Archive for October 31st, 2005

Fuchs on RTI

Published by JohnL on 31 October 2005 in News. 0 Comments

While, I’m on the subject of response-to-intervention, let me point to an article in which Doug Fuchs explained why RTI should require little of teachers of students with Learning Disabilities. Skip over the TeachingLD.org to read Doug’s answer to a teacher’s question about RTI.

Student teacher’s view of LD

Published by JohnL on 31 October 2005 in News. 0 Comments

April Luehmann, who teaches science education at the Warner School of Education at the University of Rochester, has her students maintain blogs to record their experiences during their preparation to teach. One of those students, Greg Hart, wrote about his experiences when scribing for a student with Learning Disabilities. Greg found the experience distressing.

This is one of the hardest tasks I have done. Don’t get me wrong, writing down what someone says is not grueling nor mentally challenging. But, listening to a student think through problems and arrive at completely wrong answers over and over is painful.

From this description, it sounds to me as though no one has taught the learner how to think through problems. It’s a great illustration of the need to teach students strategies, teach them how to proceed through a task systematically and strategically. What are the cognitive steps for solving problems such as these? Let’s make those mental steps into demonstrable actions, teach learners to perform them, show them the nuances of performing them, and provide copious practice in using them to solve problems. But, teaching wasn’t Greg’s responsibility in the situation he described; his description of the situation simply gave me an opporutnity to reiterate the importance of teaching cognitive operations explicity.

Greg goes on to comment about discrepancies between what he considers the learner’s capabilities and those he saw represented in the learner’s Individual Education Plan (IEP). He added some comments on special education.

I will admit, this student probably does have some learning disability, but it is not what the IEP says. How many other students struggle in school and are simply classified as students with a disability? How many of these students have wrong information and diagnoses? This is a shame. If this problem is at all wide spread, it is a disgrace to special needs education, the people who work there, the administration for not hiring enough trained support, and maybe even the education system in general.

Greg’s observations are telling. If there are such problems with the IEPs, if they do not clearly and accurately reflect learners’ unique educational needs, then there is a need to teach teachers how to prepare appropriate IEPs. This task also requires cognitive strategies! We should be ensuring that teachers, administrators, psychologists, and parents know what it takes to write legally correct and worthwhile IEPs, such as described by Barb Bateman and colleagues.

Link to Greg’s entry.

De-emphasize fancy tests

Published by JohnL on 31 October 2005 in Comments. 2 Comments

Even though response-to-intervention (RTI) concepts are being promoted by many, there is still substantial interest in psychometry and Learning Disabilities, as reflected in my recent post about Shelby County’s revision of its LD guidelines (which incorporate both RTI and traditional discrepancy ideas) and in a recent column by Jayne Matthews in the Baltimore Times. In the column, Ms. Matthews refers to explanations of the indices derived from scores on the Weschler Intelligence Scale for Children-IV. Drawing on notes from a lecture by Luann Adams, Ms. Matthews offers these descriptions.

In an IEP [Individual Education Plan] meeting a parent may hear the words WISC-IV (pronounced as “wisk 4”). WISC IV stands for Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children IV. The WISC-IV is divided into four subtests: 1) Verbal Comprehension Index (VCI) measures verbal abilities that use reasoning, comprehension and conceptualization. For example, it tests for word reasoning by asking a child to identify the common concept being described in a series of clues. 2) Perceptual Reasoning Index (PRI) measures fluid reasoning. For example it tests a child’s ability to identify picture concepts by presenting the child with two or three rows of pictures and then asks the child to choose the picture form each row to form a group with a common characteristic 3) Working Memory Index (WMI) measures attention, comprehension and the ability to hold information in mind temporarily while performing another manipulation with the information. For example it tests for letter–number sequencing by reading a child a sequence of numbers and letters and asking the child to recall the numbers in ascending order and the letters in alphabetical order. 4) Processing Speed Index (PSI) measures the speed of mental and written processing. For example it tests a child’s ability to code asking the child to copy symbols that are paired with simple geometric shapes or numbers. Then using a key, the child draws each symbol in its corresponding shape or box within a specified time limit.

It’s good to demystify these indices, and for doing so I applaud Ms. Matthews and Dr. Adams. Parents should be informed about them. Psychologists should not be able to use them as mumble-jumble that establishes underserved undeserved superior knowledge.

However, I have reservations about making much from the indices. I have yet to see an analysis of a child’s performance on these sorts of measures that actually guides instruction in an IEP. Instructional decisions need to be based on students’ performance on tasks more closely related to academic and social objectives. If students are having trouble with reading (a placeholder), instruction for them should be based on the skills they need to know, not on some assessment that is one-or-more-steps removed from those skills.

A href=”http://www.btimes.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=63009&sID=208″>Link to Ms. Matthews column on assessments.