Present Challenges and Future Directions for the Field of Learning Disabilities*

1. Present Challenges and Future Directions for the Field of Learning Disabilities* Margo A. Mastropieri * Paper presented at the 14th Annual World Congress on LD, Burlington, MA, October 28, 2005

2. Challenges Are Great • High Stakes Testing Demands • Difficulty level • Tests vary • Standards vary • RTI Issues • Learning Issues • Instructional Issues

3. Testing Issues • High Stakes Tests • Represent a single measure of performance • Selected at the state level • Administered annually • Test-taking Skills • Less well developed in students with LD

7. Released 3rd Grade Reading Virginia High Stakes Test Items • 3 pages with text and questions • 486 words • 14 words per sentence • 1.29 syllables per word • Readability: Grade Level Scores • 6th grade with Fry • 5th grade with Flesch-Kincaid

8. Difficulties with Test-Taking Skills • Understanding and interpreting novel formats • Focusing attention appropriately • Select first answer they see • Using elimination strategies • Using time wisely • Error avoidance • Deductive reasoning strategies • Using separate answer sheets • Passage independence

9. Test-Taking Skills: Passage Independence

10. Students with LD • Less likely to employ an appropriate strategy • Less likely to employ an appropriate strategy effectively • More likely to be confident in their answers, but less likely to be correct • More likely (52% vs 24%) to choose a "decoy": • blind o blink o nibble o leaned

11. Students with LD For incorrect answers: • ü89% didn't refer to passage • ü40% had not read all distractors

12. Virginia High Stakes 2004 Data: Grade 3

13. Virginia High Stakes 2004 Data: Grade 8

14. Virginia High Stakes 2004 Data: End of Course

15. Standards Issues How are the cut-off scores for passing set? • Failure to pass a test may mean .. • Failure to be promoted to next grade level • Failure to graduate from high school with a standard diploma • Decision to drop out of school based on failure of high stakes tests

16. Federal and State Standards • Federal and State Standards • Variability among States

17. Gov. Jeb Bush says that Gulfport Elementary School did so well academically last year it is a due for a state bonus check of roughly $40,000. President George W. Bush says Gulfport Elementary School has performed so poorly that its parents must be allowed, less than a week before school begins, to pull their children out.

18. Regents Math A Exam required for graduation • Last year 61% passed • This year 37% passed • Result • State will loosen testing requirements!

19. Response To Intervention (RTI) Issues • What is RTI? • What are good models of RTI • How many Tiers will be required? • I, II, III, and IV?

20. Operationalize the Tiers • Tier I, II, III and maybe IV • Describe how the classroom looks • What is the teacher doing? • What are the students doing? • How many teachers are in a room with a specified number of students per grade level per curriculum area K-12? • What do the instructional methods and materials look like? • What do the “tests” look like? • What is the record keeping system? • Who monitors the system? • Who has the ultimate decision making power in this system?

21. How will the roles of teachers and diagnosticians change given the significant demands for implementing RtI? • Unclear presently what the actual demands of RTI will look like • Where are the models besides a few selected sites? • Unclear roles teachers will have • Deliver scientifically based instruction , administering CBM, interpreting data, placing students into tiers and teaching in small groups with different instructional methods and materials and CBM, etc. • Major shift in general education teachers role

22. Who is responsible to ensure procedures are implemented with fidelity – special education or general education? • Unclear • General or Special Educators? Diagnosticians?

23. How will issues of consistency of decision-making be assured from school to school, district to district, and state to state? • Unclear – no clear answers provided • Standards issues remain across K-12 • Current federal and state variability

24. Pace Content coverage Abstractions represented Learning from texts Demand for broad shallow verbally based knowledge Inclusion and access to the general ed curriculum No longer an IEP Class size and make-up issues N = 30, 12 have IEPs, 7 at risk Learning and Instructional Challenges

25. Textbooks and Access to the General Ed Curriculum • Increase in difficulty with grade level • Discrepancy between reading level of students and readability of textbooks (Kinder, Bursuck & Epstein, 1992) • Breadth vs Depth of Coverage • Unfriendly nature of textbooks (Armbruster & Anderson,1988) • Introduction of large number of vocabulary words (Yager, 1983)

26. Readability, Comprehensibility and Density Issues In most polymers, like polyethylene and cellulose, the monomers are all identical. In other cases, such as proteins, different monomers may be combined. Although the amino acid monomers that make up proteins appear to be very different, each one has an amino functional group and an organic acid functional group, so the monomers all link in the same way, forming a "backbone" of carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen atoms. A polymer with three amino acids is called a tripeptide. (Tocci & Viehland, 1996, p. 257)

