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Prereferral Intervention
Go ahead, take all the time you need. Unless you are fluent in Greek, the task is virtually impossible without instruction in the Greek language. Therein lies the problem. Extended time is useless if teachers fail to provide additional instruction that will assist the struggling student—much like choosing the grand hotel on your journey only to find you cannot afford any of the extras because you failed to understand what you needed in order to enjoy them.
Now consider the second example—preferential seating. What does that really mean? Is it that magical seat in the front of the room? Is it beside the teacher’s desk? Is it in the far back corner of the room? Just where should it be? For most, that seat is generally located near the teacher’s desk so that the student is typically in close proximity to the teacher—which all too often puts the teacher at a desk during instruction—a practice that limits the teacher’s interactions with the other students in the class. Preferential seating does not have to be ineffective; nor should it be. A strategically placed student in an area where he or she can be more appropriately engaged is not only practical but may also be highly effective in that individual’s ability to perform academic or behavioral tasks. Moving a student to a carefully selected seat is not the end result. The move must be thoughtfully and strategically made so that the struggling student can benefit, either academically or behaviorally. Above all, the move must be made with the benefits for the individual student as its justification.
Of course, these two examples are, in the broad scheme of things, all but meaningless. They are minor examples used to make the point that any and all prereferral interventions must be carefully selected and designed to meet the specific, individual needs of the student who may ultimately be referred for special education assessments. The fact of the matter is that prereferral interventions have, in recent years, become much more meaningful with such processes as response to intervention, which provides tiered instruction designed and differentiated to provide students with significant learning or behavior needs increasingly more intensive instruction prior to an actual referral for evaluation.
The process of selecting and implementing prereferral interventions or determining appropriate tiered instruction should always be driven by the individual needs of the students. The response to intervention (RTI) process is a frequently used process to not only identify students who struggle significantly, but also prepare and deliver instructional and behavioral interventions. Although RTI has no specific definition and has no specifically designed model of delivery, it is used to expose students to increasingly more intensive tiers of instructional interventions with ongoing progress monitoring. Because it provides instruction designed to address student needs, it also eliminates both the often arbitrary and meaningless nature of prereferral interventions and the possibility of inadequate instruction as the reason for a student’s poor academic or behavioral performance. The instruction provided in the RTI process consists of evidence-based, instructional practices that are delivered in at least three separate tiers.
Tier I—Primary Intervention is delivered in the general education environment by the general education teacher; consequently, all students receive Tier I instruction.
Tier II—Secondary Intervention is designed to address the needs of students who fail to respond to Tier I instruction. Tier II instruction is more intensive, supplemental instruction than Tier I instruction. Typically, Tier II instruction is delivered to a small group of students.
Tier III—Tertiary Intervention is the most intensive instruction provided for students who fail to respond adequately to Tier II instruction. These interventions are provided to a very small group of individuals.
Individuals who fail to respond appropriately to Tier III instruction are those individuals who are then typically evaluated for special education eligibility. Because students who have been through the RTI process have received several weeks of specially designed, evidence-based instruction prepared to address their individual academic or behavioral issues, there is generally little evidence to support ineffective or inadequate instruction as a reason for their poor progress and performance.
Activity 2.1: Intervention Planning
Visit the website Intervention Central at www.interventioncentral.com. Use the menu bar across the top of the homepage to access the VIDEOS component. Watch the video, “How to Define Academic Problems for Intervention Planning.” There is also an accompanying handout you may find useful as you watch the video and as you complete this activity.
After watching the video, use the Academic Problem Identification process to determine possible interventions for the following student scenario:
Jacob is a fifth-grade student who reads on a third-grade reading level. During reading/language arts, Jacob is frequently disruptive, off task, and unresponsive to repeated reminders to pay attention. He reads aloud when asked to do so, but is not able to explain what he has read when asked to do so.
While he generally works independently and on grade level in math, he quickly becomes agitated and disruptive when math tasks involve word problems.
Ironically, Jacob’s issues with reading appear to diminish when he is reading social studies or working with science. Most recently, Jacob entered a social studies project in the school social studies fair. His topic was about the impact of Jackie Robinson on the field of professional sports. He won first place.
In science, Jacob scored the second highest grade in the class on the latest lab experiment, Homemade Lava Lamps. In fact, Jacob prepared and delivered a PowerPoint presentation about the experiment.
A matrix containing the component parts of the Academic Problem Identification process can be found in Appendix E.
Referral for Evaluation
Once a student fails to respond to Tier III interventions, he or she is then referred for evaluation. In fact, with the reauthorization of IDEA in 2004, the process of identifying students with specific learning disabilities may, in some states, only be accomplished by using the RTI process. Additionally, the law is very clear about the specific procedures for preparing to refer a student for evaluation. First, the referral is a formal request to evaluate a student who has not responded to interventions and who may have a disability.
Any one of a number of individuals can make the referral (e.g., teachers, parents, administrators). Once the referral is considered, parents should be notified that the referral process is being initiated. Although the law does not require that parents be informed of the initiation of a referral, it does mandate that parents provide consent prior to the evaluation. Once parental consent is given, the evaluation process begins.
Multidisciplinary Evaluation Team and Evaluation
The evaluation of a student for special education is the formal process of gathering information about the student’s strengths and weaknesses. The purpose of the initial evaluation is to determine eligibility for special education