Teaching Pre-school: Recognition & Response

RESEARCHERS at the FPG Child Development Institute recently completed a study on a new approach to teaching pre-kindergartners called Recognition & Response (R&R).

R&R is a tiered model for pre-k based on Response to Intervention (RTI), designed to provide high quality instruction and targeted interventions that are matched to children’s learning needs.

The recognition component of R&R involves universal screening of all children and progress monitoring of those who require additional supports to learn. The response component provides an effective core curriculum, intentional teaching and targeted interventions. Collaborative problem-solving offers a process by which teachers, parents and specialists can work together to plan and evaluate instruction at all tiers.

R&R helps teachers use information they gather on children’s skills to improve the quality of instruction for all children and to provide targeted interventions to some children who need additional supports to learn.

This study offers the first evidence of the effectiveness of R&R for promoting language and literacy skills in pre-k children enrolled in community early childhood programs.

Key Findings

As part of the Recognition & Response approach, pre-k teachers conducted universal screenings on every child throughout the year. This information helped teachers learn which children could benefit the most from language and literacy interventions (the target group).

The target group who received the language and literacy interventions made greater gains than their classmates in letter naming, vocabulary, sound awareness, and print knowledge. The target group made gains at the same rate as their classmates on other language and literacy skills.

Pre-k teachers were able to implement this approach successfully with a high level (97%) of accuracy. They found R&R an acceptable and useful instructional approach; 92% reported that they would recommend R&R to other teachers.

Study Method

Teachers conducted universal screenings of all children and used these results to select a target group of four children in each classroom. These children received a language and literacy intervention in a small group for 15 minutes a day for two months. Teachers conducted progress monitoring of these children during the intervention and a second universal screening on all children following the intervention. Also, researchers administered standardized assessments of language and literacy skills to the target children and a comparison group before and after the intervention.

The study was conducted with 353 four-year-olds in 24 child care, Head Start, and public pre-k classrooms in Maryland and Florida. The children who participated were 46% girls and 54% boys; 67% White, 24% African-American, and 9% Other; and 49% Latino. The educational levels of teachers who participated were 63% bachelor’s degree, 25% associate’s degree, and 12% graduate degree.

What Was Learned?

____ This study provides the first evidence of the efficacy of Recognition & Response for supporting the development of pre-k children with potential learning difficulties in language and literacy.

____ Further research is needed to examine the effectiveness of this approach with larger samples across different content areas.

____ Given the growing interest in RTI for pre-k, the early childhood field needs policies, guidelines, and resources to support implementation on a broader scale. __

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Special Education Voucher Programs Work

Researchers Find Special Education Voucher Programs Ensure Better Services and Outcomes for Students

While the recent debate in Washington, D.C. over the Opportunity Scholarship Program, which serves low-income children, has highlighted a sharp political divide in our nation’s capital over school choice, outside the beltway special education voucher programs tell a different story. Now serving more than 22,000 students in four states -- Florida, Georgia, Ohio, and Utah -- these programs, which serve families from all social and economic boundaries, reveal the kind of broad support that vouchers can generate.

Special education voucher laws are very straightforward: The parents of any child found in need of a special education can ask the school district to pay for their child’s education at a school the parent has identified as appropriate. In a feature article for the winter 2010 issue of Education Next, education researchers Jay P. Greene and Stuart Buck of the University of Arkansas, drawing on extensive previous research on the effects of special education vouchers, dispel several common myths about these programs and show how they have benefited handicapped children in states where they have been enacted, including those not in private placements.

Myth #1: Special Education Vouchers Are Unnecessary

Some claim that special education vouchers are unnecessary because disabled students already have the right to private placement under the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). Greene and Buck, however, point out that this ignores the complex procedures parents must follow in order to obtain a private placement, a primary reason such placement is quite rare. And when parents challenge districts over private placement for their children, school districts win more than 62 percent of the court decisions.

