Reaching Struggling Learners
Reaching Struggling Learners
Mastering the Art of Progress Monitoring: Strategies, Tips, and Resources
Ever felt overwhelmed by the task of progress monitoring? Rest easy, friends! We're here to demystify the process and arm you with some strategic tips to maximize your intervention time. We kick off our enlightening discussion with an in-depth exploration of ensuring your goals are precise and skill-focused. We’ll also touch on the importance of time-boxing lengthy skills, knowing what exactly you're monitoring, and making certain your interventions are in alignment with your goals.
The second part of our chat is just as illuminating, as we provide a blueprint to help you efficiently organize your progress monitoring efforts. Learn why the key to a streamlined process lies in setting skill-focused goals and aligning your monitoring with them. We also reveal handy resources that will be instrumental in maximizing your progress monitoring efficacy. And just a heads up - we're going to start diving into the world of mathematics in the context of MTSS next week. So, whether you're a seasoned educator or a rookie, this episode is your ticket to mastering the art of progress monitoring. Stay tuned!
Hey there, welcome to Reaching Struggling Learners and I just want to say happy Thanksgiving week. If you're in the US, hopefully you have today off and I know some schools don't give, some districts don't give Wednesday off Thanksgiving week, but hopefully you got today off and I mean, quite frankly, I hope you had the whole week off. But welcome to Thanksgiving week. I hope that you have a fantastic Thanksgiving and Black Friday and Black Friday weekend and all that. If you're tuning in and you know this podcast episode I figured I should share. This week I am doing a whole bunch of Black Friday deals and all that. Gotta have a bunch of bundles on sale, including a special education mega bundle, which is basically everything in my store progress monitoring focused. So there's a caseload manager, there is all of my progress monitoring materials, all of my assessments and all the activities that I have in there that you know focus on the skills, the specific skills that we progress monitor. All of that is on sale. I think it's starting tomorrow and definitely Friday, 50% off. So make sure you go to my website and you check out the Black Friday deals. But even if you don't, I really hope that you have a fantastic week and hey, let's get started.
Speaker 1:We're going to talk today about collecting progress monitoring in less than an hour a week. So we know that collecting progress monitoring it's daunting. It is a daunting task if you don't know a few tricks of the trade. So the question that I asked myself, and continue to ask myself daily, is how can I minimize my time spent on progress monitoring so that I can maximize my intervention time? We talk a lot about the importance of data, we talk a lot about the importance of progress monitoring and, yes, that is important, but let's face it, we're actually here doing all this stuff to maximize the intervention time for our students. So that's what we're going to focus on today.
Speaker 2:Hi, I'm Jessica Curtis of Teaching Struggling Learners. I'm a boy mom and a veteran teacher. You're listening to the Reaching Struggling Learners podcast, where we talk all about helping students succeed academically, socially and behaviorally. Thank you so much for tuning in.
Speaker 1:All right. So today we're talking about collecting progress monitoring in less than an hour a week, so let's jump in. The first one is the first tip or trick that I've got for you is make sure and you can listen to the recording, the podcast episode from two, three weeks ago make sure that your progress monitoring goal is short and sweet. Meaning is it skill focused? Make sure it's skill focused so that you can limit what your progress monitoring so to what you're doing in the goal. Okay, if you're, if you're trying to test it, if you have a goal for a really wide thing, that makes it really hard to progress monitor. So, instead, have your progress monitoring goals short and sweet so that you're only having to test for one skill. Make it, make it simple. Next, put a time limit for lengthy skills. Make sure, for example, if you have, you know, a lengthy skill like addition problems, what have you? Have them do a certain number of problems in one minute. Okay, don't flip it the other way and say the student will be able to collect, will be able to complete 30 problems. No, just say the student will be able to complete 20 problems in a minute. It's basically the same skill, but you get to stop them in a minute if they didn't get to 20. Okay, they didn't meet the skill. You can still data collect on it. You can still say, hey, they got 15 in the minute instead of the 20. That's okay, there's nothing wrong with that. But keep your keep your goals short and sweet and keep your time frame limited. Next thing is make sure you know what your progress monitoring. That way you can actually progress monitor the goal that you said. We don't want to have questions on what to do. You don't want to have the kiddo sit down in front of you and you go oh, I forgot what the goal is. I know what we worked on this week, but it's not exactly what the goal is. Make sure that you know and you you know what your progress monitoring now Helps.
Speaker 1:If the next step, make sure that the intervention is focused on the goal. So part of this is because how are you, how is the student going to make progress in the goal that you set if the intervention isn't focused on the goal? Yeah, I Believe me. I've had many a Discussion with many a co-worker over the years that, well, this is the intervention that we use. But you just said that the student needs xyz goal. This isn't going to touch on xyz. How are they going to make progress in the goal that you set, the the skill that you said the student is struggling and how are they going to make Progress there if you're not working on it in the intervention? So if You're not working on it, first of all, they're not going to make progress, but also, if the skill isn't covered by the intervention, it makes progress monitoring really hard.
