RTI Strategies for Reading, Math, or Behavior
Andrew Childers

RTI Strategies for Reading

• Teach essential skills and strategies to the student.
• Provide differentiated instruction based on assessment results and adapt instruction to meet students' needs. Effective teachers recognize that one size doesn't fit all and are ready to adapt instruction—both content and methods.
• Provide explicit and systematic instruction with lots of practice—with and without teacher support and feedback, including cumulative practice over time. Students should not have to infer what they are supposed to learn.
• Provide opportunities to apply skills and strategies in reading and writing meaningful text with teacher support. Students need to be taught what to do when they get to a "hard word."
• Don't just "cover" critical content; be sure students learn it—monitor student progress regularly and reteach as necessary. Effective teachers adjust their teaching accordingly to try to accelerate student progress.

RTI Strategies for Math

• Math Journals: Encourage students to draw, write and calculate in a math journal to solve problems, work through processes, and explain their actions. Assign math journals once a day, once a week or even once a month to create an invaluable, ongoing formative assessment.
• Manipulative's: Manipulatives help students of all ages learn and understand math concepts, from counting to multiplication and division. Break out these manipulative's -- foregoing toys in an effort to respect the maturity of eighth graders -- to introduce more complex math concepts in a way students can see and touch (and talk about).
• Introduce & Review Math Vocabulary: Post a running list of math vocabulary in the classroom and review it often. Harkening back to strategy one, ask students to journal about specific terms and real world application. It will be interesting to see how each student uniquely describes the term "factor" or "exponent." Allow students to draw, diagram or provide examples of terms rather than memorizing a textbook definition. Learning the vocabulary will help all students become more familiar with math concepts.
• Think Aloud: When teaching, or re-teaching, math concepts, using a "Think Aloud" activity is a great method for students to understand, hear, and see what's going on in your head as you solve the problem or work through a mathematical process. Walk students through several examples by thinking aloud each step of the way. Encourage struggling students to model the "think aloud" process by asking them to explain each step as they go. This can be done in a whole-class, small group, or partner setting.
• Existing instructional tools and textbooks often do a poor job of adhering to important instructional principles for learning in mathematics
• Early mathematics intervention can repair deficits and prevent future deficits

RTI Strategies for Behavior

• Expect: The behavior management plan has a limited number of rules (not more than five), e.g. “Follow directions the first time given,” “keep your hands, feet and objects to yourself,” “be on time and prepared,” etc. For those of you using PBIS as the behavioral core curriculum, keep in mind that “Respectful, Responsible and Safe" are not actual rules – they are guiding principles for developing rules for each area in the school.
• Enforce : Create a hierarchical system of consequences from minor to serious, e.g. warning, one minute out of a social time, a problem-solving assignment, parent contact and finally, an office referral. List these consequences on the plan as well as the rules.
• Encourage: Research indicates that positive teacher interactions should be offered in a ratio of four-to-one rewards to consequences. Positives might include praise, coupons, class parties or social time, school wide recognition, social incentives or free time. Use positives often, but unpredictably. Don’t make the mistake of a reward (randomly delivered) becoming an expectation (predictably required).
• Teach: One of the most overlooked aspects of behavior is that we don’t consistently teach the behaviors that we expect of students. We expect students to read our minds, or refer to the poster on the wall, or decide for themselves what “respectful behavior” means and act on that. Teachers must be aware that they need to “teach to the behavioral test” if they want students to have mastery at these skills. Some ways to accomplish this are: School wide assemblies Student-made “commercials” Student-made posters Class meetings; involving discussion, role-plays, practice, direct teaching Consistent reinforcement of the expectations
• Collaborative, team-based approach to development, implementation, and evaluation of alternative interventions.
• Continuous monitoring of progress to determine impact of interventions.
• Expectations for parent involvement throughout the process.

Implementation

• For my future students I want to help them with the strategies of reading by teaching them the essential skills that are required and filter out parts of readings that would not be effective for them to comprehend. I like the idea of using math journals to help my students comprehend mathematics and it would help me understand the severity of the lack of their processing skills on the content area of math. I want to collabortate with both parents and colleagues to build strategies towards behviors that would enforce and encourage students in the classroom.