September 12, 2025 • 45 mins
Episode 235
Matt Burns discusses effective interventions for students struggling with learning. He emphasizes the importance of understanding the learning hierarchy, identifying where breakdowns occur, and matching interventions to individual student needs. The conversation highlights the significance of modeling in teaching, shares a success story of a kindergartner's progress, and explores the application of the framework to writing and comprehension. Additionally, Burns provides insights on using assessment data effectively and offers resources for teachers to implement these strategies in their classrooms.
Resources
- Matthew Burns YouTube
- Email Matt: burnsm1@coe.ufl.edu
We answer your questions about teaching reading in The Literacy 50-A Q&A Handbook for Teachers: Real-World Answers to Questions About Reading That Keep You Up at Night.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Melissa (00:01):
Lori, we had some real aha moments getting ready to
chat with Matt Burns aboutintervention.
Lori (00:08):
Totally.
If you've ever wondered why astudent isn't picking something
up or quote just isn't gettingtraction, this episode is for
you.
Melissa (00:17):
And the key is figuring out where the learning is
getting stuck.
Are they not learning it, notremembering it or not applying
it?
Lori (00:25):
Each one needs a different kind of support Researcher Matt
Burns shares a framework thathelps you figure out what
students really need, and you'llhear how it played out in the
classroom.
You'll leave with a superpractical way to target your
instruction for the students whoneed it most.
Hi, teacher friends.
I'm Lori and I'm Melissa.
(00:46):
We are two educators who wantthe best for all kids, and we
know you do too.
Melissa (00:52):
We worked together in Baltimore when the district
adopted a new literacycurriculum.
Lori (00:57):
We realized there was so much more to learn about how to
teach reading and writing.
Melissa (01:02):
Lori, and I can't wait to keep learning with you today.
Hi, matt, welcome back to thepodcast.
We are so excited to have youback.
You were one of our mostpopular episodes last year,
great.
Matt Burns (01:17):
Thank you, very happy to be here.
Thank you.
Melissa (01:19):
And we can't wait to talk about intervention today,
and especially, I mean when wetalked to you before, it sounded
like you're going to talk aboutintervention today, and
especially I mean when we talkedto you before it sounded like
you're going to talk aboutintervention that really
actually works to meet the needsof students.
So we can't wait to dive intothat.
Great Thanks.
Lori (01:34):
All right.
So, Matt, you've done someamazing work with something
called the Skill by TreatmentInteraction Framework.
That sounds really scary.
You're going to help us workthrough it today, but that's
grounded in the learninghierarchy.
Now we know that.
You know, again, it sounds alittle bit academic, but really
it's just about how people learnand what we can do when
learning breaks down.
Matt Burns (01:56):
Yeah, exactly Right.
Melissa (01:58):
Yeah, so let's just start with the basics of this.
You know, lori gave it all thetechnical names, but just walk
us through.
Like, how does learningtypically happen?
For and we, you know we arealways talking about literacy,
but this really applies toeverything so how does learning
typically happen and what can gowrong along the way?
Matt Burns (02:17):
Well, there's so when I work with teachers I hear
them talk about this a lot.
They'll have a kid and they'llrecognize the kid's problem.
Like you know, I had a kid justlike that two years ago and I
did this research basedintervention and it worked
really well.
And so I'm going to try thatwith this kid and it didn't work
so for years, that's that'sfascinated me.
(02:38):
There's something about theindividual kid that makes the
intervention effective or not,and for decades we've been
trying to study the individualkid more Like.
Is it a working memory issue?
That's the problem.
Is it a processing speed issue?
And we've never found researchthat shows those types of
variables adequatelydifferentiate intervention
(02:59):
effects.
So a really long story to me.
Very short was a few years agoI was part of a grant and myself
, lori Hellman and JenniferMcComas at University of
Minnesota, and we had each role.
So we were building MTSS andLori was tier one and Jennifer
was tier three and I was tiertwo, basically.
(03:20):
So Jennifer developed thisreally cool way to do a brief
experimental analysis to seewhat problems kids were having,
and so what we'd do is we'd comein and assess a couple of
hypotheses, as kids are learningas anyone learns anyone in the
world.
Anything you learn, you gothrough four very specific
phases.
This is a hearing in Eden Hallin 1978, if interested.
(03:43):
But you go through veryspecific phases.
First of all, you start off inthe acquisition phase.
You've got to learn it, you'vegot to do initial learning and
you have to first becomeaccurate.
And the best way to buildaccuracy is through modeling and
explicit instruction.
So build accuracy.
Then, once you're sufficientlyaccurate, then we have to worry
about how quickly do you do it?
That's your second phase.
(04:04):
You go from initial learningacquisition to fluency building,
proficiency building phase,where you really got to get
faster.
And the goal there is practice,practice, practice, practice.
Get them faster at the skill.
