Simplifying Response to Intervention: Four Essential Guiding Principles (an RTI Book for Professional Learning Communities) (What Principals Need to Know)

 * Use the four guiding principles to guide thinking and implementation of appropriate interventions when students aren t learning.
 *Shift to a culture of collective responsibility for students with special needs.
 *Build team structures for collaboration between districts, schools, and teachers.
 *Define essential learnings in a program of concentrated instruction.
 *Create a toolbox of effective interventions.
 *Develop a system of convergent and common formative assessments to identify students for intervention, determine their unique needs, monitor their progress, and revise or extend learning based on their progress.

The sequel to Pyramid Response to Intervention advocates that a successful RTI model begins by asking the right questions to create a fundamentally effective learning environment for every student. RTI is not a series of implementation steps, but rather a way of thinking about how educators can ensure each child receives the time and support needed to achieve success. Understand why bureaucratic, paperwork-heavy, compliance-oriented, test-score-driven approaches fail. Take responsibility for supporting students who struggle due to issues of motivation, attendance, behavior, and English language proficiency. Learn how to create a focused RTI model that works. Based on the four essential guiding principles collective responsibility, concentrated instruction, convergent assessment, and certain access and with their experience working with hundreds of schools in North America, the authors address both academics and behavior in each chapter and provide considerations for district leadership as well.

Contents

Preface A Sense of Urgency

1 A New Way of Thinking

2 Collective Responsibility: Why Are We Here?

3 Building Structures for Collaboration

4 Concentrated Instruction: Where Do We Need to Go?

5 Convergent Assessment: Where Are We Now?

6 Creating a System of Interventions

7 Certain Access: How Do We Get Every Child There?

Epilogue A New Vision of Special Education