What is RTI

What is RTI ?

Response to Intervention (RTI) is the practice of providing high quality instruction and interventions matched to student need, monitoring progress frequently to make decisions about changes in instruction or goals and applying student response data to important educational decisions. RTI should be applied to decisions in general, remedial and special education, creating a well integrated system of instruction/intervention guided by student outcome data. Subsequently, RTI strategies are tools that enable educators to target instructional interventions to children’s areas of specific need as soon as those needs become apparent.

As a process RTI is broken into three “Tiers.”



Tier 1: Screening and Group Interventions
Students who are “at-risk” are identified using universal screenings and/or results on state or district-wide tests and could include weekly progress monitoring of all students for a brief period. Identified students receive supplemental instruction, or interventions, generally delivered in small groups during the student’s regular school day in the regular classroom. Students not showing adequate progress are moved to Tier 2.

FIRST LEVEL – Universal
Assess children early, kindergarten and grade 1
Measure all student progress against grade level progress
Look at progress of all subgroups
If all students, or subgroups, fall below standards you have a curriculum problem—fix it
Begin with whole class intervention strategies
Differentiate instruction as needed
Monitor and assess student progress using authentic same day result oriented measures
Measure student progress school wide
There are many good instructional models are appropriate for Tier 1 intervention. For example all of the differentiated instruction models provided with teaching materials, Reading Street, envisions and all other Pearson materials provide many interventions, best practices and multiple assessments that fit well in Tier 1.

Tier 2: Targeted Interventions
Students not making adequate progress in the regular classroom in Tier 1 are provided with more intensive services and interventions. These services are provided in addition to instruction in the general curriculum. These interventions are provided in small group settings. In the early grades (K-3) interventions are usually in the areas of reading and math. A longer period of time may be required for this tier, but it should generally not exceed a grading period. Students who continue to show too little progress at this level of intervention are then considered for more intensive interventions as part of Tier 3.

Students have the option to receive a different curriculum for their secondary or tertiary intervention. The assumption is that a different curriculum and its instructional methods might better address the students’ learning difficulties. Students in a secondary or tertiary RTI tier are provided a dose of the curriculum that addresses the specific deficit indicated by the screening results or classroom progress monitoring.


Tier 3: Intensive Interventions and Comprehensive Evaluation
Students receive individualized, intensive interventions that target the student’s skill deficits. Students who do not respond to these targeted interventions are then considered for eligibility as required by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). The data collected during Tiers 1, 2 and 3 are included and used to make the eligibility decision. (Note: This part of the process may be broken into 2 separate tiers in a 4-tier model).