Now teachers push back to meall the time Do we really need
kids to do it faster?
Well, no, what we need is forkids to do it with automaticity.
(04:25):
If you can't do it withautomaticity, you can't
generalize the skill.
How do we know if it'sautomatic Speed?
So yes, we do have to get themfaster, but that's really just
so we know it's automatic.
And then, once they learn it inthe first place, then they're
fluent in it, then they cangeneralize it.
And so if they aren't fluent,they can't take it and put it in
(04:46):
a different setting ordifferent stimulus, or they
can't do that.
So we have to first get themaccurate, fluent, and then they
can generalize it.
Once they can generalize it,that's when we use information
to solve problems.
And I know as teachers that'swhere we want our kids to be,
where we want our kids to besolving problems.
But if they're still in theinitial learning they can't do
(05:07):
that.
So we have to build modeling,build accuracy, then build speed
, help them to generalize it andthen they can apply it to solve
problems.
So to answer the questioninitial question, which was one
of the phases in where canthings go wrong?
Any step along the waysomething can go wrong.
The kids might not learn in thefirst place, or they might
learn it but then forget it thenext day, or they might learn it
(05:30):
and remember it but then can'tapply it, or they can't use it
to solve problems.
Now, with me as aninterventionist, I'm not dealing
with a kid who knows it, isfluent, can generalize it, just
doesn't use it to solve problems.
That's usually not a kid thatpeople call me about.
So I'm usually much morefocused on those first three
phases.
So I really focus on did theylearn it in the first place, did
(05:51):
they remember it and can theygeneralize it?
Lori (05:54):
Matt, why do you think it's those first three?
Matt Burns (05:57):
So that's a great question, I think I think I've
never tested this.
I've studied this framework anumber of times.
I've never tested what I'mabout to say.
I think it's because if theyget through those first two,
most of the time they cangeneralize it and use it to
solve problems.
Why it happens in those firsttwo I don't know, but I think
(06:19):
that's where they're notlearning it well in the first
place or they can't retain it.
That's why they're not gettingto the last two.
Almost any time I've got thatkid through the fluency phase,
they generally hit those lasttwo really easily.
Now, with generalization, withreading, I don't see it much.
I haven't studied this, it'sjust experience.
I don't see it being as much ofa problem in reading, but it is
(06:39):
occasionally a problem in math.
The kid knows, can do the skill, can do the skill fluently, but
then they go to apply it andthey really struggle with that.
So we do see that there.
So why that's the case I don'tknow.
But I do think most of the timekids are struggling to learn it
in the first place or rememberit.
Melissa (06:56):
Yeah, I just wanted to say you mentioned that teachers,
like, often see this researchand then they try it with
students and it works for someand it works for others.
And I just wanted to mentionthat that can be really
frustrating for teachers, youknow, to feel like you're doing
what the research said to do andit's not working.
And I just wanted to say thatso that we can say, like as we
(07:19):
talk today, like we're reallygoing to talk about the reasons
why it might not be working forcertain students.
It's not because the researchis bad and you want to throw it
all away, but because things arehappening for those students
and we're going to actually givesome things that they can do to
help those students.
So you don't feel so lost.
Matt Burns (07:37):
I'm so glad you said that Because, remember, most of
the intervention research isdone with, you know, 50 kids or
something, and what we don't see, we see on average it works
really well, but when you lookat the data, there might be five
kids in that group it didn'twork well with, or something
like that, but that doesn'treally come out in the data.
So that's why most of theresearch I do is single case
design.
We're actually looking atindividual kids and, by the way,
(07:59):
so we developed this.
I first wrote about this in2010.
No-transcript.
Not long ago, maybe five yearsago, a teacher called me.
A teacher was in a differentstate, called me up and said hey
(08:22):
, look, I've been doing soundpartners.
Sound partners is a goodintervention.
I talk about sound partners alot.
That's why he thought to callme.
And at the same time, in 2017,lynn Fuchs had this great
article come out about how tointensify interventions and she
used like five or six strategies.
He was just picking one or twostrategies and trying them and
they didn't work.
And he called me up frustrated.
He's like okay, burns, I'vebeen trying this thing, it's not
(08:49):
working.
I got this article that didn'thelp.
You talk about sound partners,what do I do?
And this frustration was clear.
I'm saying it a bit facetiously, but his frustration was clear.
I said, okay, let's talk to thekids.
And we found, in talking andseeing where they were and such
that he just happened to pick,got unlucky and picked two ones
that didn't match the kid' needs.
And once we picked that onethat did match the kids' needs,
they took off.
Lori (09:06):
Okay, before we dive in a little bit further, can you tell
us what didn't match the kids'needs?
I'm just curious.
I'm not going to be able tosleep until I know this.
Matt Burns (09:16):
So let's talk about these two kids.
So if you're not familiar withSound Partners, it's a finance
intervention.