27. Previous page equals • 15% of the space of one page of an 848-page book • Reading level for passage: 15th grade • Students take annual state wide SOL on text and content covered in class in May

28. What Do We Have to Do? • Deliver vast amount of content very rapidly • Unclear whether all standards will be met • Use what has research documented as best practices for students with LD

29. Samples of Ways to Address Challenges • Peer Mediation • Strategy Use • Text comprehension • Mnemonic strategies • Peer Mediation + Strategy Use • Enhance Concreteness in Verbal and Conceptual Learning

30. Peer Tutoring + Comprehension Strategies in World History (LDRP, 2003) Extension of previous research in peer tutoring and reading comprehension to content area learning with high school students with disabilities. • Purpose: • Compare peer tutoring versus teacher-directed study in high school world history with students with disabilities

31. Partner Reading*  1st reader (admiral) reads 1-3 paragraphs while second reader (general) listens and helps with difficult words Switch roles – turn to the beginning of section and 2nd reader begins reading Answer summarization questions using strategy sheets _______  * Modeled after Fuchs and Fuchs PALS

32. Comprehension Strategy • Read the paragraph - ask and answer: • Who or what is it about? • What is happening to them? • Use those answers to write a summary sentence • tells what the whole paragraph is about • Use self-monitoring card

33. Paragraph Summarization Sheets Name :______ Date: __________ Paragraph No. _____ Who or what is this paragraph about? ______________ What is happening to the who or what? _____________ Summary Sentence ____________________________ Who or what is this paragraph about? ______________ What is happening to the who or what? _____________ Summary Sentence ____________________________

34. Graphic Display of Content Test Performance

35. Year-End Final Exam: Items Covered and Not Covered During Study

36. US History Study • Design • Crossover design with four inclusive 7th grade classes • Plus parent component involving in-service, technology and home activities • Sample N= 81 students and their parents/guardians • 15 with mild disabilities

37. Parent Component • Training sessions held in evenings to teach parents how to access and use study materials on Blackboard site • Materials sent home for those without pc and internet access • Pre and Post testing Blackboard use • Anecdotal record keeping of material use at home

38. Blackboard Training • Evening sessions in pc lab • Pre and post testing • Blackboard access and use • History training materials and use

39. Rules for Tutoring: At school and home 1.Talk only to your partner about the peer-tutoring program. 2.Talk in a quiet voice. 3.Cooperate with your partner. 4.Do your BEST.

40. Identifying Mistakes ·Your child says the wrong answer. ·Your child gives a partially correct answer. ·Your child adds unnecessary information. ·Your child waits longer than 3 seconds to give an answer. (count: 1- one thousand, 2 - one thousand, 3 – one thousand)

41. Correcting Mistakes ·If your child misses an answer say, “You missed that one. Can you try again?” ·If your child answers correctly, say, ‘Good.’ Ask the question again. ·If your child does not know an answer, wait 3 seconds, then say, “The answer is “_____.” ·Ask the question again. ·Then say, “Good.”

42. Parent Home Tutoring Checklist üGet out own tutoring fact sheets and record keeping sheet. üGet with your child. üWrite date and time on your record sheet. üBegin asking and answering the questions with your child (if child is alone, have him/her cover one side of the sheet and ask and answer questions independently). üPut all tutoring materials away.

43. Date Blackboard Section Visited Purpose for Information Retrieved Comments Announcements Staff Information Information Assignments Labs/Strategy Sh. Student Tools Labs/Assessment Personal Info To get materials for student use To get materials to work w/ student Announcements Staff Information Information Assignments Labs/Strategy Sh. Student Tools Labs/Assessment Personal Info To get materials for student use To get materials to work w/ student Announcements Staff Information Information Assignments Labs/Strategy Sh. Student Tools Labs/Assessment Personal Info To get materials for student use To get materials to work w/ student

44. Parent Recording Sheet

45. Name the Railroads and the railroad towns. Railroads: Union pacific and Central Pacific Towns: Promontory Point, Utah; Omaha, Nebraska; Sacramento, California Tutoring Sheets

46. Name the cattle towns and trails. Towns: Abilene, Kansas; Cheyenne, Wyoming Trails: Chisholm Trail; Goodnight-Loving Trail Tutoring Sheets

47. Write the card you practiced in this column (Example: Tanks) Write date you practiced this item with your partner (Feb. 14; Feb. 18) Place date you covered the information, but still need more practice (Feb. 18) Please check and date when mastered the content (Feb.14 )

48. Parent Training Results • Pretest vs posttest • Evaluation of blackboard usage • Evaluation of access of study materials • t(21) = 25.228, p =.000

49. Parent Evaluation of Training1 = low; 5= high; Mean (SD)