Before using this outline to train users, make sure you've read through the Training Manual and completed the required preparation.
timer | Time: 20 minutes |
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library_books | Discussion 1: SameGoal is a documentation management and compliance platform for special programs with over a 99% annual retention rate. SameGoal has been serving districts since 2008 and supports several special programs. |
library_books | Discussion 2: Discuss the reasons why the district decided to switch to SameGoal as well as which problems SameGoal will help to solve. |
library_books | Discussion 3: During this training we will cover topics such as:
I will be logged into the environment demonstrating the functionality as we work through the different topics and you will also be able to complete several activities where you can try completing different workflows in the application yourself. |
library_books | Discussion 1: Discuss how login works for the district (SSO, ClassLink, OIDC, etc.). |
touch_app | Activity 1: Log into SameGoal.
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priority_high | Important: Logging in can take a while. Make sure everyone is able to log in, and help those who are having difficulties. |
library_books | Discussion 1: During this training, you’ll come across real students and real documents, but for the purpose of training, we will be working with test data. For the time being, please ignore the real data. If we have time at the end, you will get the chance to explore the environment, the students, and the documents a bit more. |
library_books | Discussion 2: There are several different features and pages you can access from the left menu: Dashboard: This page gives users a quick and easy way to see important information in SameGoal and will reduce the number of clicks needed to get to commonly used information. Recent: This is the landing page when you log into SameGoal and it shows your 50 most recent documents. If you leave a document to work on other students, you can easily come back to what you were working on. Additionally, all documents you’ve been working on are all in one place. Caseload: Shows the documents you are actively working on. You can control which documents appear here by adding and removing documents throughout the year as what you’re working on changes. We will discuss how to manage your Caseload later. My Students: All students who have at least one document on your Caseload. This list is dynamic and will change as you work on documents year to year. If you add a student’s document to your Caseload, if they are not already on your My Students list, they will be added. Once a student no longer has any documents on your Caseload, they will be removed from My Students. Chat: You can switch from the My Students tab to the Chat tab by clicking on the chat box icon. This allows you to securely message other online colleagues. To switch back to My Students, you can click back to the student icon. All: Lists all of the documents you have access to, given your permissions; whether it was explicitly shared with you or because your administration gave you default access to the form type. Deadlines: A calendar of any deadlines that have been assigned to you. You can also display deadlines for students who you have an educational interest in, even if the deadlines are not assigned to you. Deadlines are calculated by SameGoal automatically when documents are completed and are assigned to whoever the owner of the previous document was. Students / create new: This is a list of all students you have access to based on your building permissions, which are controlled by your administration. Students are automatically added and updated each night based on a SIS demographics integration. All students are added, regardless of program participation status. This means if a student needs to be evaluated, they don't need to be added to the system first. Reports: This page will list all reports you have access to run given your report permissions set by your admin users. When you run a report, you are able to see information from documents you have access to. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Make sure you have the correct building permissions by searching for students.
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timer | Time: 10 minutes |
inventory | Preparation: Assign everyone in training a number associated with a test student. Test005 through Test250 are available. |
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library_books | Discussion 1: In order to create a document for a student, you will first need to find that student and navigate to their Documents tab. You can do this by clicking on their name in your My Students list if they are listed there, or by searching for them on the Students / create new page. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Search for your test student.
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library_books | Discussion 2: There are several tabs on a student's page:
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library_books | Discussion 1: When you click into the Create new dropdown at the top of a student’s Documents tab, you can see all of the forms you have permission to create. Again, this access is set by your administration. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Make sure you have the correct form permissions.
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library_books | Discussion 2: If a student needs to be evaluated for special education, they will first need to be referred to the program. To refer a student, you'll need to create a Referral for Evaluation. |
touch_app | Activity 2: Create a referral for your test student.
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library_books | Discussion 3: When you create the document:
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timer | Time: 15 minutes |
library_books | Discussion 1: If a student is referred for special education and their parents give consent for evaluation, you'll need to create an Evaluation Team Report (ETR) in SameGoal. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Create an ETR.
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library_books | Discussion 2: When a new document is first created, demographics information on the cover page is automatically pulled in from the student's Details tab (which is updated nightly based on an active demographics integration). If information has been updated on the Details tab since the document was first created, you can click Update Student/Parent Info at the top of the document to re-pull the data. |
library_books | Discussion 3: There are a couple of ways to move throughout a document. You can scroll through or you can click on the section tabs to be brought directly to the section. |
smart_display | Demonstration 1: Navigate a document.