It's oftentimes done one-on-oneor in a small group.
It's a fine intervention.
It's oftentimes done one-on-oneor in a small group.
It's a fine intervention.
Now, so there were two kids wewere talking about.
Both had different issues whichworked out well for me.
The first kid really struggledwith initial learning.
(09:37):
He would sit down with the kidand, let's say, taught the
grapheme CH that day I'm justmaking that up and then at the
end of the lesson we'd the chand he couldn't do it.
He didn't know what that meant.
He's like you know, they justtaught it to you 10 seconds ago
and you interacted and did it,but now you don't, you don't
know it.
So for that kid it wasn'treally the skill he needed.
(10:00):
He wasn't quite ready for thatintervention that we had to back
it up to really focus more onbasic freedom of awareness and
then to teach the skill and abunch more modeling, a lot more
modeling.
Now the second kid, when he'ssitting there with him doing the
lesson, at the end of thelesson he did fine, no problem.
Then the next day he forgot it.
(10:21):
So for that kid right afterlesson practice, practice,
practice, practice.
So after we're done.
We had a little drill technique.
I used that once he taught himwhatever skill that was that day
they'd practice it over andover and over again so he
remembered it.
So one kid needed more modeling.
We had to match it up to thekid's skill level better I
(10:43):
shouldn't say word skill level.
We had to match it up to theskill better.
And that kid needed more basicframework awareness and then
more modeling of the skill,whereas the other kid just
needed a lot more practicebecause they just weren't
retaining it very well.
And, by the way, those are thetwo most common that I see.
I said that briefly a secondago, but those two just not
learning in the first place orjust not remembering it.
Lori (10:58):
When students need more support, which you just gave a
great example of two studentswho did.
Teachers want to know what do Ineed to do differently, what
can I do differently?
And I think what I'm hearingyou say is it really depends
where the breakdown is right.
Are they not learning it, arethey not remembering it, or can
they just not apply it yet?
Are they struggling to apply it?
Can you say more about that?
Matt Burns (11:19):
Yeah, as I said, in 2010 or so, we were doing this
hour long or so briefexperimental analysis and I went
to the teacher afterwards andshowed her what we, what we did,
and the teacher, I said so,this kid's really struggling to
remember it.
And the teacher said I couldhave told you that, and she's
walking me.
I thought about it and Ithought she could have.
(11:40):
She could have told me that.
She could have easily told methat.
Why didn't I think of that?
And so then we had this ideawhere we started just asking the
teacher these three things.
So what I'm saying here, I'mstating the questions we asked.
These are three things to lookfor when you're working with
kids.
Number one at the end of thelesson can the kid do it?
So you just talk to him, yousit down, can the kid do the
(12:01):
skill you just taught?
And the answer to that is yes,everything else is a no.
Because oftentimes I askteachers that and they'll say
well, sometimes that's a no,inconsistently that's a no.
It depends.
Those are all no's.
Yes, everything else is a no.
So I ask at the end of thelesson can the kid do it?
No, okay, then that's where thebreakdown is occurring.
(12:22):
Two options there Either well,I don't want to say either.
First, assess theirprerequisite skill.
If you're focusing on fluencyand the kid's not learning in
the first place, go reassesstheir Phymex.
If you're assessing, if you'redoing Phymex and the kid's not
learning in the first place, goassess phony-week awareness.
From experience I haven'tstudied this from experience I
(12:45):
think 75% of the time that's theissue.
It's to not doing the rightskill.
If they had the prerequisiteskill and this is what we need
to work on with this kid thenyou have to add in a lot more
modeling.
So think of this, think of atthe end of the lesson can the
kid do it?
If the answer is no, assess theprerequisite skill.
If it's low, back it up.
If it's low, back it up.
(13:06):
If it's not, add in moremodeling.
Now, if the answer to thatquestion at the end of the
lesson can do it, the answer isyeah, sure, no problem.
The next question is the nextday, does he remember it?
Again, yes, everything else isa no.
So if the yeah, he learned itin the first place, but the next
day he's forgotten it, okay,that kid.
Practice, practice, practice,practice.
We talk a lot about dosage inintervention, research and
dosage is important, but I'm notconvinced dosage is always the
(13:29):
answer.
If the intervention is notworking.
Doing it more may not help, butin this example, where the kid
is getting it and they're justnot retaining it, that's the
most important thing you can do.
Give that kid as much practiceas possible and then, yeah, at
the end of the lesson the kidlearns it the next day does he
remember it?
Yeah, okay, then is hestruggling to apply it?
(13:50):
And of the three, that's theone that's the most difficult.
I just tell teachers your bestbet is teach it how you want
them to use it.
So you know, the kid learns thegrapheme and then goes to read
words and text.
They struggle with it.
