Week Three Assignment One

The whole idea of Response to Intervention has always been difficult to comprehend. I have sat through various workshops that explained in short detail what it is all about but for some reason it was hard to wrap my head around the concept of it all. While reading the article, I was pleased to say that the breakdown of RTI was more clear and informative this time. It could be that I was exposed to this topic various times before or that the article clearly outlined specific that I needed to see in detail in order to comprehend.

While reading this article I was completely shocked to discover that about 80% of students that are identified for special education struggle with literacy. I have read in a wide variety of educational articles that too many children are being qualified for special education when, in reality, these students just need a little extra help or different methods for delivering instruction. Response to Intervention allows teachers, school psychologists and any other professional working with the students to set miniature goals to ensure that progress is occurring. That is, rather than measuring the IQ of a student, RTI replaces IQ scores with measured goals.

The steps of the Response to Intervention Process helped me see clearly what exactly RTI is all about. The first step in the process is to ensure that universal literacy practices are established. Students need a standard to be held to otherwise we are measuring these children unfairly. If the child is in second grade it would only be fair to test this child on second grade literacy standards. The second step in the RTI process is to ensure that scientifically valid interventions are implemented. When we are working with students on setting new goals and new methods of instructions, we want to make sure that we are using reliable methods with these children. It is not a good idea to try messing around with teaching methods that are not proven to be effective, but instead we are encouraged to use methods that have been scientifically proven effective.

The third stage of the RTI process is to consistently monitor student progress while receiving intervention instruction. The monitoring of the student should be targeted to the specific behavior or learning discrepancy that we want to alter or modify. We should be testing our students weekly or bi-weekly to ensure that progress is being made. The fourth stage of Response to Intervention is to focus on individualizing the intervention for that specific student. For example, what works for Johnny in our classroom might not work for Suzy. We need to gear our instruction and our intervention strategies to ensure that the needs of these particular students are met. The final stage in the RTI process is how to make the decision to determine if this child needs special education services. To ensure that we are not over-diagnosing our students and classifying them in categories of special education that do not apply, we should ensure that we have tried every other method.

Response to Intervention has helped teachers cater to the needs of individual students in their classroom without having to classify them for special education services. Teachers are able to monitor students and set sub-goals to ensure that progress is being made.

The article on the assessment of thoughtful literacy in NAEP was a little difficult to comprehend for me at first. I found myself constantly reading this article over and over again because it was a little dry for me. With that being said, after I got past the test I was able to comprehend the idea between NAEP testing and state testing. I thought it was interesting to find out that states could possibly be “lowering their standards” due to the No Child Left Behind Act. In any subject at any level, true comprehension comes from applying what you know to something that is completely different. For example if I was teaching my students how to measure water using a measuring cup, my students would demonstrate mastery of this knowledge if they were able to go home and measure ingredients for a recipe. They are taking their level of understanding and bringing it into a new topic that they were not necessarily taught to do.

I was also surprised to find out that teachers were often observed in engaging the readers in their classroom to memorize and recite specific details rather than react, think, and respond to text. The National Assessment of Educational Progress tests their students’ ability to react to a piece of a literature or to use prior knowledge to help understand characteristics of characters in a story. The item type of the assessment they used was exceptional. By using 57% of open-ended questions in the NAEP assessment, in comparison to the average 7% of state assessment questions, the students are able to use higher level thinking skills to answer questions.

The way we test our students is critical. We want to teach our students to be critical thinkers and analyze a text without asking them to recite information or look for vocabulary in the text and find a synonym. Our students are independent learners and should be taught to think abstractly rather then definitively. As the next generation is tested, we should be using NAEP assessment standards to ensure that our students can master the material without lowering the standards of the individual learner.