrate knowledge and skills within the general education curriculum aligned to grade-level standards.

 
3. How are Ohio’s Learning Standards–Extended related to Ohio’s Learning Standards?
The OLS-E target the same academic content and skills as OLS but reduce breadth, depth, and complexity of the grade-level standards into alternate achievement markers for state testing purposes. This ensures participation in grade-level assessment.

The breadth and depth of the content and skills within the OLS have been unpacked and three target skills have been selected representing three complexity levels from within each standard. The skills outlined within the OLS-E are organized from "most complex" to "least complex" and are aligned to each grade-level standard. This skill range represents alternate achievement standards aligned with Ohio's AASCD and are called OLS-E.
 
4. What does instruction look like for students who are eligible to participate in Ohio’s AASCD?
The Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (2004) requires that students with disabilities, including students with the most significant cognitive disabilities, are to be provided access to and make progress in grade-level general education curriculum, not an alternate curriculum (CFR 34 § 300.320).

Instruction for students who qualify to take the AASCD should include meaningful opportunities for learning grade-level concepts and skills. Instruction should incorporate universal supports including:

  • Explicit instruction
  • Direct instruction
  • Systematic instruction
  • Sequential instruction
  • Differentiated instruction
  • and Universal design for learning
These universal supports should be paired with the integration of individualized supports including:
  • Accommodations
  • Scaffolds
  • Peer interaction
  • Special services
  • Assistive technologies
  • and, when needed, modifications based on individualized student data
These universal supports and individualized instructional methods, materials, and services should be described in detail within the student’s individualized education program (IEP), specifically in sections 7 and 12.

More information about Ohio’s Learning Standards–Extended, including how they are used in pairing with the grade-level standards to plan for instruction and assessment, can be found at the Teaching Diverse Learners Center at the OCALI.
 
5. How can my child who is nonverbal participate in standards-based instruction and assessment?
All individuals communicate, regardless of their verbal ability. Most people interact using many modes of communication throughout each day. Students may communicate through facial expressions, eye gaze, gestures, signed language, augmented language systems, picture exchange and/or using a variety of other behaviors. Your child may use many modes of communication. The educational team will need to provide access in all modes of communication.
 
Content learning that is guided by the grade level standards provides the student with many opportunities to communicate and participate with peers around grade-level topics and engage with learning materials that should include communication supports. Educators can teach grade-level skills and concepts and also teach and collect data on language/communication skill development. A wide range of assistive technology tools (low tech to high tech) can be modeled by adults and peers and used by students during everyday instruction and assessment.
 
To learn more about supporting communication access for students visit https://literacyaccessforall.org/ website and go to Chapter 4: Language and Communication Access: ALL In! via the Teaching Diverse Learners Center at OCALI.
 
6. Can Ohio’s Learning Standards–Extended be used with students who do not take the AASCD?
The OLS-E and associated learning progressions can support educators to differentiate instruction for all students. However, they must be used with caution. The OLS-E and learning progressions provide entry points into Ohio’s Learning Standards for students who need explicit instruction in foundational/base skills to close gaps in knowledge and skills. It is important to remember all students are working toward grade level standards/OLS. When referencing the range of skills within the OLS-E to support students who do not have the most significant cognitive disabilities nor qualify to participate in Ohio’s AASCD, the learning expectation should be the same as their peers not participating in Ohio’s AASCD.
 
7. What are Ohio’s Learning Standards-Extended with Learning Progressions?
Content specific teams of Ohio general and special educators worked together to deconstruct Ohio’s Learning Standards into learning progressions. Ohio’s Learning Standards-Extended with Learning Progressions include alternate achievement markers (OLS-E) and foundational/base skills, to monitor growth and progress of student learning over time. Ohio’s Learning Progressions:
  • Unpack skills and knowledge within a single learning target or standard and provides an outline showing how learning builds over time with explicit instruction
  • Includes foundational/base skills, that are often outside of the grade-level, including initial engagement in the target topic
  • Provides a detailed outline of skills toward the mastery of the grade-level standards or learning targets with multiple entry points for students
  • Help educators maintain age and grade-level alignment while identifying both strengths and needs for individual students
  • Can help students demonstrate skills leading toward grade-level outcomes through various entry points
  • Help educators see each and every learner as part of the learning continuum at grade-level
  • Can be helpful in designing assignments and classroom assessments to show student progress

Learning Progressions can help teachers, families, and students gain more clarity about the embedded skills within each grade-level standard that must be taught explicitly. They can be used as a data collection tool when paired with evidence of student learning, such as work samples, audio/video recording of students demonstrating skills, or as a rubric for cumulative projects. A learning progression can reveal skill gaps and reveal targeted skills for intervention needs. Large segments of missing skills within a learning progression may be considered by IEP teams as potential goals and objectives or support tiered intervention needs within integrated multi-tiered system of support. Learning progressions may be useful in monitoring skill gap data during interventions and hopefully, show the closing of achievement gaps between students with disabilities and grade-level peers.
 
8. Why do students with the most significant cognitive disabilities participate in academic instruction and assessment?
The reauthorized federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (2004) extends educational accountability and reform to ALL students, including those with the most significant cognitive disabilities. This legislation, along with the federal Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), and Ohio law, mandates that all students with disabilities be included in state and district test programs and that they take either the general tests (with or without accommodations) or alternate tests. These laws provide clear expectations that states will align assessments of student achievement with the state’s academic content standards.
 
All students have the right to have the same opportunity to access academic content and demonstrate their mastery in addition to learning functional life skills such as communication, social skills, and practical daily living skills. Students with the most significant cognitive disabilities must have access to the general curriculum; be involved in the general curriculum; and make progress in the general curriculum. General curriculum means the same grade-level academic content standards curriculum that is afforded other students.

More Information 

The Ohio Department of Education and Workforce (DEW) offers online instructional modules for Ohio’s Learning Standards – Extended (OLS-E). Educators can earn contact hours for completing these modules, which can be accessed at Literacy Access for ALL. 

Questions?

For more information on the extended standards, contact:

Last Modified: 4/4/2025 8:43:56 AM