Uncovering Practical Intervention Strategies for Secondary Students

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Uncovering Practical Intervention Strategies for
Secondary Students

• Frank Dykes, Ed.D.
• Assistant Professor
• The University of Texas at Tyler
• Suzanne Thomas, Ph.D.
• Assistant Professor
• The University of Texas at Tyler

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Why do we need interventions in secondary schools?

• NCLB requirements for standards-based curricula
  and standardized assessment
• Heavy content demands and implications of high
  stakes testing
• The LRE provision of IDEA
• Diversity of students in the general education
  classroom

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Session Objectives

• Participants will leave this session with an
  understanding of the rationale for utilizing
  intervention strategies for students in secondary
  classrooms.
• Participants will acquire strategies to engage
  students in active learning.
• Participants will leave the session with a
  handout with examples of practical interventions
  that can be used in a variety of subject areas.

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The Way Things Are..

• Under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) and the
  recent reauthorization of IDEA, most students
  with disabilities are expected to take standard
  tests of academic achievement and to achieve at a
  level equal to that of students without
  disabilities (Hallahan Kauffman, 2006)

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The Way Things Are..

• To complicate the situation further, most special
  education teachers are not experts in the content
  domains which comprise the standard tests of
  achievement. To aid students in this endeavor,
  more secondary schools are placing students with
  disabilities in general education classrooms in
  order to insure that students are being
  instructed by a teacher highly qualified in the
  subject matter

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The Way Things Are..

• Often general education teachers are not trained
  in techniques and strategies to meet the unique
  learning needs of students with academic
  challenges (Mastropieri Scruggs, 2001).

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Factors Affecting Secondary Students

• Learner Variables
• Age
• Motivation
• Learning Styles and Strategies
• Specific Capabilities
• Personality
• General Intelligence

• The Learning Context
• Manner of Acquisition
• Opportunity for Learning
• The Social Context (Communicative interaction is
  affected by the need to communicate, low-risk
  setting, opportunities for practice, and peer and
  teacher support.)

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What can we do?

• Differentiate Instruction
• Differentiated instruction is not a book or kit
  you buy, it is a philosophy of systematically
  planning and curriculum and instruction that
  meets the unique diverse learning needs of each
  student and maximizing each students learning
  capacity (Tomlinson, 1999).

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Wait a Minute!!!!
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Remember We are talking PRACTICAL strategies!

• Its easy to differentiate instruction when you
  think of it in this context
• Content
• Product
• Affect
• Learning Environment

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Content

• Refers to what is taught and how to access
  information given
• Examples
• Use of examples based on student interest
• Texts at varied reading levels

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Process

• How students come to understand and own the
  knowledge, skills and understanding
• Examples
• Varying the pace of student work
• Using cooperative grouping strategies

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Product

• Student demonstration of what he or she has come
  to know, understand and be able to do.
• Examples
• Written papers, demonstrations, posters, games,
  etc.

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Affect

• Student linking of thought and feeling in the
  classroom.
• Examples
• Ensure equitable participation
• Model respect

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Learning Environment

• Classroom function and feeling.
• Examples
• Classroom arrangement
• Availability of supplies/materials
• Grouping

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Research Based Practical Interventions

• Word Walls
• Guided Notes
• Graphic Organizers
• Mnemonics
• Classwide Peer Tutoring

• Virtual Field Trips
• Think Alouds
• Cooperative Learning
• Co-Teaching
• Sheltered Instruction

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Word Walls
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What are Word Walls?

• When students work with word walls, the words
  become anchored in their long-term memory
  allowing quick and easy access.
• Word walls also encourage students to make
  connections between words.
• Students learn to use the words to construct
  knowledge in conversations and activities. Word
  walls also provide a visual record of skills
  taught and content studied.
• They are powerful tools, if and when words are
  discussed and analyzed with students before they
  are posted on the wall (Routman, 2003).
• For older students, content area words or key
  vocabulary words are effective resources in the
  classroom. Used effectively, word walls assist
  and support the core instructional program used
  in the classroom.

