Uniting Academic and Behavior Interventions

The students most at risk of not acquiring the academic skills, dispositions and knowledge necessary for long-term success are those who experience both academic struggles and behaviour problems. Whether behaviour influences academic performance or vice versa is an ongoing discussion that many experts have weighed in on with varying conclusions. The authors of Uniting Academic and Behavior Interventions: Solving the Skill or Will Dilemma delve into the fray. They highlight teachers' responsibility to educate all students and the need for united and simultaneous academic intervention and behaviour intervention for students at risk. They show how collaborative teams of teachers and school personnel can use a research-based framework, "RTI at Work", to implement intervention that combines three proven complementary models: Professional Learning Communities (PLC's), response to intervention (RTI), and schoolwide positive behaviour supporst (SWPBS). They offer F-12 administrators and teacher teams tools and processes to instruct and provide academic and behavior intervention simultaneously within a three-tiered structure. They present a process they developed, the RTI at Work Pro-Solve Intervention Targeting Process, for determining, targeting and observing academic and behaviour interventions.