As of 2007, there were 5,978,081 students in special education nationwide, with fewer than 100,000 in private placements. Only 67,729 were being served by private schools at parental initiative, a mere 1 percent of disabled students. Greene and Buck note that in Florida, where the McKay Scholarship for Students with Disabilities program has offered vouchers to disabled students since 1999, vouchers allow nearly 7 percent of special education students to be educated in private schools at public expense, six times the national average for private placement.

Myth #2: Special Education Vouchers Raise Public Education Costs

As enrollments have steadily grown, the overall cost of special education has become a significant financial issue for school districts nationwide. However, Greene and Buck find that vouchers are unlikely to increase the burden on districts: Special education voucher laws typically stipulate that the voucher amount should reflect the severity of the disability and that the cost to the district may not exceed the average cost the state pays for the education of children with similar conditions.

For example, the value of McKay scholarships in 2006-07 ranged from $5,039 to $21,907, with an average of $7,206. In contrast, Florida public schools spend close to $17,000 per disabled student.

Myth #3: Special Education Vouchers Cause Disability Enrollments to Rise

The opposite is true: Special education vouchers discourage school districts from over-identifying disabled students, because any student identified as disabled might leave the district for a private school, reducing district revenue received from the state.

Greene’s research has shown that vouchers slowed growth in special education enrollments in Florida. In another study, Greene found that the addition of seven private schools that accept McKay funding within five miles of a public school reduces the probability that a student will be identified as having a learning disability by 15 percent.

Myth #4: Special Education Vouchers Won’t Ensure Students Receive Needed Services

In a previous study, Greene found that parents who use vouchers are actually more likely to obtain necessary services for their child. When participants in Florida’s McKay voucher program were surveyed, only 30 percent reported they had received all services required under federal law from their previous public school, while 86 percent reported their McKay school provided all the services they promised to provide.

In addition, parent satisfaction at McKay schools is high: 90 percent of McKay respondents reported being satisfied or very satisfied with the school their child attends compared to 71 percent of public school respondents.

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Removing Barriers to College

By Peter R. Orszag, Director, OMB

This weekend I read a fascinating new paper about the impact of providing a simplified approach to financial aid for prospective college students.

The results are startling: high school seniors who were provided a modest amount of help in filling out the forms were almost 30 percent more likely to attend college and receive a Pell Grant the next year than a statistically comparable control group. The paper underscores two key themes we are promoting at OMB: the crucial role of behavioral economics (which often highlights the benefits from making things easy and simple) and the use of rigorous analysis (in this case, the study relies on random assignment).

In particular, during tax season, H&R Block professionals offered help in completing student financial aid applications to a group of low and moderate income clients. One set of clients was assisted by their tax professional through the process of completing the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA). Data already provided in their tax forms was automatically pulled into the form, and the tax specialist walked clients through a series of questions to complete the rest of the form. Families were immediately given an estimate of possible federal aid and cost information on four local post-secondary options. If the clients approved, H&R block then electronically submitted the completed FAFSA on their behalf. The result was a 40 percent increase in FAFSA submission rates, and a 29 percent increase in college attendance rates the next year (see chart below).

Increases in FAFSA Submission and College Enrollment Resulting From the H&R BlockFAFSA Experiment



These outcomes are very impressive, and point to the deleterious effects associated with the complexity of the current application process. The FAFSA is more than four times longer than the 1040 EZ tax form, includes 153 questions, and requires applicants to report detailed information about income and assets, much of which is difficult to understand and pull together, and often has little ultimate bearing on eligibility for aid. As this study demonstrates, small differences in application procedures can make a difference in program participation.

The Administration is already taking several steps to remove barriers from the FAFSA application process. These include the use of a shorter, simplified form as well as enabling online users to automatically transfer data previously supplied electronically in their tax forms directly into their FAFSA application. Congress is considering the Administration’s proposal to simplify aid eligibility requirements. This research underscores the benefits of these types of reforms -- and how important it is to remove barriers to college entry.

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