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Jen Forbes, fourth-grade teacher at Townsend Elementary School in the Hazelwood School District, guides a group of students through a communication arts activity using Response to Intervention (RtI) learning strategies.

At Townsend Elementary School in the Hazelwood School District, working in small groups at least three times a week helps students enhance their skills in math and communication arts.

In one classroom, fourth-grade students are working to build their skills in communication arts with a book titled “Snakes in Asia and Africa.” The focus of the activity is to understand what it means to infer. On the whiteboard, a graphic organizer shows the morning’s progress.

Jen Forbes, fourth-grade teacher, leads the small group.

“Make your guess based on the clues in the story and what’s in your head,” Forbes said.

After calling out a few answers, the students take turns reading aloud about spitting cobras and king cobras.

“We’re looking for something we need to infer about,” said Forbes.

“What kind of food do you think this snake is going to eat? We know where it lives,” she questioned.

“Frogs,” a voice spoke up.

“Insects,” said another.

“Let’s be careful about the facts,” Forbes reminded the group.

The communication arts activity is a learning strategy related to Response to Intervention, or RtI.

Carrie Holt, instructional specialist, explained RtI as “a way for us to use data to place kids in small groups for more intensive academic focus on specific areas of weakness. RtI takes place in addition to the regular reading and mathematics curriculum.”

Comprehension, fluency, vocabulary and phonemic awareness are areas of focus for reading groups. In math, the focus includes “deepening mathematical understanding and increasing computational fluency,” Holt continued.

“We even have enrichment groups for students who are meeting grade level expectations that focus on extended learning projects in art, music and physical fitness,” she said.

Down the hall, students in fifth grade are reading in the round from the book “Loser” by Jerry Spinelli.

Next door, in Michelle Pendleton’s fifth-grade classroom, students are using what is referred to as Peer Assisted Learning Strategies to coach each other in math. PALS is a combination of direct instruction and peer tutoring.

Working in pairs, the morning’s activity is adding and subtracting decimals.

“Are the decimals lined up?” a classmate patiently asks her partner. They work diligently to get the answers correct.

Pendleton walks around the room and checks on the students, reviewing their work and answering questions.

Through PALS, each person takes the role of a coach or a player. The coach uses scripted strategies to assist the player as he or she works through an exercise, Holt said.

PALS and RtI is used at each grade level.

In kindergarten and first grade, PALS is used for phonemic awareness. It is used for math in third through fifth grades. RtI takes place for 30 minutes every other day for second through fifth grade students in either math or reading, while other students are involved in enrichment groups.

“Our data teams examine AIMSweb progress monitoring, reading and math unit test scores and e-Valuate data in order to determine the best match for students and strategies,” said Holt.

The pairings help students understand concepts in math and reading because the small groups are designed to be highly engaging and to move at a fast pace to keep the students directed on the academic tasks.

“Students are highly social and enjoy the time to interact with peers in an appropriate, productive way. A key component to the PALS program is that the students provide immediate corrective feedback as well as verbal praises to their peers,” said Holt.

The goal of implementing RtI and PALS is “to prevent academic failure, to promote the use of evidence-based instructional strategies, and to reduce unnecessary referrals of students for special education services by identifying and meeting the specific academic needs of all students,” said Holt.

Schools throughout the District use RtI strategies to improve student achievement; PALS is being used in many of the schools as well.

(Story by Hazelwood School District Communications Department)

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