Project Screen and Support

Kathleen Lynne Lane, Ph.D., BCBA-D, a professor at UNC Chapel Hill’s School of Education, is offering a professional development series funded, in part, by a Research Triangle Schools Partnership Community/Schools Partnership Grant entitled:

Identify and Supporting K-12 Students within the Context of Three-Tiered Models of Prevention to Meet Students Multiple Needs: A Collaborative Effort.

As part of Project Screen and Support, Dr. Lane will host a monthly series at the Carolina Center for Educational Excellence (CCEE) beginning on January 31, 2012. Sessions are held one Tuesday evening per month from 5:00 – 7:00 pm. This professional development series is offered at no charge to all kindergarten through twelfth-grade teachers, administrators, paraprofessionals, and parents interested in learning more about proactive, systematic methods of looking for students who might require additional assistant to experience success in schools. Information will be provided regarding systematic screening tools and how to use these data to inform tiered intervention efforts, with an emphasis on supporting students whose behavior impedes their academic and social success. We encourage you to attend all five sessions; however, each session provides stand-alone information to build knowledge, skill sets, and confidence in supporting students with challenging behaviors.

• Registration
• * The sessions in March, April and May are fully booked. Registrants will be wait-listed.

Presenter

Kathleen Lane is a Professor in the School of Education at University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill. She earned her master’s degree and doctorate in education from the University of California, Riverside. Prior to entering academia, Dr. Lane served as a classroom teacher of general and special education students for five years and provided consultation, intervention, and professional development services to five school districts in Southern California for two years as a Program Specialist. Dr. Lane’s research interests focus on school-based interventions (academic and behavioral) with students at risk for emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD). She has designed, implemented, and evaluated multi-level prevention models in elementary, middle, and high school settings to (a) prevent the development of EBD and (b) respond to existing instances. While at Vanderbilt University, Dr. Lane served as the primary investigator of a state funded technical assistance grant, Project Support and Include (PSI). PSI provided professional development and technical assistance to schools in 17 counties, focusing on the design, implementation, and evaluation of comprehensive, integrated, three-tiered (CI3T) models of prevention. Dr. Lane also served as the PI of other federally-funded projects including: Project WRITE, a Goal Area 2 Grant funded through the Institute for Education Sciences, focusing on impact of writing interventions for students at risk for EBD who are also poor writers; an Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP) directed project studying positive behavior support at the high school level; and an OSEP field-initiated project studying prevention of EBD at the elementary level. She has expertise in school-based intervention and statistical analysis including multivariate analysis of longitudinal data sets. She is the co-editor of Remedial and Special Education and is an associate editor for Journal of Positive Behavior Interventions and Education and Treatment of Children. She also serves on several editorial boards including Exceptional Children, the Journal of Special Education, and Journal of Emotional and Behavioral Disorders. Dr. Lane has co-authored five books and published over 120 refereed journal articles and book chapters.

For questions regarding registration, please contact: ccee@unc.edu.

For more content information, please contact:
Eric Common, Project Coordinator, UNC School of Education, common@live.unc.edu.

This workshop is funded, in part, by a Research Triangle Schools Partnership Community/Schools Partnership Grant entitled: Identify and Supporting K-12 Students within the Context of Three-Tiered Models of Prevention to Meet Students Multiple Needs: A Collaborative Effort.

Session 1: Behavior Screening Tools

Date: January 31, 2012

Time: 5-7 pm

Location: Carolina Center for Educational Excellence

Cost: Free

Description: Many school systems are adopting comprehensive, integrated, three-tiered (CI3T) models of prevention to meet the academic, behavioral, and social needs of an increasingly diverse student population (Lane, Kalberg, & Menzies, 2009). Such models provide a structure for identifying and supporting students with, or at risk for, learning and behavior problems that may impede school and long-term life success (Golly, Sprague, Walker, Beard, & Gorham, 2000). Three-tiered models of prevention are more likely to be effective when early identification procedures are in place and effective targeted supports are available. Systematic, school-wide behavior screening procedures are available to schools for the early identification of students at risk for problem behaviors in an effort to provide them with the targeted supports they need. This session serves as a guide for using behavior screeners to systematically identify and provide necessary support for students with behavioral challenges. We will provide illustrations of how to use the Systematic Screening for Behavior Disorders (Walker & Severson, 1992); the Student Risk Screening Scale (Drummond, 1994); and the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (Goodman, 2001); as well as practical information on how to conduct these screenings and analyze the information to identify students for targeted supports.
*We strongly encourage you to bring a school-site team or one other member of your faculty.

