IDENTIFICATION OF READING PROBLEMS IN FIRST GRADE WITHIN A RESPONSE-TO-INTERVENTION FRAMEWORK

Models of Response to Intervention (RTI) include parameters of assessment and instruction. This study focuses on assessment with the purpose of developing a screening battery that validly and efficiently identifies first-grade children at risk for reading problems. In an RTI model, these children would be candidates for early intervention. We examined accuracy, fluency, growth, and teacher rating measures as predictors of child status (at risk, not at risk) at the end of the school year based on an unselected sample of 243 children. The prediction model that best fit our selection criteria included 2-word fluency measures and a teacher rating of reading problems. Word-fluency growth was an equally plausible choice statistically, but, because the measure would require an additional data point, it was not the most efficient choice. The receiver-operator characteristic curve analysis yielded an area-under-the-curve index of .96, which indicates the selected 3-variable model is highly accurate.     

Enthusiasts, deregulators, guardians, and skeptics: Contrasting policy viewpoints on the National Information Infrastructure

Passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996, and events leading up to it, brought to public attention a proposed National Information Infrastructure (NII) that would connect homes, businesses, universities, schools, and government offices. The policy discourse surrounding the Act reveals a variety of perspectives among stakeholders, including the Clinton administration, federal agencies, Congress, telephone companies, the computer industry, broadcast and cable TV companies, educators, and other interest groups.While there are many reports and commentaries on the NII, few authors have tried to characterize the political viewpoints behind the public discourse. This article reviews more than 80 NII-related documents, published from 1988 through 1997, and classifies their views and authors according to a two-dimensional typology by policy analyst William Dutton. Comparisons are made between those advocating Public versus Market leadership in NII development, and between Promotional and Restrictive statements regarding NII policy.     

The ‘no problem’ Discourse model: Exploring an alternative way of researching student learning

In this paper we explore an alternative way of characterising the student learning experience, drawing on sociocultural perspectives on learning. Here, learning is not merely the application of an approach to a cognitive task, but a social process of identity formation. In particular, we draw on Gee's concept of Discourse models to identify the implicit theories students use to make sense of their learning and assessment experiences. From interviews with third year engineering students, we identified what we termed the ‘no problem Discourse model’, in which students construct an upbeat portrayal of their experience of a course, despite experiencing crises induced by assessment events. Through a process of justification the seriousness of the crisis is denied. This Discourse model appears to have its roots in a popular Discourse of self-actualization. There was evidence of co-construction of this model during the student learning interviews. This suggests implications for the roles that teachers can play in either maintaining or challenging the Discourse models that are adopted by students.