This toolkit supports school-based occupational therapists in completing evaluations using a neuroaffirming and strengths-based lens. Resources are aligned with the PEO model and enable therapists to document student strengths, needs, and school-based fit in a practical, organized, and easy-to-implement way.

This toolkit includes the following four resources.

1. Neuroaffirming OT Evaluation Template: A structured and editable evaluation document to support affirming school-based OT evaluation and reporting.

2. Neuroaffirming Occupational Therapy Profile for Schools: A companion resource to help gather meaningful information about student strengths, stims, roles, rituals, routines, supports, and school participation facilitators and barriers.

3. Library of Neuroaffirming Approaches for Assessment: A curated guide to assessments and tools that support deeper understanding of student strengths, needs, regulation, participation, and school-based fit.

4. Neuroaffirming IEP Goal Checklist: A practical checklist to support goal writing that is aligned with neuroaffirming practice in schools.

Neuroaffirming OT Evaluation Toolkit

$59.00

Built on the PEO Model: This template supports school-based occupational therapy evaluation through three core areas of assessment: Person, Environment, and Occupation. The structure allows analysis of student “Fit” and “Lack of Fit” within meaningful school participation.

Written Content with Flexibility for Revision: Written descriptions of evaluation focus areas are embedded in this template, alongside guided prompts and reporting sections. At the same time, language in each section is editable to reflect a therapist’s own wording, reasoning, and clinical priorities.

Organized by Section and Page: Person-level findings are separated into individual sections, with pages that can be deleted if a given area is not assessed. This allows therapists to include only the Person areas relevant to a given student in their final evaluation. The template also includes dedicated sections for environmental demands, occupation demands, and a final summary that brings key findings together across the full report.

Designed to Support Efficient Report Writing: Because the structure, written content, and prompts are already in place, the template is designed to make evaluation writing more manageable without sacrificing depth or clinical reasoning. It provides a starting point while allowing for therapist individualization.
Why Use an Occupational Profile: An occupational profile helps the therapist develop a fuller understanding of the student at the outset of the evaluation. Without it, the therapist may miss the student’s regulation needs, relational patterns, sources of safety, meaningful interests, and priorities, all of which directly shape participation, learning, and access. In neuroaffirming practice, these factors are essential to developing supports that are respectful, relevant, and effective.

Built to Capture the Whole Student: This document is designed to help OTs gather meaningful information about the student. It provides space to document identities, strengths, interests, praxis, cognition, mental health, and other person-based factors that shape school participation. This fuller understanding helps the therapist recognize how the student’s nervous system responds to environmental demands and occupational demands (teaching modalities, motor demands, social expectations, task structure, etc.), so better fit can be established.

Organized Around Regulation, Participation, and School Fit: This occupational profile guides therapists in documenting sensory, social, motor, communication, and technology-based facilitators and barriers that may shape participation across the school day. It also includes dedicated space to capture stims, comforts, routines, rituals, and roles, all of which may be essential to regulation, predictability, and school-based fit.

Grounded in Student Priorities and Desired Outcomes: The final section centers the student’s passions, dreams, goals, ambitions, and desired changes in school participation. This supports thoughtful evaluation and planning.
A Directory to Support Thoughtful Assessment Selection: Unlike the evaluation template and occupational profile, this resource is not a form to complete. It is a directory to help school-based occupational therapists identify and organize assessment options through a neuroaffirming lens. Its purpose is to support thoughtful selection of tools for the school OT evaluation.

Organized Across the Three Areas of PEO Assessment: This library is structured around the three core areas of the PEO model: Person, Environment, and Occupation. This organization highlights an important principle of affirming evaluation, namely that meaningful assessment does not stop with student factors alone, but also identifies and considers environmental and occupational/task demands being asked of the student across the school day.

Distinguishes Three Different Areas of Assessment: In the person section, therapists consider student factors such as sensory processing, praxis, motor abilities, executive function, communication, and self-empowerment. In the environment and context section, the assessment focus shifts to demands such as sensory conditions, social demands, physical setup, movement opportunities, and other contexts that impact engagement. The occupation section focuses on actual demands within tasks, including teaching modalities, motor demands, and how instructions are communicated.

Includes Formal and Informal Assessment Options: The library includes neuroaffirming assessments, non-affirming tools that may be used with very thoughtful modification, as well as interviews, questionnaires, and observations.
A Review Tool for Goal Writing: Unlike the evaluation template and occupational profile, this resource is not a form used to gather evaluation data. It is a checklist designed to help school-based occupational therapists review IEP goals through a neuroaffirming lens before those goals are finalized. Its purpose is to support more thoughtful goal writing by helping therapists reflect on the message, focus, and assumptions built into a goal.

Encourages Goals That Respect Neurodivergent Students: This checklist is designed to help therapists consider whether a goal supports the student rather than trying to change Autistic ways of being for the sake of appearing more typical. It prompts reflection on whether a goal is respectful of neurodivergent identity, nervous system needs, regulation, autonomy, and authentic participation in school.

Brings Attention to What the Goal Is Really Asking: The checklist helps therapists look closely at whether a goal is targeting meaningful access and support, or whether it is unintentionally centered on compliance, masking, or normalization. It encourages more careful thinking about whether the goal aligns with student well-being, self-advocacy, dignity, and long-term empowerment.

Supports Revision Before Goals Are Finalized: Because it is formatted as a checklist, this resource can be used as a quick review tool during report writing, IEP development, or team discussion. It is designed to help therapists catch concerns early and revise goals before they are formally proposed.

Neuroaffirming OT Evaluation Toolkit

Resource #1: Neuroaffirming OT Evaluation Template

Resource #2: Neuroaffirming Occupational Profile

Resource #3: Library of Neuroaffirming Assessments

Resource #4: Neuroaffirming IEP Goal Checklist