Response to Intervention
Response to Intervention and General Education
Response to Intervention refers to various models of identifying learners with learning disabilities in schools. The Response to Intervention is a multi-tier model based on both academic and behavioral systems of a learner’s environment. This identification helps the special education providers to ascertain their eligibility for special education and related services. The Response to Intervention is part of the 2004 Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act. Unlike the traditional identification of learners with learning disabilities, Response to Intervention focuses on discrepancies contingent to age-based instruction and expectations. This is the first instance in which the Response to Intervention model distances them from the traditional model which uses cognitive disparities in the process of identifying learners with disabilities. Response to Intervention model also does early screening and monitoring in schools before finally determining the learner’s eligibility. This criterion is further used by the Response to Intervention model to establish the best teaching methodology that does not emphasize on the cognitive disparities of the identified learner. These features make the Response to Intervention very different from the traditional and other identification criteria. (Fletcher and Vaughn, 2009)
One of the key strengths of Response to Intervention is anchored in its early screening and monitoring of learners during their early school ages. This strategy ensures that the learners with learning disabilities are identified and accorded the necessary assistance in good time. In fact, this model can provide comprehensive assistance to learners with disability as immediately without waiting for the completion of their case-study evaluation. For instance, when a student transfers from a parish school to a public institution, his or her case-study evaluation can run parallel with the provision of special education assistance. This, in essence, helps in eliminating unnecessary delays of providing these learners with special educational services. This principle ensures that the disabled learners get these special services in a timely manner. For instance, struggling students may find help in good time before a very large gap is created in their skills and abilities. (Fletcher and Vaughn, 2009)
Response to Intervention also relies heavily on the learner’s assessment data to ascertain the learner’s eligibility. This data provides the learner’s response and general progress towards the various intervention strategies that are administered by their teachers. The feedback obtained from these assessment statistics is very important as it gives the way forward. If the response is not positive, then the implementers of this model can design other strategies to ensure that the learner’s response is impressive. To make its objectives achievable, Response to Intervention model uses evidence-based scientific intervention strategies in the elimination of learner’s academic difficulties. Similarly, Response to Intervention puts more emphasis on ensuring that a student is taught through the correct teaching methods. The main goal here is to prevent relating a student’s poor performance to inappropriate curriculum and poor instruction methods. The Response to Intervention mode therefore ensures that proper research is conducted to come up with the most appropriate and the most applicable teaching methods to suite the learner’s educational needs. Response to Intervention also provides much assistance to the learners with learning disabilities. (VanDerHeyden, Witt and Gilbertson , 2007)
One of the main problems that the Response to Intervention models has is that it over neglects the learners who are performing at grade levels. RTI does not consider the fact that not all learners fail due to poor instructional and poor teaching methods but may also have inherent disabilities. For example, a bright student may be scoring an aggregate grade of ‘C’ which is way below his or her standard. Such a student is seriously in need of special intervention. However, the Response to Intervention model regards such learners as unqualified and hence ineligible for special attention.
The education professionals and institutions involved in the implementation of the Response to Intervention are facing some challenges. Helen Guffy states that the implementation of Response to Intervention is bound to a long process. She emphasizes the fact that this model requires a well trained staff which clearly is and will understand all its principles. Currently, this kind of staff is not readily available and this puts the implementation under test. (Duffy, 2007) This same worry is also expressed by educational specialist Resnick who says that many schools have not yet started in-service programs for their staff to make them compatible with the Response to Intervention model. He reiterates that some of the teachers are not well equipped with the scientific methods of data collection, analysis, presentation and interpretation. (Resnick, 2009)
In other words, a teacher planning to implement the Response to Intervention model must update her profession in accordance to the principles of Response to Intervention model. Professional educators went through their training long before the development of the Response to Intervention. Their skills may not exactly match the requirements of this model but more in-service training can surely place them into the model’s context. Proper execution of this model and its success greatly relies on its effective implementation. This calls for a continuous professional development on assessment processes, its intervention strategies and excellent close monitoring of the student’s progress based on the assessment data. It is also worth noting that the teaching staff must also understand how they can best use the student’s assessment data to evaluate the appropriateness of the instructional interventions in use.
In conclusion, Response to Intervention is more detailed and thus provides a better alternative to identifying learners with disabilities in good time. It helps eliminate wastage of time and devices strategies that ensure that a learner does not become a victim of poor instruction and curriculum. The model implementation is also very challenging to the current education specialist and professional who must take their professional training to an extra mile to become more compatible with it.
References
Amanda M. VanDerHeyden, Joseph C. Witt and Donna Gilbertson . (2007). A Multi-year
Evaluation of the Effects of a Responseto Intervention (RTI) Model on Identification of
Children for Special Education. Journal of School Psychology , 45, 225-256.
Duffy, H. (2007). Meeting the Needs of Significantly Struggling Learners in High School: A
Look at Approaches to Tiered Intervention. American Institutes for Research , 1-14.
Jack M. Fletcher and Sharon Vaughn. (2009). Response to Intervention: Preventing and
Remediating Academic Difficulties. Child Development Perrspectives , 3 (1), 30-37.
Resnick, B. (2009, October 10). What is Response to Intervention (RTI)? Retrieved May 25,
2013, from Rush Neurobehavioral Center: http://www.rnbc.org/2009/10/what-is-
response-to-intervention-rti/