Speaker 1:If you know that you didn't work on the skill, what even? Quite frankly, I've sat in, I've sat with kids and I've gone. Why are we even progress monitoring this if we never worked on it this week? No, of course they didn't make progress in it because we don't work on it. It is also super slow. If the student isn't working on the skill, then that's going to be reflected in how long it takes them to perform the task that you want them to to do for their assessment.
Speaker 1:And it's frustrating, it is super frustrating to sit there and watch a student continue to struggle with something and in your head you're going yes, I know, I know you didn't actually work on this this week. And not only is it frustrating to you, the teacher, but it is super frustrating to the student who is looking at this and going I am not getting any better at this skill. That's frustrating. It just slows everything down and you're wasting time. If you're collecting data on the wrong goal or if you're not even working on the goal, the data is moot anyway Because again, you're not working on it, you're not saying what. You're not doing what you said you were gonna do. It's not your fault. Don't start saying, well, I can't help it. I realize that schools have their specific interventions and all that, but again, you have to make sure that that intervention is focused on the goal or we're wasting our time. That's the reality.
Speaker 1:The next thing is be prepared, and we've said I've said this a lot over the years have your copies and materials ready. Go ahead and have it for the entire iteration, if possible. Go ahead, and teachers love, I love laminating. You can send me stuff and I will gladly cut that stuff out for you. I will sit in front of my TV and watch old reruns of Grey's Anatomy forever and I will cut out your lamination for you. I love prepping stuff. Go ahead and get it prepped for the amount of time. Have your data sheets ready to go. Have all your stuff, your cards, ready to go and all that Because, again, if you can just pull it out and go, you don't have to go.
Speaker 1:Oh, I gotta push that to next week because I don't have the copies. Don't push it to next week, don't do it, just have it done in the time that you had allotted for it. Make it easier. Don't make yourself scramble unless you have to. And then part of that is having the data collection pages ready to go.
Speaker 1:I am notorious for having my post-it notes. I have lost a lot of data until I learned that post-it notes are not the way to go. Make sure that you do not pull a Jessica and have your data collection sheets ready to go. And if you use the ones that I've got in my bundle ready to go this week, they're already set up for the whole nine weeks that you could do and you don't have to worry about it. It's all there and ready to go. If you don't use mine, use something, just use something. Use my FreeBee, go to get my five steps to begin progress monitoring. Use those data collection sheets for free. It's a beautiful thing. Have it all ready to go and then don't worry about it. And then the last thing is get and stay organized Again. Have the things ready to go when you need them and know where they are in the space. Have it organized for quick and easy use For me.
Speaker 1:I am a weirdo because I like a combination of file folders and three ring binders. Don't ask me why I just do, and I've got certain skills in three ring binders. That just it just works for me. And I've got my sheet protectors in there and for some reason letter sounds. I have them in that. But you ask me to progress monitor for time, for example, and I've got my little ring with all my clock faces on it and that's. That is absolutely the way to go. That doesn't fit in a three ring binder. That is in my hanging folder.
Speaker 1:And so do what works for you, and it can be a combination of different things, but choose what works for you, have it organized and keep it that way, and that will save time forever and ever and ever, because you don't want to be switching different organization techniques unless you again, unless you have to. But also that way you're not looking for stuff and if goodness knows if you have an extra set of hands in the classroom one day and you can point over to the cabinet and say, hey, my time progress monitoring is in there. Would you go get that for me, okay, okay, we're going to do some progress monitoring. That is one of the most joyful experiences that I could ever have is to just have an extra set of hands in the classroom and I can get my stuff done and we can move on. So, all that being said, progress monitoring if you set yourself up for success, starting with making a skill focused goal and making sure that what you're doing in your groups is skill focused, is focused on the skill that they need to work on the goal that you made, and that the progress monitoring lines up with that goal and the skill, you're going to be just snapping right through your progress monitoring.
Speaker 1:It's not going to take long. It's when those three things aren't in line with each other that progress monitoring really becomes a massive, massive headache. So if you need help with any of that, make sure that you get to teachingstrugglinglearnerscom. I've got lots of resources there for you, but in the meantime, I hope you have, like I said, an absolutely fantastic Thanksgiving, black Friday week and next week we're going to do? We're going to actually start talking about some math, because the fact is, math doesn't get talked about nearly as much as I think it should when we're talking about MTSS, and so I think we're going to spend some time and we're going to focus on that for all my math people out there, but in the meantime, may your coffee be strong, your students calm and your week, your time off, relaxing. Bye.