A word wall is a systematically organized
collection of words displayed in large letters on
a wall in the classroom (Cunningham,1995).
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Guided Notes

• Guided notes are instructor-prepared handouts
  that provide all students with background
  information and standard cues with specific
  spaces to write key facts, concepts, and/or
  relationships during the lecture.

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How do guided notes help?

• Guided notes require students to actively respond
  during the lecture, improve the accuracy and
  efficiency of students' note-taking, and increase
  the students' retention of course content.
• Guided notes can help organize and enhance
  lecture content in any discipline or subject
  area.
• Instructors can develop guided notes for a single
  lecture, for one or more units within a course,
  or for an entire semester- or year-long course
  (Heward, 2003).

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Guided Notes Example

• Major European counties were in competition to
  extend their power in North America and claim the
  land as their own.
• Motivating forces of exploration
• Economic- _______________, ________________
  resources, and ____________
• Religious- Spread of _____________________________
  ____
• Competition- Competition for _______________
  and belief of ______________________ of own
  culture

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Graphic Organizers

• A graphic organizer is a visual and graphic
  display that depicts the relationships between
  facts, terms, and or ideas within a learning
  task. Graphic organizers are also sometimes
  referred to as knowledge maps, concept maps,
  story maps, cognitive organizers, advance
  organizers, or concept diagrams (Hall
  Strangman, 2002).

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Graphic Organizer Examples
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Keys to Effective use of Graphic Organizers

• Consistency
• Create a standard set of graphic organizers
• Establish a routine for using them
• (Baxendell, 2003)

• Coherency
• Provide clear labels for the relationship between
  concepts in GO
• Limit the number of ideas covered
• Minimize Distractions
• Creativity
• Use during all stages of learning
• Add illustrations
• Implement with cooperative groups and pairs

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Ideas for Secondary use of Graphic Organizer

• Illustrations of science concepts
• Key issues in history
• Comparing/Contrast two pieces of literature
• Preteaching mathematical concepts
• (Dye, 2000)

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Remember these??

• ROY G BIV
• PLEASE EXCUSE MY DEAR AUNT SALLY
• My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nine
  Pizzas

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Mnemonics

• According to Scruggs and Mastroperi (1990), a
  mnemonic is a specific reconstruction of target
  content that is intended to tie new information
  to the learners existing knowledge base, and
  therefore, facilitate retrieval (p. 271).
• Most popular methods include keyword, acronym and
  pegwords.

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Types

• Keyword

• Acronym
• H-Huron
• O-Ontario
• M-Michigan
• E-Erie
• S-Superior

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Pegword (Ehren, 2000)

• The pegword device uses one word that is
  associated with another as a hook for memory, as
  in the rhyme "one/bun," "two/shoe," three/tree."
  This device would also be paired with a mnemonic
  illustration. So, for example, if a student
  taking a health class needs to remember that the
  number one cause of death in women is heart
  disease, he might create an illustration of a
  woman eating a bun with a symbol of a heart
  enlarged over her chest.

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Classwide Peer Tutoring

• CWPT is an integrated behavior management and
  direct instruction procedure based upon
  reciprocal peer tutoring and group-oriented
  reinforcement contingencies ( Mercer Mercer,
  2001, p. 64).
• Three features of CWPT
• Peers are used to supervise responding and
  practice
• A game format is used that includes points and
  competing teams to motivate and maintain
  interest.
• A weekly evaluation plan is used to ensure group
  and individual progress

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Planning and Implementing Peer Tutoring

• Steps (Mercer Pullen, 2005)
• Determine goals for peer tutoring
• Target skills or content for the peer tutoring
  pairs
• Select materials
• Train tutors
• Train tutees
• Teach social skills used in peer tutoring
• Review rules
• Schedule the sessions and evaluate

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Examples for Peer Tutoring
What is this? ( Right Angle) What degree is
associated with it? ( 90 degrees)
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Peer Tutoring Card Example
Interphase
Which stage of mitosis is this? (first) What
happens in this stage ? (DNA replicates nuclear
membrane stays intact)
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Virtual Field Trips

• Virtual field trips are explorations through the
  Web, typically an organized set of links with a
  particular theme (Foley, 2003).
• Virtual field trips can
• Build content vocabulary
• Provide background knowledge
• Allow for hands-on learning
• Lets Go!

