Teach Effectively!

Over on Behavior Mod Info readers can find several entries about the hearings regarding US schools’ use of seclusion and restraint. The hearings were conducted by the US House of Representatives’ Committee on Education and Labor.

News sources around the US are abuzz with how state and local education agencies will spend the influx of funds for special education that comes with the US government’s increases in IDEA funding under the stimulus plan.

• Schools getting stimulus aid, but is it too late? from AZ Central.com
• Schools’ stimulus a puzzle from the Daily Tribune – Columbia, MO
• State schools to get $118M from the News Sentinel – Knoxville, TN
• A boost for poor, special-needs kids from the Star Tribune – Minneapolis, MN
• Berkeley Unified Will Receive $2.4 Million in Stimulus Funds Next Month from the Daily Planet – Berkeley, CA

Given that these funds may be pretty fleeting (here today, gone in a couple of years?), how wise is it to invest in more teachers whom the LEAs will have to dismiss or materials that are likely to need replacement in just a few years? I’d say, “NOT!”

Why not invest in staff development, using the two-year span to ensure that virtually all teachers know how to measure progress in easy-but-rigorous ways (e.g., curriculum-based measurement), implement school-wide discipline programs, and present lessons in systematic and (dare I say it?) instructive ways?

Here are some relevant links: Research Institute on Progress Monitoring and Student Progress; School-wide Positive Behavioral Interventions & Supports.

Zig Engelmann, principle author of a sweet suite of instructional materials that cover the range from beginning language skills to core concepts in physical sciences, has revised his Web site, Zig Site. If you’ve ever heard of “Direct Instruction” (sometimes said, “Big DI”), you’ve heard of Zig’s work. The new site has somethings new and somethings old. Rather than précis the changes, here’s how Zig describes it:

Starting in 2009, Zigsite is going to have an emphasis on training through videos. The first will be a series of 13 video sessions on teaching English pronunciation to non-English speakers. It will be followed by a series of training videos on teaching our new program, Direct Instruction Spoken English.

The longer printed works on Zigsite include, Rubric for Identifying Authentic DI Programs, Low Performers’ Manual, and the log of the first formal study I did in education—Comparative Preschool Study: High and Low SES Preschoolers Learning Advanced Cognitive Skills. These are constructive. Most of the other works are constructive only in the sense that they help clarify why education has gone basically nowhere in the past 40 years. Only now are educators starting to “invent” some of the stuff we used back in the 60s.

Continue reading ‘Zig site morphs’

Jim Wright, who is a school psychologist in New York and an author of multiple sources about current topics in education, has a Web site that some folks will likely find valuable. He calls it “Intervention Central,” and he’s populated it with guidance about teaching techniques. There are specific many specific recommendations, organized according to academic area (e.g., arithmetic, reading fluency) as well as by topic (e.g., RTI, classroom behavior). Mr. Wright has based many of his recommendations on published studies. Link to Intervention Central.

In the chat section of Education Week there is a transcript of a discussion of the implications of response to intervention (or instruction; RtI) for classrooms. Although the questions they answer cover much broader scope than classroom instruction (e.g., roles of administrators, counselors, and psychologists), Judy Elliot and Doug Fuchs provide responses to many instructional matters in the transcript.
Continue reading ‘RtI implications’

In an editorial published by the Houston (TX, US) Chronicle, Ashley Herzog takes direct aim at schools’ oft-expressed interest in promoting self-esteem. The opinion piece is entitled, “No Way to Succeed: The flaws of the self-esteem fad: Research doesn’t justify obsession in U.S. schools.” Here’s her lead:

“Self-esteem,” it seems, is the 1990s fad that just won’t die. A few weeks ago, a newspaper based in Athens, Ohio (where my school, Ohio University, is located) ran a story about a new feel-good program at nearby Amesville Elementary School. Fittingly dubbed Amesville Rocks, the program is designed “to make the kids feel important,” in the words of one school employee. In accordance with the theme of self-adulation, the article described how the whole school applauded themselves “as if it were the Academy Awards.”

Continue reading ‘Self-esteem gets lowered’

The Association for Behavior Analysis International opened on-line registration for the 2008 Education Conference “Evidence-Based Practice, Scientifically Based Instruction, and Educational Effectiveness.” The conference, which will be held 5-7 September 2008 at the Hyatt Regency Reston in Reston (VA, US) near Washington D.C., features lots of potentially valuable presentations.

* Anthony Biglan: Teacher Stress and Collegiality: Overlooked Factors in the Effort to Promote Evidence-Based Practices
* Ronnie Detrich: Evidence-Based Education: Can We Get There from Here?
* Robert H. Horner: Implementing Evidence-Based Practices at Socially Important Scales
* Lynn Okagaki: Solution Driven Research
* Timothy Slocum: Sources of Evidence-Based Education Recommendations
* W. David Tilly III: Nailing the Educational Pendulum to the Wall
* Hill M. Walker: Critical Issues in the Use of Randomized Clinical Trials and Control Groups Within Applied Settings: Rationale, Challenges and Benefits
* Susan M. Wilczynski: The Role of Single Subject Research Design in Establishing Evidence-Based Practice Guidelines
* Amanda VanDerHeyden: Using RTI to Accomplish System Change

Here are relevant links to the program, registration, and hotel reservations.

The Consortium to Prevent School Violence has launched its Web site. There’s a note on EBD Blog giving more information.