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Community-based instruction

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Community-based instruction is teaching skills in the real places a student will use them, such as stores, banks, bus stops and workplaces.

Topic: Transition and adult life

In plain terms

Many functional skills, like shopping, using public transit or ordering food, are hard to learn only in a classroom. Community-based instruction, often called CBI, takes students to those settings with planned lessons and data collection. Practice in the classroom first, then the community, helps skills generalize.

How it shows up in an IEP

CBI goals are often measured with task analysis in the community setting. The IEP should list it as part of special education or transition services, with frequency and location.

Example

A student practices a 12-step grocery shopping routine weekly at a local store, using a picture list and the next-dollar strategy, recorded on a task analysis sheet.

Related terms

  • Task analysisA task analysis breaks a complex skill into a sequence of smaller, teachable steps that can be taught and tracked one at a time.
  • GeneralizationGeneralization is a student's use of a learned skill in new settings, with new people or materials, and without the original teaching supports.
  • Functional goalA functional goal targets the everyday skills a student needs at school, at home and in the community, outside academic subjects.
  • Next-dollar strategyThe next-dollar strategy is a money skill where a student pays by giving one more dollar than the dollar amount of a price.
  • 18 to 21 transition programAn 18 to 21 transition program serves students with IEPs who have finished high school coursework but not exited special education, with a focus on adult life.

On IEP Atlas

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