Teaching of reading and writing for elementary school students based on the intervention response model (RTI)

Abstract

The Response to Intervention (RTI) model aim to intervene early with children at-risk (or difficulty) in acquiring academic skills. Therefore, this model presents a direction in relation to the service proposals to work the needs of the students as early interventions, demonstrating itself as a preventive model to reduce the academic difficulties. Considering the promising results found in the use of an individualized and computerized reading and writing program, the present study aims to evaluate the effects of reading and writing teaching through an individualized and computerized teaching program, based on the Response to Intervention model, in incoming students of elementary school. Additionally, monitor the performance of these students in large scale assessments that include reading and writing skills. Two classes of the 1st year of elementary school in a public regular educational institution will participate in the study. An experimental design involving the direct manipulation and control of variables of interest will be used, through pre and post-test measures. Initially, the pre-test data will be collected by the teacher with the whole class, through a governmental evaluation and a functional assessment instrument of academic areas. Based on the RTI model, participants of the two classes will be selected to carry out the reading and writing teaching program. In this first selection (second semester of the first school year), those students that present the lowest performance in the Portuguese language evaluation will be recruited from the two classes. During the research, the classes will carry out monitoring evaluations to analyze the performance in the target skills of the study proposal. In the first semester of the second year of elementary school, new students, that present the lowest performances in the Portuguese language evaluation conducted in the second semester of the first school year, will be recruited from the same two classes, to carry out the computerized teaching program. Finally, in the second semester of the second year, students that present the lowest performances in the governmental evaluation, carried out in the first semester of the current school year, will be recruited. For the three recruitment stages, a maximum of ten participants will be selected, with five participants from each class, prioritizing those participants who present a lower performance in the Portuguese language evaluation. At the end of the second semester of the second school year, the evaluations with all students in the classes will be re-applied as post-test. The government evaluation carried out every six months will allow to monitor the students' performance in Portuguese and evaluate the effects of the computerized teaching program through three recruitments at different stages. The intention is to verify if the intervention proposal showed an effect in relation to the reading and writing abilities of the students in need of support. The data analysis will also allow to evaluate the individual performances of each participant before and after the teaching procedure and to monitor step by step the process of acquisition of reading and writing. Also, to verify the measures of the initial repertoire and the evolution of the students of the two classes in the governmental evaluations and in a functional assessment. (AU)