Special Education Listserv

Subject: Response to Intervention (RtI)

Source: Barb Gilpin, Interim Assistant Director, Effective Practices

Intended Audience: General Education Teachers, Special Education Teachers, Principals, Special Education Directors, Counselors

Date: April 16, 2008

The National Center for Culturally Responsive Educational Systems (NCCRESt) has recently published a new Practitioner Brief entitled A Cultural, Linguistic, and Ecological Framework for Response to Intervention with English Language Learners http://www.nccrest.org/Briefs/Framework_for_RTI.pdf by Julie Esparza Brown, Portland State University and Jennifer Doolittle, OSEP.  This 14-page article promotes a three-tiered Response to Intervention

Approach: (1) universal screening and research-based instruction, (2) more intensive support, and (3) intensive individual instruction.

This brief discusses how "RtI has the potential to affect change for English Language Learners (ELLs) by requiring the use of research-based practices based on individual children's specific needs."  The focus of this brief is to provide an initial framework in the use of RtI that considers students' life experiences, including their language proficiencies in their first and second language, as well as the contexts in which they are taught.