Welcome back. Exciting things are afoot… This month is all about connecting and relationship building. Behind every one of those faces are stories waiting to be heard. Changes to both our infrastructure and Fast ForWord content is going to make this an exciting year. If you are interested in having this program in your…
Category: Intervention Strategies
Interventions to support moving students forward. List continues to be updated.
Interventions – Positive Steps in the Right Direction
Those pesky red flags made your heart sink. And they were doing so well. At some point every student reaches this wall. Actually this can be seen as a good thing. It means that both the student and the program have located the area of need, that point where the student missed along the journey…
Secret to the Universe When Motivation Wanes
Many times I’ve been asked “how do you motivate students”? This is usually during the time when the newness of the exercises wear off and it’s clearly drudgery that takes over. This might happen during week one (sigh) or perhaps pop up in week three. If you’re lucky, you won’t see the effects for quite…
Discovery and Relationships
It’s June and I’m really not sure what happened to this year. The ten months prior have whizzed by and here we are again. I wanted to take this moment to share some reflections of the year. Our Fast ForWord teams saw a boost and challenge in the delivery of this Tier 3 intervention program. The move…
Connecting the Dots
It’s definitely spring. Everyone is in high gear especially with the good weather. Our final session of “Connect the Dots” happened last week with a gathering of folks at Schou. Along with some interventions, we were able to review the latest information on MyScilearn (teacher area). The Results tab now houses the individual graphs and…
Reading Connections and Interventions
Many of you have taken advantage of accessing Reading Levels. These products focus on elements that bridge to reading – decoding, spelling, sentence and paragraph comprehension. As well, practice with word play, categorization and comprehension strategies serve to enhance areas that are weak. The program follows the same protocols as Fast ForWord and interventions are…
Quick Markers As Evidence Along the Way
We all understand that having current information about a student’s learning help in guiding our ongoing practice. When there are so many things that compete for time in our day, sometimes it’s difficult to get to those formative assessments. And it’s in these times that I find efficiency and speed is my friend. Even though…
Choice Words
Things happen when you return from a conference. New ideas attach with old ones and a host of “how does this all connect” is sifted through a lens of “what if…”. At FETC, keynote speaker Michael Wesch (watch TED talk) talked about the fast rise of the new technologies (Youtube 2005; Twitter 2006) resulting in a new culture of…
Growing Readers
I just finished rereading A Corner of the Universe (A. Martin), an intermediate novel for Literature Circles next term. I was reminded once again how meaning can be taken to a whole new level just by the manipulation of words. What happens when there are monstrous barriers that make words impossible to decipher? Make no…
New Sessions – Launching Fast ForWord and Interventions
Hi Everyone, We’ve booked 2 sessions on the Staff Development calendar for ANYONE who is working at a Fast ForWord site (including satellite sites). If you came to the Introductory session in October, please consider attending Part 2. Part 1 (Wed. November 16th; 12:30-3:00) will focus on the following: brief introduction to neuroscience and implications to…
Fireside Conversations on Interventions (webinar)
Sometimes you just need a place to voice those questions, comments or situations that don’t appear to have any answers. I’m reminded that having ‘partners in learning’ help to enrich and see things in different ways. With all the busy-ness of school, it’s difficult to get away. Enter ‘technology’… The webinar approach was a good…
The Next Steps… Reading Series Bridges Literacy
It’s here! For those of you with students who completed Fast ForWord or with students who may fit into that RTI (tier 2 or 3) group, this may be the connection you’ve been seeking. I’ll be hosting an online webinar to share details of the Reading Series and Fluency Program, who would best fit, as…
Lang v2 – New Interventions
New intervention tips are uploaded under the Elementary Intervention page for Language v2 (Ele-bot, Space Commander, Whalien Match). Some of these can be done in a “prevention phase” rather than intervening afterwards.
Prevention is easier than Intervention
Imagine a week where no red flags appear in Progress Tracker – those crazy hints that you may have to readjust your teaching. This is one of the reasons that it is important to work through the exercises yourself so that you get a feel for any problems that may crop up for your students. …
Words Their Way – Shedding Light on Process
Words Their Way is a program that offers a developmental curriculum for phonics/spelling instruction, reading fluency and vocabulary development. The hands-on activities engage students as they actively categorize their ‘word sorts’ and the assessment inventory provides a clear indicator of where each student is in the process. We’ve been working with a new group of…