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library_books | Discussion 1: Once you create a document, you’ll want to begin working on it. When editing documents, SameGoal has many tools to help you. Authoring is very simple and works similarly to any other word processing application. Add and Remove Sections: Some additional sections can be added using the add buttons. You can also remove these sections if you don't need them using the X in the top right corner. Rich Text Editing: When you click into a field, the rich text editing toolbar at the top of the screen becomes available. This allows you to format your text as you wish as well as insert tables and lists. Copy and Paste: You can copy and paste items directly into a document. If you paste images or tables, the original formatting will be preserved, and tables that have been pasted in will continue to be editable. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Add and remove a section.
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touch_app | Activity 2: Add text to a document and format it.
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library_books | Discussion 1: Once you start working in a document, you probably want to make sure that your work is saved, but you might have noticed that there is no save button. Rather all document edits are autosaved, and you can see the save status in the top right of the document. Changes are saved every time you click out of a field or every few seconds while working within a field, so there is never a risk of losing more than a few seconds worth of work. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Explore autosave.
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library_books | Discussion 1: You can add information to documents by typing it or copying and pasting it in, but another way to include information in a document is by adding attachments. Several different file types are supported. It can be helpful to attach examples of student work, submitted documentation from third parties, or even audio recordings from meetings. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Add an attachment.
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library_books | Discussion 1: Documents can be previewed in-screen at any point, with or without PDF attachments. From a document preview, you can print (or download the document). Additionally, when a document is printed, it looks the same as when you’re editing it. SameGoal’s document layout is “what you see is what you get”. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Print a document with attachments.
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library_books | Discussion 2: Before a document is completed, you will be able to see a DRAFT watermark across each page when printing or downloading. Displaying a draft watermark on documents until they are marked complete helps districts better communicate to parents and other team members when a given document contains all required information and signatures, especially when meetings are held remotely. This will go away when the document is marked complete. |
timer | Time: 15 minutes |
inventory | Preparation: Organize attendees into groups of 2 or 3. You can either place attendees in groups yourself or allow them to find their own partners. It will be easiest if partners are seated next to each other. As the trainer, it will be helpful if you also have a partner to demonstrate with. |
library_books | Discussion 1: If the evaluation team determines that an IEP should be developed for the student, the IEP team should begin developing the IEP before meeting to review it and sign off on it with the parents. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Create an IEP.
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library_books | Discussion 2: When you're authoring documents, it can be helpful to add additional collaborators to it so they may also contribute. |
touch_app | Activity 2: Share a document with another user.
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library_books | Discussion 3: You may have noticed that by default, other staff are added to the Collaborative Team with Can Edit permission. When sharing a document you can determine which level of access other collaborators will have. The document access granted through explicitly sharing a document with a user might be different from the default access granted to them by administration.
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library_books | Discussion 4: When a document is shared with you:
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campaign | Callout: You can try finding the student on your My Students list and locating the document on your Caseload and Recent page. |
library_books | Discussion 1: There is no limit to how many users a document can be shared with and multiple collaborators may work in one document simultaneously without the risk of overwriting each other’s work. When another user is working in the same document as you, a concurrent user icon will pop up in the top right and you’ll be able to see their edits in real time. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Work in a document with another collaborator.
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library_books | Discussion 1: If you see another team member in the document at the same time, you can easily start a chat with them by clicking their card in the top right. In-application chat is a way to speed up communication between staff members and foster professional collaboration. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Send a message using the Chat feature.
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library_books | Discussion 2: It’s important to note that chat is not attached to the educational record for a given student and is not stored with the document in any way. You can start or continue a chat with another online team member by navigating to the Chat tab in the left menu. |
library_books | Discussion 1: Even with potentially several users all collaborating on one document, there is never a risk of losing your work due to another staff member entering the document and making unwanted changes or removing your work. SameGoal has a Version History panel in every document that is available to any user with access to the document. |
touch_app | Activity 1: View events in the Version History panel.
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library_books | Discussion 2: Version History is helpful in several ways:
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campaign | Callout: You may return to your own documents now. |
timer | Time: 10 minutes |
library_books | Discussion 1: We’ve covered how to author documents and how to author them collaboratively. Now let’s discuss how to speed the process up. SameGoal offers the functionality to store frequently used text in text fields in any form. This tool is referred to as Bank Values. By storing text in banks, users can avoid needing to rewrite common content for each document. Bank values support name and pronoun substitution. By typing “[Name]”, the student’s name will be substituted when adding the text to the document. Any gendered pronouns (he/she, his/hers, etc.) will also be automatically substituted to match the student’s gender. User Bank Values can be made by any user and are only accessible to the user who created it. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Create and use a user bank value.
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library_books | Discussion 2: Saved banked values are available in every document of the same form type. In every other IEP, you will be able to use this value in the Measurable annual goal field. |
smart_display | Demonstration 1: Use your new user bank value in another student’s IEP.
