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RESPONSE TO INTERVENTION

Scheduling to

Facilitate RTI

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Where Have We Been?

October• Overview for Secondary Schools on

What is Response to Intervention

• Changes to the regulations that impact Secondary Schools

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What is Response to Intervention?

• A process that is a multi-tiered approach to providing services and interventions (at increasing levels of intensity) to students who struggle with learning.

• Regularly scheduled monitoring of student progress at each tier of service and intervention.

• Using data from monitoring to guide decision making and inform instruction, intervention and services for all students.

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Implementation of RTI in Secondary Schools

AKA: Scheduling with RTI Regulations

• Secondary Schools identify who is At Risk of academic failure.

• All students identified as At Risk must be screened within 2 weeks of the beginning of the school year or within 2 weeks of entering school (i.e. transfers, new students).

• Secondary Schools establish what triggers will identify students At Risk of Academic Failure

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Tier I:All StudentsCore Class Instruction

Tier II:Students with insufficient progress in Tier I Group and individual research-based interventions

Tier III:Students with insufficient progress in Tier I/Tier IISustained Intensive InterventionsPossible Special Education Identification for students with insufficient progress with Tier III interventions

~80% of Students

~15%

~5%

Three Tiered Model

Special Services

Increa

sing S

upp

ort

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TIER I

• Core Classroom Instruction: delivered in a general education setting, by a general education teacher. Instruction shall be delivered with fidelity as part of a scientifically based core curriculum and matched to student need.

• All Students receive instruction in core curriculum in the regular classroom.

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Tier 2• In addition to regularly scheduled core instruction in the

general education curriculum

• Small group intervention for 90 minutes per week not less than two (2) sessions per week.

• Students needing intervention in both reading & math, the intervention shall be designed by the instructional support team proportionate to student need, but not less than one hundred twenty (120) minutes per week.

• Students must receive a minimum of 6 weeks of intervention with weekly progress monitoring.

• Problem solving team makes decision based on progress monitoring data if sufficient progress is made or student needs to continue for an additional 6 weeks.

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Tier 3• In addition to regularly scheduled core instruction in the

general education curriculum

• Small group intervention for 120 minutes per week not less than four (4) sessions per week.

• Students needing intervention in both reading & math, the intervention shall be designed by the instructional support team proportionate to student need, but not less than one hundred fifty (150) minutes per week.

• Students must receive a minimum of 6 weeks of intervention with weekly progress monitoring.

• Problem solving team makes decision based on progress monitoring data if sufficient progress is made or student needs to continue for an additional 6 weeks.

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Today

• Focus is on how to infuse the intent of responding to the instructional needs of all students into the scheduling process.

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Scheduling that Supports RTI

• The master schedule is critical to a successful secondary school experience.

• It affects:– Students– Administrators– Teachers– Counselors– Nurses– Support Staff– Transportation Providers– Parents

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Master Schedule

• For many schools, the master schedule remains the same from year to year.

• Among the reasons for maintaining the same schedule are:– It works– The teachers are happy with it– It accommodates the bus schedule– It fits in all the lunches– Band, chorus and athletics work well

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Scheduling Considerations

• Curriculum– What courses will be offered?– How many students will select what

courses?– How many teachers are assigned to the

school?– What are the teachers’ areas of expertise

and certification?– In what areas are teachers highly-

qualified?

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Scheduling Considerations

• Parameters– Periods in the day– Days in the cycle– Courses that don’t meet on a daily

schedule– Back to back courses– Double period classes (i.e., science labs)– Carnegie units

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Traditional Master Schedules

• Characteristics of Most Schedules– Time Bound– Based on a quarter, semester, or school

year– Rigid– Difficult to change– Requires grades and credits– Deadlines for changing classes

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Scheduling that Supports RTI

• How RTI challenges traditional scheduling– All students access general curriculum– Flexible movement within class day and

school year– Three tiers of instruction– Time– Staff– Matching interventions to quarters,

semesters– Meeting course and credit requirements

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Scheduling that Supports RTI

• Individually, identify those issues that present a challenge to your school as you think about how to implement RTI.

• Write each issue you identify on a separate post-it note.

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Scheduling that Supports RTI

• As a school team, sort your issues into categories.

