Introduction to the Site and Contents

Hey there!

Welcome to my intervention resources site! This site is intended to serve as a general resource for finding evidence-based interventions for school psychologists or teachers in the field! The categories above this sticky post are fully clickable and each include a variety of interventions and web resources that you may find helpful under that specific category. You can also see a list of each category over to the right of the website, in alphabetical order, and click any of those options to see all posts in that category.

In general, each post explains why the resource can be considered relevant and useful for my future practice. However, as a general rule of thumb, preference was given toward evidence-based interventions (either specific descriptions or the research behind them), relevant fact sheets for quick-access information, or tools that will be useful for my own future practice and I thought may be useful for others.

Contents:

1. Academic
   1. Reading Interventions
   2. Math Interventions
2. Behavior
3. Specific Needs/Categories
   1. Autism
   2. ADHD
   3. English Language Learners
   4. Traumatic Brain Injury
4. Collaboration
   1. Family/School Collaboration
   2. Teacher/Psychologist Collaboration
5. Miscellaneous
   1. Bullying/Prevention
   2. Drugs/Alcohol Abuse

This page will be updated periodically as new interventions and resources are found. Any feedback or recommendations would be much appreciated, feel free to comment, like, or share!

Kevin

Family Engagement and Support – OH Community Collaboration Model for School Improvement

Ohio has published a model for school improvement based on community and family engagement. The section on family engagement and support can be found at:

http://education.ohio.gov/getattachment/Topics/Other-Resources/Family-and-Community-Engagement/Models-for-Family-and-Community-Engagement/Family-Engagement-and-Support.pdf.aspx

Family engagement and support is crucial to our student’s development, and involves both behaviors at the schools and at home.

Parents can support schools through activities such as volunteering or attending school events. Schools can support parents through family support groups, education efforts, GED/literacy or ESL programs, and more. Forming a two-way relationship, in which parents and schools are equal partners toward success, helps all parties involved.

This document also includes design principles and strategies, along with descriptions of what these principles look like.

I also liked the “4 most important findings on family-school relationships”:

1. Parents and teachers usually want the same things for the child
2. Many barriers prevent teachers from developing this realization
3. These barriers can be addressed and allow families and schools to work together
4. Intermediaries (e.g. United Way) can help remove these barriers

 

Overall, this document is an excellent resource for considerations when working toward family-school partnerships, and would be a great starting place for any school administrator or psychologist wondering where to start.

 

 

 

Family-School EBIs with Preschoolers

Preschool is an important time for not only child development, but also in development of family-school partnerships. Bates (2005) summarized the research on specific family-school interventions for preschoolers as part of School Psychology Quarterly’s special issue on the topic. Overall, “results indicate that family-school interventions with preschool children have taken many forms, have targeted a variety of problems and behaviors, and have generally shown positive effects. Efficacious interventions included parent and teacher training, parent education, and behavioral family therapy” (Bates, 2005, p. 352). Many of the effect sizes of the studies in this report were medium-to-large, indicating clinical significance. This report summarized 15 studies.

The studies that showed Strong or Promising Evidence included:

• Goff & Demetral’s (1983) intervention on parent and teacher training on behavior modification, which helped students with developmental disabilities reduce aggressive episodes.
• Parent-Child Interaction Therapy, a behavioral family approach, showed strong improvement in behavior across settings
• PARTNERS parent-education program, which involved parent education over 8-9 weeks on parenting skills, positive discipline, and social skills.
• Incredibly Years Training Series also showed strong evidence, an education program similar to PARTNERS but also including teachers.

Overall, they found that family-school connections and interventions can be valuable for preschoolers, and since this time, there may be newer interventions on this topic that were not covered in this review.

Reference:

Bates, S. L. (2005). Evidence-based family-school interventions with preschool children. School Psychology Quarterly, 20(4), 352.

Family Involvement in Schools

Reschly (n.d.) provided an excellent summary of the importance of family involvement in schools and RTI. This article can be found at: http://www.rtinetwork.org/essential/family/schools-familes-and-rti

Here are some of the main takeaways I took from this resource:

• Family involvement is clearly linked to a student’s outcomes in school and beyond
• When schools and families effectively collaborate, these outcomes are further improved (Henderson & Mapp, 2002)
• Research on this topic is difficult to conduct as it is hard to isolate parent involvement as a factor, but it is promising regardless
• The “Task Force on Empirically Supported Interventions in School Psychology, found moderate to large effect sizes across family intervention domains (i.e., parent education, parent involvement, family/parent consultation, family–school collaboration/partnerships, family systems therapy/family training, and early childhood family-focused interventions; Carlson & Christenson, 2005). Across these areas, certain intervention components stood out: those that stressed collaboration and dialogue between families and schools and joint monitoring of student progress; parent interventions that focused on specific, measurable outcomes; family involvement interventions that emphasized the role of parents as tutors in a defined subject area; and school–family consultation (Christenson & Carlson, 2005).”
  • This article consistently cites this Special Issue of School Psychology Quarterly,

    Volume 20, issue 4 (2005), which may be a valuable starting point in synthesizing research on this topic.

