As part of my mission as a teacher the words “whole child”
are what always sticks out to me. I
believe in really seeing the child in more than one light of “academics”.
If interventions are not utilized in a purposeful manner
then the risk is that it will be ineffective.
I liked this definition of intervention best: “care provided to improve
a situation” (http://www.definitions.net/definition/intervention). Although in this source it is applied to
medical situations, it got me to thinking.
When we provide an intervention to a struggling child, aren’t we
providing care in order to strengthen the child’s weakness?
Would you stop providing care for a bleeding
patient? Of course not. What if that patient could not pay? Would you let him/her bleed to death? Of course not. Our human nature is to care for one
another. We don’t like to see someone
suffer. Why is it when it comes to
education that we don’t provide the same care? We see the ‘care’ being denied to many of our
students for varying reasons. Whether it
be funding, not enough time, class size, not enough staff, etc.
When watching the YouTube video Response to Intervention
at Tigard High School- I loved how one woman put it “I think we need to be
thinking flexibly so students can move more fluidly from classes to better meet
their needs, instead of having the schedule dictate.” This is exactly where I would hope someday
all our schools will be. Those making
decisions at the government level need to realize that we are dealing with real
lives, children coming to school with real problems. Again, when we teach to the whole child we
take all of these different areas of the child’s life into consideration and
develop a plan for that particular child.
We can’t turn a blind eye to the other issues taking place in a child’s
life which will in turn affect academics.
When we are advocates for our students and their families
we can make big things happen. More
networking needs to happen when funding is cut.
We don’t have control over the funding, I am not sure we ever will. But we can come together and advocate for
these kids and get their stories out.
When can network and collaborate together to help these children in all
areas of their life, not just the academics.
Interventions at the early stages such as Help Me Grow, Success by Six, counseling
agencies, etc. Recently funding just hit
my class, YSU has had to cut the SMARTS program. This program offered intervention (in my eyes)
to struggling students, teaching them in a different way. I am sadden that this amazing program has been
cut and its loss will negatively impact the community it served.
I have been in plenty of classrooms where there are
students in need but we are waiting on more data. We analyze the data, but we have to wait for
resources. A child can be struggling for
months before he/she receives help… as teachers, we have to provide our own
interventions or find our own resources, that’s the job… to provide care for
these kids when they need it most! It
may require that we put more hours in to get it, but advocating is our best asset
to helping these children get what they need!
I really think that you touched base on some important thoughts that teachers need to be aware of when educating children. It is important for teachers to understand that many of the early intervention programs are being cut and the funding for these programs are also being cut. Therefore, many individuals that need any type of program to help the student, is not serving the student like it use to. Since this is happening, many times it falls on the teachers to provide interventions, like you mentioned. I also feel that teachers should spend the time and send work home that the parents to work on with the child.
ReplyDeleteWe have to keep fighting for all of the students. It isn't easy and can be down right exhausting on top of reading, writing and arithmetic. That is one of the things I really like about RTI is it can be implemented with little cost but having the support systems and services at tier 2 and 3 is why their has to be collaboration with a purpose. One of the things several of the grade level teachers I work with are going to do is coordinate some same level reading groups and switch among classrooms, This will actually be a form of intervention for all of the students, by providing them with another teacher and same level peers to help push them up together. CEC recommends not only using research based strategies but to be creative and innovative as well. That is what we are collaborating to do. Collaborating with a purpose of servicing all these students in a different way.
ReplyDeleteI couldn't agree with you more on when teaching think of the student as a 'whole child.' I have seen so many times with regular education teachers, push those students that require some extra help to the side. Many times it is the veterans teachers that are pushing them to the waste side. Along with putting students to the waste side and not considering the whole child, many classroom teachers are not utilizing the tools available to provide appropriate interventions for those children. Just as discussed in another course recently about co-teaching. Many schools are trying to implement it, but in all reality it is not being done the most appropriate way. In this case all the benefits that co-teaching brings to all children is ineffective in these cases.
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