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library_books | Discussion 1: District banks are made by an administrative user and are accessible to all users in the district. District banks are denoted with a small building icon so you can tell them apart from your own user banks. District banks cannot be edited or deleted by non-administrative users. District bank values can provide users with compliant text and suggestions and reduce the amount of bank value creation and management required at the user level. |
library_books | Discussion 2: Both district banks and user banks may utilize Topics and Keywords. Topics help to group like values together, similar to putting the values in a folder together. Keywords basically give a bank value a title. This is useful when a bank value is very long and can help you identify the bank value quicker. |
smart_display | Demonstration 1: Create and use a keyword.
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library_books | Discussion 3: Administrative users can also add district banks as default values. Default district bank values will automatically pre-populate fields when a new document is created. These values are often meant to act as a template for staff to follow to ensure they include all required information. |
timer | Time: 15 minutes |
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library_books | Discussion 1: Documents in SameGoal run validation checks, which ensure all required fields are filled out and check for data errors. All required fields are denoted with a red asterisk and any data issues will cause a big red dot to appear. Validation checks are dynamic and update in real-time as you work within a document. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Explore validation checks.
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library_books | Discussion 2: As you’re finishing a document and getting ready for a meeting, you’ll want to make sure you haven’t missed anything important. To save time, you can enter into Validation Mode, which allows you to quickly go through all remaining unsatisfied validation checks. |
touch_app | Activity 2: Enter into validation mode.
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library_books | Discussion 3: Documents cannot be completed until all validation checks pass (except when bypassed by administrative users). If you try to complete a document before all validation checks pass, you will receive a popup warning with the remaining errors and will not be able to complete the document. When all errors have been satisfied, the validation icon in the toolbar will appear as a green check mark. Once this happens, the document may be completed. |
library_books | Discussion 1: Meetings can be held in-person or remotely. When meetings are in person, many districts present the document in SameGoal on a smartboard or using a projector for the group. When doing this, it’s recommended that you enter into Meeting Mode. This minimizes incoming chat messages so no unexpected messages pop up, hides other students on the left, and gives you more screen room by hiding the editing toolbar. Meeting Mode can also group multiple documents together and can be shared with other users. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Share a meeting and enter into Meeting Mode.
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library_books | Discussion 2: If a meeting is being held remotely, the document can be shared with the parents. When you share a document with a parent, they will receive an email containing a link to the document. Then the parents may follow along in the document during the meeting. While a parent is viewing a document, if a staff member clicks into a field in the document, the parent’s screen will automatically scroll to that field, making it easy for the parent to follow along. Parents see a read-only version of the document and are not able to make edits, except to parent signature-related fields if you grant them Can View & Sign permission rather than just Can View permission. This allows them to fill out consent fields and add their signature. When a parent makes an edit to a document, the document owner will receive a notification in SameGoal. |
touch_app | Activity 2: Share your document with a parent.
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library_books | Discussion 1: Document authors, collaborators, and meeting participants can easily sign documents electronically. Any place where a signature is required, you’ll see a little pen icon and when you click the signature field, you’ll get a popup that allows you to sign electronically. Signatures can be drawn on a computer using a mouse or trackpad, or on a smartphone or tablet using a finger. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Electronically sign your document.
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library_books | Discussion 2: Additionally, rather than writing your signature each time, you can store your signature and "stamp" it into signature fields with one click. |
touch_app | Activity 2: Store your signature.
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library_books | Discussion 1: If you’re meeting with parents who do not speak English as their first language, before the meeting takes place, you may request a document translation directly within SameGoal. When a document is translated into another language, its contents will be displayed in both English and the second language. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Request a document translation.
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smart_display | Demonstration 1: Show a translated document.
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library_books | Discussion 2: If a translator participates in a meeting and the meeting is recorded, the recording may be uploaded as an .mp3 attachment directly to the document. |
timer | Time: 15 minutes |
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library_books | Discussion 1: Once all information has been entered into a document and all necessary meetings have been completed, the document should be marked complete in the program. |
smart_display | Demonstration 1: Complete a document.
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library_books | Discussion 2: When a document is completed:
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library_books | Discussion 3: With the Alerts and Document Viewer integration, visual indicator alerts are generated for each special program a student currently participates in. When an alert is clicked, the document is displayed in a document viewer web page that staff can easily access. When staff view documents, they can view Additional Views. SameGoal generates these views and pulls in a subset of information from the document to present it in a more understandable format for a given use case. These print views can also be viewed, printed, or downloaded from within SameGoal. |
smart_display | Demonstration 2: View an additional view.
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library_books | Discussion 1: SameGoal automatically tracks special program participation. In order to see more information about program participation, you can view the participation timeline on the student’s Programs tab. This page displays participation information for all programs. |
smart_display | Demonstration 1: View a student’s Programs tab.