• In its ideal form, RTI allows parents and educators to collaborate from the start of any noticed difficulties and continue to build a positive relationship through the intervention process and beyond.
• Let’s problem solve together with parents!!

 

Importance of Teacher-Psych Collaboration for Mood Disorders

Mocinic & Feresin (2012) published a brief paper on the importance of teacher and school psychologist collaboration in assisting primary school students with mood disorders. Teachers are in a valuable position to recognize disorders in children and should be the first point of contact in regards to their classroom behavior and potential symptoms for mood or behavioral disorders. If a teacher is noticing some symptoms that are out of the ordinary for a student, it is important to note these concerns to an parent, administrator, and/or the school psychologist through a referral.

According to this article, some teachers may not be aware that a school psychologist could potentially assist with these situations. Though it is true that we are not psychotherapists, school psychologists have training in mental disorders and can be a valuable first step for connecting a student or parent to community-based resources, or as a triage step if they cannot receive outside services.

The authors recommend a universal screening process and referral of students who score highly for further evaluation and follow-up. Then, a treatment plan can be implemented through collaboration with the psychologist, teacher, parents, and any outside providers or involved individuals. The article also mentions a few simple steps for facilitating this collaboration, including:

• Involving the teacher in therapy if possible and helpful
• Providing a supportive environment in the classroom
• Helping create positive peer connections
• Continuing to report any changes or successes visible in the classroom
• Regularly meeting as part of a multidisciplinary mental health team

These tips can be applied to most student observations, and facilitating a positive relationship between teachers and the school psychologist (e.g. through the previous post’s advice) can lead to increased outcomes for the students in our schools at any ages.

 

Reference

Mocinic, S. & Feresin, C. (2012). The importance of collaboration between teachers and school psychologists in helping primary schoolchildren to cope with mood disorders. Occasional Papers in Education & Lifelong Learning: An International Journal Volume 6, Nos. 1—2, 2012, pp. 98—108 . Retrieved from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/237077708_The_importance_of_collaboration_between_teachers_and_school_psychologists_in_helping_primary_schoolchildren_to_cope_with_mood_disorders.

How School Psychologists Can Support Teachers

This post, from school-psychology.org, provides some general tips on how to better support teachers.

http://school-psychology.org/school-psychologists-can-support-teachers

Some of the advice may seem slightly obvious. However, especially the buy-in strategies, these small things can be crucial for feeling welcomed in the school and creating effective collaboration between disciplines. Teachers have a lot on their plate, so offering ongoing support, including materials, professional development, data collection, and support with students who may provide unique challenges, can all be invaluable.

 

State Department of Education TBI Pages

The Ohio Department of Education page on TBI is located at http://education.ohio.gov/Topics/Special-Education/Students-with-Disabilities/Traumatic-Brain-Injury

This page includes a lot of great resources for TBI, but one of the most important pieces of information for Ohio’s practitioners is that “Ohio’s educational definition of traumatic brain injury is not restricted to injuries resulting from external trauma. It is more inclusive than the IDEA definition. Ohio’s definition covers conditions such as strokes, tumors, and injuries caused by surgeries. This expansion of the federal definition allows more children with brain injuries to be identified under the TBI category for the purpose of receiving special educational services.”

Wisconsin’s Memory Module, linked on the ODE page, is also a valuable resource (http://dpi.wi.gov/sites/default/files/imce/sped/pdf/tbi-memory-ppt.pdf). It discusses how a TBI affects memory, gives a description of various parts of the brain, common issues and fixes (e.g. environmental modifications), what a teacher may see in the classroom, and strategies.

Strategies discussed include:

1. Instructional Strategies – explicit strategies with chances for practice,
2. Cued Recall – student is asked to recall recently prevented information with cues and organization
3. External Memory Aides – to help a student remember an event or process, which could include rearrangement of the environment (e.g. visual schedules).