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Virtual Field Trips

• Expand classroom experiences
• Make challenging subjects more real and
  understandable (math, science, poetry.)
• Enhance creativity and productivity
• Develop research and evaluation skills (students
  locate, collect and evaluate information)
• Promote positive attitude about and develop
  expertise in technology use
• Provide opportunities for career exploration

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Think AloudsA metacognitive technique or
strategy in which a teacher verbalizes thoughts
aloud while reading a selection orally, thus
modeling the process of comprehension (Block
Israel, 2004). Effective think alouds

• Provide demonstration and guided practice of what
  readers do before, during and after reading
• Describe why a specific thought process is
  effective
• Encourage periodic reflection on the processes.
• Help build comprehension, decoding, vocabulary
  and fluency.

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Think Alouds
ActivitiesBefore beginning reading -
Overview and look for important information
- Connect to the Big ideas - Put yourself
in the book

• As you read
• Predict
• Recognize writing style
• Ask questions
• After reading for awhile
• - Relate to prior information
• - Anticipate use of knowledge

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Cooperative Learning

• Students work in small groups to accomplish
  shared goals, while maintaining individual
  accountability. (Prater, 2007).
• Important components
• Teacher specify the objectives and the group
  skills needed for the activity
• Use groups balanced for skills and interests
• - Define group parameters
• - Assign specific roles
• (Mastropieri, Margo
  Berkeley,
• 2007, p. 55).

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Characteristics

• Tasks are shared to reach a common goal
• Small groups should contain 2 to 5 members
• Students use cooperative, pro-social behaviors to
  accomplish their common task(s)
• Students are positively interdependent.They need
  each other to accomplish the common goal.
• Students are individually
  accountable.
• Each holds a job for which they are
• individually responsible.

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Learning is enhanced

• Student are motivated to learn
• Students construct their own knowledge and share
  information

• Cooperative Learning promotes
• Social and collaborative skills
• Higher self-esteem
• Increased appreciation for different points
• Positive interaction among students of diverse
  backgrounds

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Co-Teaching

• A system of support for students with
  disabilities that occurs when two educators
  combine their complementary sets of professional
  knowledge and skills and work simultaneously in
  general education classrooms (Hourcade
  Bauwens, 2003).

• 2 or more professionals with equivalent licensure
  or status
• Both participate fully in instructional process
• Students are heterogeneously grouped
• All students are our students (not yours and
  mine)

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Co-teaching
Influences definitions, schedules, content,
students, professional training
Provide Support
Teach Same Content
Teach Different Content
Team Teaching
Instructional Actions Explain, question, give
help, give feedback
Adapted from Weiss Lloyd, 2002)
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Sheltered Instruction

• Specially designed academic instruction in
  English for students with language challenges.
  Sheltered instruction provides access to the core
  curriculum using techniques that make lessons
  more understandable to students (Echevarria,
  1995).
• The goal is for the student to learn content
  material while simultaneously developing English
  proficiency.

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Sheltered Instruction Techniques

• Control speech - slower rate, clear enunciation,
  short sentences, avoid jargon
• Control vocabulary target words critical to the
  lesson
• Contextualize instruction hands-on and visual
  cues, gestures, facial expressions, real objects,
  props,
• demonstration

• Make connections. Relate to previous experience
  and knowledge.
• Adapt curriculum and instruction. Supplement
  instructions with visuals pictures, charts,
  maps, graphs. Check understanding frequently.
• Encourage interaction and practice. Group native
  and non-native speakers.
• Correct indirectly. Restate incorrect comments
  in correct form.