RtI Meeting Preparation

Earlier this year, I explained the changes that we made to our interventions, schedules, and meetings for RtI.

One of our big challenges as a building has always been meetings.  We have a large amount of Tier II and Tier III students (which we hope to be turning around as we dive deeper into RtI).  Due to this large amount of students, meeting on ALL of them has been hard, frustrating, tricky...I don't know...just not happening the way that it should.  Our mission this year was to change that.

It was a bit of a scary endeavor.  In order to meet on all of these students in a consistent, efficient manner, it would take some "leg work" up front.  Previously, teachers would bring all of their data and then we would listen to the data on each student.  This was not a quick process and conversations could quickly stray off topic.

Although we had folders set up for each team member that included "decision rules" and intervention options, we really needed more than that.

What we needed was all the student data in a clean, clear format.  This would help us to move through each student efficiently. We needed something like this:

And so that is what we did.  First, we assessed each Tier II and Tier III student on the DRA (that is our reading assessment).  This assessment helped us to determine if their interventions were impacting the overall "picture" of their reading progress.  Second, we gathered all of the progress monitoring data.  This could have been LLI reading records, an Aimsweb assessment, or any other predetermined progress monitoring tool.  Finally, we imported all this information into the slide (like the one above) for each student. 
As an intervention team, we came up with a "rough draft" of the interventions that would change, stay the same, or be discontinued.

Then came the meeting day...

As an intervention team, we met with each grade level during their plan bells.  We flipped through the slides.  None of this data was unknown to the classroom teacher, of course, but having it all on one slide for us to look at collectively was extremely helpful.  It was a HUGE time saver in terms of our meeting.  Once we quickly went over the data, the intervention team provided their recommendation for an changes to the support the child needed and the classroom teacher would agree or disagree.  Then we moved on to the next student.  And this would continue on until all of the slides were complete or the plan bell time was up!

We met on each and every Tier II and Tier III student each 7 weeks.  This has never happened in this manner before and I will tell you...I think it made a HUGE impact on our interventions this year.  Yes...it took us a full week to assess, prepare the slides, and complete RtI paperwork...BUT...the payoff for this time commitment has been great.  We have seen more growth this year than I can ever remember observing in the past.
 
Now.  That could be for several reasons. 
We just started using LLI.
We added a Title I person to our team.
We were no longer tied to grade levels.
We were following a true RtI framework.
We had consistent meetings every 7 weeks based on current data.

All of these factors played a part in the success that we have seen this year.  But stopping to analyze, reflect, and make changes (no matter how small or how big) has been really important.  Each student received interventions tailored to their needs. 

And that is what it is all about, right?  Meeting them where they are and taking them to where we know that they can go!  While supporting and loving them the whole way.

Em