If you're looking for some insight into RtI, there's an excellent podcast available at the International Reading Association's website. If clicking on the word "podcast" above doesn't get it for you, you can go here and you'll find the podcast under "online resources" about halfway down the page.
I'm a fan of Richard Allington - and not just because he teaches at the University of Tennessee (thoguh I do know all the words to "Rocky Top"). Dr. Allington is a past president of the IRA and has several good books out.
Among the insights in this 13 minutes podcast (the download is about 12 megabytes):
- RtI does not necessarily mean a three-tier model
- Not all RtI curriculum are appropriate for all reading problems (duh)
- There is not a huge amount of research yet to show that RtI will be effective
I especially appreciated two points he made. First, in order for an RtI curriculum to be useful in solving the problem of a student being behind, it has to deliver more than a year of progress in one year. It doesn't help (not much, at least) to take a student who is two years behind and learning 5 months worth of skills each year, and put that student in an intervention program that gets them to learn seven months worth of skills a year. Slowing the rate at which students fall behind is not the goal. The goal is for them to catch up. Second, students are rarely the problem. If a program doesn't work, it's probably because the program isn't suited for that student.
I also learned a new term: sound outable. Dr. Allington used that phase a couple of times. I'd never heard that before; usually I hear people say "decodable." I smiled and put the term away for later use...
Listen to Dr. Allington's podcast on RtI.
1 comment:
Dick always states clearly what others complicate. He is so easy to read, and even easier to listen to because he gets to the point.
Why is it that policy makers don't consult with experts like him? It is baffling!
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