• Place them on the poster paper with the heading that most closely matches your category.

• Choose a member of your team to clarify your issues and to discuss them with other schools.

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Scheduling that Supports RTI

• Constraints– Shared or part-time teachers– Room limitations– Team teaching– Specific course placements – Number of lunches (determined by size of

cafeteria)– Teacher contracts– Work study assignments– Bus schedules

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Scheduling that Supports RTI

• Think outside the box!

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Scheduling that Supports RTI

• Few models for implementation at the secondary level exist.

• Most of the literature talks about Tier 2 taking place within the general education classroom during regularly scheduled class time.

• There are significant implications for teacher training to implement such a model.

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Scheduling that Supports RTI

• Step 1– Create a scheduling team or committee.– Establish your beliefs about student

learning.

• Step 2– Survey staff capacity and availability.– Examine and analyze student data.

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Scheduling that Supports RTI

• Step 3– Assess all students.– Determine number of students in need of

Tier 2 intervention.

• Step 4– What interventions will be delivered?– When will they be delivered?– Who will provide the interventions?– How do students move in and out of

interventions?

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Scheduling that Supports RTI

• Freshman academies• Team teaching• Instructional specialists

– To deliver instruction to students– To support classroom teachers

• Modify the schedule– Move to A Day, B Day– Stagger the school day– Split blocks– Common planning time– Add minutes to the day– Incorporate homeroom into 1st period– Shorten each period by a few minutes to create a

skinny

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Scheduling to Support RTI

• There is no one way to design a schedule or to provide interventions in Tier 2.

• Your response to intervention is as individual as your school, its staff, and the students you serve.

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Getting A New View of The School Schedule

Team Planning Activity

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Carpenters can produce large numbers of items of the same dimensions by using a JIG. Each Jig helps lock in a parameter such as “length” or “width” that a machine or other tool will yield as the wood is worked.

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Jigs or Templates are often used in Education &Training organizations

• Template Examples– Course

prerequisites needed to enter a course

– Qualifying test scores for placement

– Uniform length of class meeting periods for all content areas

– Master schedule criteria

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With the wrong criteria, jigs can create problems in teaching, training, or supervising people.

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What are the Characteristics or Design Criteria of a Typical School Scheduling Jig?

1. Number of days in the cycle

2. School Bus arrival and departure times

3. Cafeteria lunch periods

4. Sessions for instrumental, choral, and sports activities

5. Catalog of available courses

6. Matrix of available instructors

7. Student schedule requests

8. Other activities at your school? (List)

9. Other factors at your school? (List)

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Complete your worksheet #1 and discuss at your table

• First, indicate on your Scheduling worksheet #1 the order of importance of various criteria in the development of this year’s building instructional schedule at your school.

• Then, discuss with others at your table the following question:

Is our school schedule a Is our school schedule a resourceresource or a or a constraintconstraint in our efforts to improve in our efforts to improve

instruction?instruction?

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Review the Schedule Characteristics of Today’s School Presentations

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Use Worksheet #2 and table discussion to consider applications of these presentations to your school

• On your own, fill in Worksheet #2, and then,

• Discuss at your table one of the schedule features your team believes might work at your school with suitable preparation and support.

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A Possible Scheduling Template

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Recommended Design Criteria for a Master Schedule Template

• Every student in Grades 9 & 10 takes a rigorous core program in English, Mathematics, Science, and Social Studies (reduce course sequence options) (Default: College-ready/Workplace-ready curriculum for all students)

• Every student has additional periods during the week for enrichment or re-teaching in one or more content areas (Tiered Instruction offered by certified teacher with graduation credit for the student)

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Recommended Design Criteria for a Master Schedule Template

• Every faculty member has at least two common planning periods per week- one with departmental colleagues, one with grade level team (Teacher collaborate around school instructional focus)

• Co-curricular activities (e.g., Drivers Ed.,Band, Chorus) occur in extended school day block (Core instruction, sequenced career pathways, expanded learning time)

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Complete and discuss at your table your thoughts on Worksheet #3-

• What opportunities for student success would be possible with a schedule designed with these characteristics in mind?

• What challenges would need to be solved in order for the schedule to work?