It also includes the TBI Memory Checklist, available at:

http://dpi.wi.gov/sites/default/files/imce/sped/pdf/tbi-checklist.pdf 

Their Memory Strategy Chart may also be valuable (Slide 39), in addition to their Accommodations and Modifications Charts, which are available at:

http://dpi.wi.gov/sped/program/traumatic-brain-injury

 

Lastly, the Tennessee Department of Education has developed a resource packet for TBI, which can be accessed at:

https://www.tn.gov/assets/entities/education/attachments/se_eligibility_traumatic_brain_inj_res_pkt.pdf

It includes background information, resources, assessment examples, checklists, definitions,

TBI Class Handouts

From our class on TBI, our professor shared two handout-resources and I feel as if this would be a good place to save these brief handouts. One is a brief primer on the importance of executive function, and the other is a handout of guidelines for families and schools in assisting students who have undergone a traumatic brain injury. Both resources are brief, but have valuable information for any practitioner.

TBI – Guidelines for Families and Schools

Brain as CEO – TBI

 

What is TBI? – Resources

TBI.org has provided an extensive list of FAQs along with their answers at http://www.tbi.org/category/what-is-tbi. This FAQ includes:

• What is a Traumatic Brain Injury?
• What are its effects?
• When will he/she wake up?
• How do we know how bad the injury is?
• What will be the outcome?
• What can I do to improve the outcome?
  • Cognitive Rehabilitation, Family Therapy, Substance Abuse Counseling, Political Advocacy are their main results

TBI.org also provides an “Educator’s Guide to the Brain” at http://www.tbi.org/pediatric-tbi/educators_guide.html. This guide gives a description of various parts of the brain, what happens to it during an injury, geography/parts of the brain, and information about recovery/cognitive development.

Ohio State University TBI ID Interview Form

Ohio State University has published a TBI identification method, designed as a “standardized, short, structured interview designed to elicit a rich lifetime TBI history.” (via http://www.brainline.org/content/2013/08/new-tbi-screening-tool.html). The aforementioned website also includes a presentation on the tool, which provides training on the purpose of the TBI-ID form, a description of why screening is important, and training in conducting an interview and interpreting the results. As school psychologists, it is not our job to medically diagnose a TBI. However, if provided with information from a doctor that indicates a TBI, or we have a reason to believe such an injury has occurred, this screening interview tool may be a valuable resource in gathering data on the student and their medical history. However, as with any measure in which the participant reports their own history, it is possible to make errors or not report certain history, and outside or medical assistance is likely to be helpful in TBI cases.

The screening tool itself can be accessed from: http://www.brainline.org/content/2013/08/new-tbi-screening-tool.html

 

Accommodations for TBI

DadeSchools created a quick list of accommodations that may be useful for a student who has recently suffered a Traumatic Brain Injury. These accommodations can be incorporated into the classroom temporarily following a TBI, or added to a 504 Plan or IEP, depending on the severity of the injury and its impact on the student’s educational functioning.

Environmental Modifications:

• minimize extraneous auditory and visual stimulation (use study carrels or room dividers)
• provide preferential seating
• arrange seating to allow for more space between students
• provide small group instruction
• structure student’s activities and schedule to limit number of changes and reduce unstructured time
• limit number of persons that the student deals with each day
• provide the student with a written schedule and keep the schedule as consistent as possible
• provide area to keep supplies, books, etc., away from student’s work area
• select a classroom buddy

Learning Strategies:

• gain the student’s attention before speaking
• break complex tasks down into component parts and complete each part before trying to combine the components
• provide frequent repetition of important tasks
• utilize the child’s best sensory modality
• question student to be sure the information was received and interpreted clearly and provide feedback as necessary
• provide cueing systems in the form of assignment books, placing task cues on student’s desk, etc.
• provide verbal and written instruction
• shorten assignments and/or divide assignments into parts
• structure thinking processes graphically through outlines, graphs, flow charts and models
• develop a system for maintaining organization
• facilitate note taking by providing outlines with major headings
• give short frequent quizzes, rather than all inclusive exams
• accompany homework with written instructions
• initiate a behavior modification program for academic and/or interpersonal behavior skills encouraging student to chart his or her progress.

 

via http://ese.dadeschools.net/tbi/2classroom.html, which was accessed from the National Association of Special Education Teachers website on TBI (https://www.naset.org/traumaticbraininj2.0.html), which may also be valuable for finding other resources and interventions for TBI.