Tag: phonemic awareness

I’m not sure this blog post is appropriately titled! These may still be wishes at this point, or maybe better termed focus areas for 2019. The plan is in process.

Response to Intervention

I started to title this “Intervention” but I can’t make that a focus. Because high quality first instruction is so critical, that I can’t think about intervention without making sure that I’m supporting high quality first instruction. Any time intervention comes up, I need to remind myself and others that first we teach and teach well.

So with that said, assuming excellent high quality first instruction, we can reasonably expect RTI to look like this pyramid. I like this one because it looks at academic and behavioral instruction, even though the focus of my work is generally academic. The MTSS model as explained in PBIS.org.

We cannot throw around interventions like spaghetti, hoping they stick to the wall. So my plan for 2019 is to investigate assessments that will best target our goals. In the DuFour PLC model, this would revolve around the question, “How will we know if they’ve learned it?”

Assessments we currently have in place universally in our district for K-6 ELA include:

• Spelling Inventory
• Fluency
• K1 Phonemic Awareness
• K1 Phonics

We also have a decision making tree to help decide what other assessments might help us target need. The plan for 2019 is to continue to guide thinking around these assessments, and coach teachers in understanding the results of these assessments, as well as planning for intervention based on the results.

Assessments we have in place universally in our district for K-6 Math include:

• <This space intentionally left blank.>

So there is clearly a need to understand math assessment and intervention. The plan for 2019 then is to understand the first two PLC questions, “What do we want them to learn?” and “How do we know if they’ve learned it?” My first step in understanding is to look at two common statements I hear from teachers – “They don’t know their math facts.” and “They can’t do our work because they are low.”

For the first question, we want them to know their facts, but we don’t know if they’ve learned them. So I’m going to investigate Math Running Records in more depth, with a couple of specific classes. We will do running records for the entire class, and look at trends as well as possible interventions.

For the second question, I’m curious about how we define “low” as well as how we can have student access grade level math despite any areas of need. One of the projects I’m looking into was something Graham Fletcher brought up last summer at the Virtual Math Institute called the Georgia Numeracy Project. I’m going to adopt a couple of classes with this as well, to see how we might use the materials to specifically identify areas of intervention and thus maximize our intervention results.

Phew…and I’m just getting started on 2019 Goals. 🙂 It’s going to be a great year! Any advice on high quality first instruction or targeted intervention is welcomed in the comments!