RTI: Intervention and Progress Monitoring 1
Paola Pfl
ü cker
Application Assignment: RTI: Intervention and Progress Monitoring
EDSP 5311-20: Diagnostic and Prescriptive
Teaching for Exceptional Children
Houston Baptist University
Professor: Dr. Fontenot
February 6, 2014

RTI: Intervention and Progress Monitoring 2
RTI- Response To Intervention is an early approach to identification and support of students that have learning or behavioral needs. The purpose is to provide interventions at increasing levels of intensity to accelerate students’ learning and target behavioral challenges.
This instruction can be provided by different school personnel like general education teachers, special education teachers and specialists. It consists of three tiers. Tier 1 is High Quality
Classroom Instruction, screening and Group Interventions. It consists of all students receiving high quality instruction to ensure that they don’t have difficulties due to inadequate instruction.
All students are screened periodically to establish a learning and behavioral baseline in order to identify struggling students. Tier 2 is Targeted Instruction. It consists of students that have been identified as strugglers in tier 1. These students are provided interventions in a small group setting in addition to the general curriculum. Tier 3 is Intensive Interventions and
Comprehensive Evaluation. It consists of students that have not made enough progress in Tier 2.
These students receive individualized, intensive interventions to target students’ skills deficits. If students’ do not reach the desired progress in response to these targeted interventions they are subject to a referral for special education services. The RTI has 4 main roles. The principal and assistant principal as administrators, smaller campuses will only have the principal as administrator, but at times the counselor can be called in as a support role. The special education teacher, that provides the point of view as an experienced professional in the field. The homeroom teacher, that has had the interaction with the student and can provide feedback on interventions tried. The diagnosticians, they provide professional insights, since they are the professionals that administer the testing for special education services and their opinion and expertise are valuable. The data collected can be istation records (computerized reading program used in HISD), think through math records (computerized math program used in HISD), overage

RTI: Intervention and Progress Monitoring 3 reports, excessive absences, office referrals, benchmarks/ common assessments, district level assessments, curriculum embedded assessments and any other type of the assessment that the teacher may have used in the classroom. All the forms used for an RTI in HISD are found online.
You can have access to them using “Chancery”, that is a program used in HISD that allows teachers to have access to students’ information. The same information is available for administrators as well as attendance clerks. Only homeroom teachers can access the RTI forms for your own students. Below is an example of the form. The format is the same for all three tiers.
First you have to enter the date of the entire intervention period, ex. November 1 st
, 2013. After that you enter the progress monitoring tool as well as the date. After that, input the outcome and the notes regarding that monitoring tool. This is repeated three times, using three monitoring tools and three different dates as well as the corresponding notes. All three tiers have the same components and formats. All forms have an electronic format. In my opinion, RTI provides a

RTI: Intervention and Progress Monitoring 4 tool for teachers to identify strugglers at an early stage. I think that a strength of RTI is that students can benefit completely of the RTI process when used appropriately. RTI is a great tool for teachers as well as students to monitor their progress and also provide alternative instruction for areas of major need. I think that a weakness of RTI is that the system, HISD web online system has many flaws. I think that another weakness is that if the timelines are not respected for each tier, RTI will not be effective. RTI must be followed thoroughly and that can be a weakness when not done correctly.
I have chosen a student in the second tier of RTI. Tier 2 is Targeted Instruction. So far data collected for this student is district assessments, curriculum based assessments, benchmarks, class projects and weekly academic checkpoints. I interviewed Dr. Virginia Elizondo, assistant principal at my campus. She has the administrator role in the RTI. As an administrator, she makes sure that procedures are taken place as RTI procedures are stated under HISD policies.
She stated that her understanding of RTI is that it is an opportunity for teachers to get additional support in how to deal with academics as well as behavioral challenges with students. She stated that RTI gives teachers the opportunity to work as a committee to design a plan to aid students academically as well as behavioral. She also said that RTI is the initial steps for special education referral, when all tiers have failed. Dr. Elizondo said that she believes that RTI is a good way to filter students with challenging problems instead of over testing students. Dr.
Elizondo identified collaborative efforts as strength of RTI. She identified Chancery- HISD system- as a weakness because it is not keeping records up to date, delaying the process as well as information retrieval, making the process more difficult. I believe that RTI gives teachers a great opportunity to develop creative strategies for struggling students. It is also a great opportunity for collaboration among teachers that share different expertise to develop plans for

RTI: Intervention and Progress Monitoring 5 struggling students. I think that the monitoring tool is of great help to track student progress allowing teachers to tailor instruction and monitor it as well. I think that RTI is great tool when using it within the timeframes as well as inputting the information accordingly.

RTI: Intervention and Progress Monitoring 6
References
1.
HISD - http://hisdrti.com/
2.
HISD - http://hisdrti.com/response-to-intervention/
3.
HISD - IAT District Training 2013