Samuel J. Meisels on whether Response to Intervention can live up to expections
Response to Intervention (RtI) has been proposed as an approach to teaching reading effectively and diagnosing learning difficulties (LD) better than is currently accomplished by conventional methods ("Response to Intervention"). Both areas are in need of improvement, but it is not clear that RtI is the solution.The greatest difficulty facing proponents of RtI is that they have not been able to be clear about what it is. If it is no more than “problem solving” (as it is called by some), it’s hard to believe that this will remake reading instruction or special education. If, on the other hand, it refers to an explicit set of rules and procedures, that has not yet been made evident.
The literature on RtI seems to be based on two assumptions. First, that a child’s initial status can be accurately and fairly ascertained with existing on-demand tests that teachers can administer, and second, that current “evidence based” interventions are adequate for dealing with children who are having difficulty learning. Both of these assumptions are questionable. Some children may have learning problems that will not be adequately diagnosed from the few teacher-administered assessments that are permitted under “Reading First” and “Early Reading First.” Similarly, the curricula that are certified as evidence-based may not be suitable for children with these types of learning problems. When we are working with children who have trouble learning to read, we don’t want to limit our choices; we want to expand our options. Moreover, many early learning problems are not just a matter of remediating isolated skills; rather, they present problems of how to teach a variety of interlocking skills. This is made all the more challenging by the very different backgrounds and opportunities to learn of the children we are concerned about.
Another issue raised by RtI is the potential to confuse LD and problems of learning to read. The two areas present overlapping but distinctly different sets of problems. This does not mean that the same generic approach, RtI, cannot be used for both. But it does suggest that both the diagnostic and treatment procedures may be very different, depending on the child’s problem and background.
As it stands now, RtI is an idea or a set of beliefs about how to structure instruction. It closely resembles a diagnostic-prescriptive approach to teaching, which is a sound way to work with nearly any child having trouble learning something. However, it is not a panacea. It does not have explicit rules for how to assess or how to teach—which may be just right, given the diversity of children’s learning patterns and the narrowness of the “evidence-based” approaches that are available. But this lack of prescriptiveness makes it very difficult to evaluate its effectiveness or to describe it to potential adherents.
Sadly, RtI may be another instance of an educational innovation being adopted too quickly and without sufficient examination. Currently based more on belief rather than reason, RtI must not be oversold. Its fundamental premise—that of establishing a diagnostic baseline and then trying a number of different teaching strategies until progress begins to be made—first has to be understood and elaborated before extensive claims are made on its behalf.
Samuel J. Meisels is president of Erikson Institute, a graduate school in child development located in Chicago. His primary area of research is assessment in early childhood.