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library_books | Discussion 2: When a student is participating in a program, a participation badge will appear next to their name in the system. Hovering over this badge shows more information about program participation, but it also displays deadline information. |
library_books | Discussion 1: Future deadlines are also calculated when a document is completed, and an overview of upcoming deadlines is displayed when hovering over the badge. |
library_books | Discussion 2: You can also see more deadline information on a student’s Deadlines tab. This page lists all past due and upcoming deadlines for each special program. Each deadline includes information about what is due, when it’s due, who the deadline is assigned to, and what document the deadline was determined from. Deadlines are assigned to whoever was listed as the owner of the document that the deadline was determined from. You’re able to click on deadlines on this page to show more details. |
smart_display | Demonstration 1: View a student’s Deadlines tab.
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library_books | Discussion 3: The Deadlines page in the left menu will show you a calendar of all deadlines that have been assigned to you. You can switch the calendar to a month view, week view, day view, or to a list view. |
smart_display | Demonstration 2: View the Deadlines calendar.
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library_books | Discussion 1: If a document needs to be edited to correct a clerical error (i.e. change an incorrect date), it may be marked Incomplete by an administrative user. If you need to make a small edit to a document, reach out to an administrative user and ask them to incomplete the document for you. When the document is re-marked incomplete, you can go in and make changes, then complete the document again once you are finished. |
library_books | Discussion 1: If you need to make a significant change to a plan document, you should create a formal amendment. Amendments can be created by a document’s owner. When you amend a document, you should have a meeting to discuss the changes. |
smart_display | Demonstration 1: Create a formal amendment.
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library_books | Discussion 2: If a student's related services need to be updated, if they've already begun receiving services, you shouldn't delete the original service. Rather, change the end date of the service and add a new service that starts when services were updated. |
smart_display | Demonstration 2: Amend a student's instructional services.
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campaign | Callout: Staff can see each historical version of a document in Version History. These historical versions can also be printed or downloaded. |
timer | Time: 15 minutes |
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library_books | Discussion 1: After a plan is completed, it can be helpful to track a student’s progress toward their goals during the duration of the plan. SameGoal has progress reports that pull goals directly from the most recent, completed plan document. In these progress reports, you can track progress narratively or with a progress monitoring chart. These charts provide a visual representation of the student’s progress over time and can be very helpful, especially when working with parents. |
smart_display | Demonstration 1: Create a progress report and chart progress.
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library_books | Discussion 1: A Prior Written Notice to Parents (PWN) is a form in SameGoal that can be used to communicate to parents when their child's special education status changes or when action (such as a referral for evaluation) has been requested. A PWN is required in several cases, such as:
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smart_display | Demonstration 1: Create a Prior Written Notice.
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library_books | Discussion 2: When this document is filled out, it can be marked completed and then it can be shared with the parents. The parents do not have to reply to this document. |
library_books | Discussion 1: Before an evaluation can take place, you must obtain parental consent to evaluate the student. In SameGoal there is a Parent Consent for Evaluation form that can be used to obtain consent for both initial evaluations and reevaluations. |
smart_display | Demonstration 1: Create a Parent Consent.
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library_books | Discussion 2: This document should be left as incomplete and shared with the parents electronically so they may fill it out with their consent decision. They should fill out Part 1 to grant consent and Part 2 to deny consent. When the parents fill out the document, it will send a notification to the owner of this document. The owner can then finish filling out the rest of the document before marking it complete. |
library_books | Discussion 1: Parents should be invited to evaluation meetings and IEP meetings. In SameGoal, the Parent Invitation form can be used to invite them. A staff member can fill out this document with meeting information, share it with the parents, and mark it complete once the parents respond with their plans to attend. |
smart_display | Demonstration 1: Create a Parent Invitation.
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library_books | Discussion 1: For each student participating in a special program, you’ll need to conduct a plan review each year to ensure the student’s needs are still being met. With this review, a new plan document will need to be created. To help save you time, you are able to copy from existing, completed documents to create new documents. |
smart_display | Demonstration 1: Create a new document by copying from a completed document.
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library_books | Discussion 2: The new document that is created will automatically pull information from the previous document. Exactly which fields will copy over varies by form type, but dates, signatures, and demographics information will not pull over. So when it comes time to review a student’s plan, you can copy last year’s plan and just review and update the information as necessary. |
timer | Time: 5 - 30 minutes |
library_books | Discussion 1: SameGoal publishes robust online help guides covering a range of topics from general system functionality to specific program documentation workflows. These support guides contain step-by-step instructions on how to complete different tasks in SameGoal as well as videos that demonstrate the workflows. Users can also contact and receive support from SameGoal’s daily helpdesk via phone or email. |
touch_app | Activity 1: Access SameGoal’s support resources.
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library_books | Discussion 1: If time, allow users to ask any questions they might have. |
touch_app | Activity 1: If time, explore your environment and the real data already in it (optional).
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After completing this training, make sure you complete the required Cleanup steps.