The Road to RtI

Response to Intervention (RtI): Some call it a paradigm shift; others call it educational reform. I call it what many of us have been calling it for years — differentiated instruction. RtI is about using assessment data to inform instruction rather than placing students in special-education classes after perhaps years of failure. It is well-known that nearly 80 percent of children labeled as learning disabled, simply have a lack of success with reading.

Differentiating instruction to address the needs of these mislabeled students is what RtI is all about. It is also what Reading A–Z and all the Learning A–Z websites are all about. We recognize that teachers need lots of tools to address the needs of all the students in a typical classroom, yet teachers do not have the financial resources to acquire all the tools they need. As the International Reading Association (IRA) states in one of its position statements, "making a difference is about making it different." I like to think that we at Learning A–Z help teachers make a difference by offering thousands of affordable, downloadable resources for differentiated instruction. And, it is important that teachers know they can differentiate instruction with quality, research-based resources, even on a small budget.

Comments

[Mary Hamilton]

Response to Intervention appears to be more than stated above. Reading disabilities are real and failing to read is a societal problem. Special Education is about 75 years behind regular education with funding that was transparent. Now the need for services is mushrooming like an atomic cloud. The bottom line, however,is that there are few people who are highly trained to do the job and a growing population of multi-symptomatic diabilities. RTI is mearly a movement to bring budgets together and make people in control document that something is making a difference. Data is not going to make the difference in the dignity of the services. Only people can do that.

[Melvin Thomas]

I have had the oppurtuity to work as an intern at an "RtI district" and I see a major diference in the actual teaching. In a traditional model, educators were able to place a student with academic difficulties in a warehouse of special ed, which was only that way due to serious overcrowding. At the "RtI school", students who have serious academic difficulties based on nonresponse to good, diagnostically accurate instruction get extra help from a learning specialist who is not overwhelmed. The gen ed teacher has more tools to help kids in the class and that same learning specialist can also help with struggling students since she has less warehouse management duties. I can find few problems with this kind of model. The model is solid. However, if people are outright negative about education, there is nothing that can be done about those people, which I see as the real issue in education.

[K Burnham]

I am a college student,elem|sped, and a parent of a LD student. In my classes we are talking about RTI and the great need for early intervention. I can see how many students are simply falling through the cracks. These are the quiet ones they aren't disruptive and not low enough to raise big flags. Each year they fall a little bit farther behind until finally one teacher notices a serious delay. RTI is suppose to be targeting PreK-1st graders. If these teachers don't catch it the delay these students have just continues to build. At that point it is about reteaching not trying to just catch up. In my experience one problem I am seeing is that there are some teachers that are having issues following an IEP let alone recognizing one or two students who simply need a little extra help. We need more development for teachers with RTI and the things they can do for those recognized students.

[Denise Phillips]

RTI is the most wonderful thing that has happened to me in my 8 years of teaching. I switched to RSP after 3 years of teaching general ed. students with tremendous gaps in their education. For 5 years I have attempted to become the "guru" of differentiated instruction. My goal was to integrate technology into my curriculums in order to reach every student's needs. This year, it has all come together as my elementary school is a trial school for RTI. I am finally able to work with the students who just need a little extra individualized or small group instruction. I can quickly identify their area of need from their RTI test scores and from sitting with them individually. Then I work hard to fit them into a group or time slot with either RSP students or other RTI kids. I absolutely love this job because it allows me to utilize all of my areas of specialization. I actually feel like an "Education Specialist" as the credential states and my multiple subject credential helps me even more than ever when communicating with other teachers concerning their individual students' needs.

[Teri]

I think in theory RTI looks great but we're still seeing kids fall through the cracks because there aren't enough spaces for kids. We have only 5 spaces for all of first grade(about 100 students). It's still that kid who's just above the cut-off who needs extra help but won't get it until he or she falls below the ones getting help.

[R.K. McCain, M.Ed.]

RTI has it's upside and it's downside. If implemented correctly RTI and differentiated instruction are wonderful and beneficial tools for assisting students and teachers. When viewed as a "quick cure," RTI will fail just as all other programs before it have failed.

I, as many others have stated, work at a RTI school. Differentiated instruction is THE motto at our school. We are required to pre-test and post-test, to document on lesson plans, and show evidence in student portfolios of the success or failure of interventions. Each intervention model is given only 3 weeks for success or failure: and therein lies the problem. Students are being turned into human guinea pigs as they grow in frustration and confusion with each "new intervention model" that is thrust at them each 3 weeks.

At what point do teachers get to go back to teaching what they know needs to be taught, HOW it needs to be taught and stop "documenting" each and every intervention? I, truly, spend more time on lesson planning, pre and post-testing, and documenting than I do presenting and teaching information. The ones who suffer? The students...