Session 2: Using School-wide Data to Identify Students for Tier 2 and Tier 3 Supports

Date: February 21, 2012

Time: 5-7 pm

Location: Carolina Center for Educational Excellence

Cost: Free

Description: Spurred by federal guidelines (No Child Left Behind, 2001; Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act, 2004) and literature that supports its use (Fuchs & Fuchs, 2006), data-based decision-making has taken hold in schools. Three-tiered models of support have proven useful in (a) preventing learning and behavior problems from occurring using primary (Tier 1) prevention efforts and (b) responding to existing incidences of such problems with more intensive secondary (Tier 2) and tertiary (Tier 3) supports. Moreover, three-tiered models have been effective for supporting students academically (e.g., Response to Intervention; Fuchs & Fuchs, 2006) and behaviorally (e.g., Positive Behavior Support; Sugai & Horner, 2006). In this presentation we will emphasize a comprehensive, integrated, three-tiered (CI3T) model of prevention addressing academics, behavior, and social skills. We will work with participants to develop procedures for analyzing data collected by schools as part of regular school practices (e.g., curriculum-based measures of academic progress, behavior screeners, office discipline referrals, attendance) to identify students for secondary (Tier 2) and tertiary (Tier 3) supports. Participants will design a secondary and tertiary intervention grid to establish the supports available at their respective school sites. This session will build upon the content from the previous session. However, it is in not necessary for participants to attend the January session on Behavior Screening Tools.
*Please bring a school-site team or one other member of your faculty.

Session 3: Using Instructional Techniques to Improve Students’ Motivation and Engagement

Date: March 27, 2012

Time: 5-7 pm

Location: Carolina Center for Educational Excellence

Cost: Free

Description: Differentiated instruction is crucial to help students reach their potential and succeed in school. Differentiated instruction refers to how content is taught and assessed and involves modifying instructional strategies to create varied learning opportunities catered to individual student needs (Hall, 2007). In classrooms where instruction is differentiated, teachers assess individual student needs and present learning activities geared toward students’ based on these needs (Tomlinson, 1999). In this presentation, we address issues related to differentiating instruction including: creating learning experiences that allow students to work at their optimal instructional level with a focus on differentiating content, processes, and products. Moreover, we will focus on choosing appropriate curricula, providing choice and preferred activities, and adjusting instructional pacing and  delivery. We will address potential challenges and discuss solutions for making differentiation work in your classroom.
*Please bring a school-site team or one other member of your faculty.

Session 4: Using Simple Strategies to Improve Classroom Behavior and Increase Engagement

Date: April 24, 2012

Time: 5-7 pm

Location: Carolina Center for Educational Excellence

Cost: Free

Description: Student engagement leads to improved social and cognitive development, and enhanced learning and achievement (Finn, 1993; Marks, 2000; Newmann, 1992). Despite the importance of student engagement, a long line of research has documented low levels of engagement in US classrooms (e.g., Goodlad, 1984; Steinberg, 1996), and increasing student engagement continues to be a challenge for educators (Sax, Astin, Korn, & Mahoney, 1997). Academic engagement and behavior problems are closely related. For example, behavior problems are more likely to emerge when school work is either too easy or too difficult. In this presentation, we explore how teachers can examine their own teaching style and student-teacher interactions in an effort to proactively support student engagement and behavior. We introduce a host of strategies teachers can use, including: active supervision, proximal control, positive reinforcement and appropriate use of praise, “with-it-ness”, opportunities to respond, instructive feedback, and error correction.
*Please bring a school-site team or one other member of your faculty.

Session 5: Using Self-Monitoring Strategies to Improve Academic Performance

Date: May 1, 2012

Time: 5-7 pm

Location: Carolina Center for Educational Excellence

Cost: Free

Description: Self-monitoring is a self-management strategy that involves teaching students how to monitor, observe, record, and change their own behavior (Vanderbilt, 2005).  Self-monitoring is a feasible and potentially effective practice to support the academic and behavioral performance of students with varied needs (Carr & Punzo, 1993; Mooney, Ryan, Uhing, Reid, & Epstein, 2005). Self-monitoring interventions can be structured and implemented in a variety of ways, often requiring minimal classroom resources (e.g., teacher time; Lane, Menzies, Bruhn, & Crnobori, 2011; Menzies, Lane, & Lee, 2009). Topics will include an overview of self-monitoring strategies, supporting research for its use, the efficacy of self-monitoring, and examples across various grade levels and settings. We will also include a detailed explanation of how to implement self-monitoring in your classroom by introducing a research-based approach for conducting self-monitoring interventions to address academic and behavioral issues with individual students (Menzies, Lane, & Lee, 2009; Vanderbilt, 2005).
*Please bring a school-site team or one other member of your faculty.