Okay, well then, really focuson teaching that grapheme within
(14:10):
a word and then have the kidread sentences that contain that
word as part of the lesson.
So my advice to teachers goingforward, interventionist, going
forward look for those threethings.
Can they do it at the end ofthe lesson?
And it doesn't have to be ahundred percent, but I want to
see 90%.
Do the next day?
Do they remember it?
And again, some forgetting isnormal, but I want to see 90%
(14:33):
retention, and then can theyapply it, just as you're working
with kids.
Look for those three things andif the intervention is not
working, that'll help you figureout how to intensify it.
Lori (14:44):
So good, okay, I feel like the thing that we go to the
most is we skip over all thebeginning stuff you said and we
go right to the practice.
Is that right?
Yes, okay.
So I'm hearing you say you knowmore is not necessarily the
answer.
It depends on what the need is.
And if we don't match this likeright instruction to the actual
(15:05):
need, I'm assuming there couldbe some dire consequences.
Right, like we're just havingkids do more, do more, do more,
but that's not really helping.
You're actually, matt, this isa silly analogy, but I teach
fitness classes at the gym and Iteach body pump and you know,
in that you lift weights.
Well, it's like when peoplecome to class week after week
(15:26):
and you know, I do like reallycorrect them, because I do think
there's that we're not learningit in the first place.
If they come week after weekand every time they go to do a
tricep kickback, they'rebringing their arm all the way
back into their shoulder.
They could come week after weekfor the next five years.
They're never going to definetheir triceps.
So more practice isn't actuallygoing to get them right.
(15:47):
What we need, the outcome thatwe need.
You got to stop to keep thetension.
You got to stop that weightlike right at your hip and keep,
you know, kick it back fromthere.
You can't just fling it around,and so we could do more
practice all day, but it's notgoing to matter.
So if we're not matching theinstruction to the actual need,
it makes sense in like thisgreater context, but I think
(16:08):
often in a classroom settingwhere it might be tricky
sometimes to get to the actualneed of the students right, like
I'm hearing you.
What I'm hearing you say is wereally have to analyze this.
Matt Burns (16:25):
You really do, you really have to think about it
Now.
So if I'm willing to acceptthat there's a lot of kids for
whom just more practice might behelpful, but if they practice
it wrong, that does more harmthan good.
First of all, if they'repracticing and it's not helping,
you're just wasting time.
You're better off just to youknow, find out what the kid
actually needs and really focuson that.
So that's in and of itself.
But number two, if it's amismatch, you might actually do
more harm than good.
And so I think it's absolutelyfine if teachers start with
(16:48):
dosage first, but if thatdoesn't work, switch right away
to something else, and you'rebetter off to try and really
pinpoint it at the beginning.
Melissa (17:01):
Yeah, so that makes so much sense and I think, like you
said, it's it's almost aninstinct to just like keep doing
more, more, more, more, but tonot waste too much time doing
that.
Right if it's not working andcome back to what's really
happening.
I think you, I think told usthat you have a story about a
kindergarten class that youwanted to tell us about.
That's an example of this.
You gave us a lot of examplesalready, but I want to hear what
(17:22):
this really looks like in aclassroom.
Matt Burns (17:24):
Yeah, it wasn't in a classroom, it was a kid, it was
a kindergartner, okay, and itwas the first kid we built this
with.
So again 2010 or so, we had alittle guy who came to in
kindergarten is, you know, verylow, very low skills, and we he
had very little foot, almost nofooty McEwan.
So we worked with him to buildthat and he learned that really
(17:44):
quickly.
Now, in the meantime, we'realso trying to work on just
basic letter sounds and I havenever seen a kid struggle
learning the letter sounds likethis kid did, and it was.
It was.
It was really kind offrustrating because you would
literally teach him the letter t, right, and say this is t, it
makes it sound, and at the endof the lesson, okay, ready,
what's this letter?
I mean this letter t, whatsounds it make you look at and
go, we have no idea.
(18:06):
We just taught it to him.
He didn't.
He during the lesson, did justfine.
In fact, weeks we tried thisand, um, we couldn't.
Uh, he.
Every time we taught the lesson, at the end we show him the
card or whatever, and he nevergot it, never got right,
literally not even once.
And so that's, we started todevelop this framework, uh.
(18:27):
And we said we gotta figure outhow this kid.
So we went to basic, went backto basic learning theory,
thought about these three phasesas we sat down this kid now,
the good news was he wasn't.
The bad news was he wasn'tlearning in the first place, he
really struggled.
And so we just remember I justsaid the other lesson couldn't
do it.
So, um, we assessed hisphonemic awareness.
(18:48):
And there was, when we taughthim his phonemic awareness, that
was fine.
So for this little guy, hereally just needed a lot more
modeling.
So we did with him is we tookthe a picture.
Now again, freedom of awarenesshelps so much.
So, for example, teachingletter h, we had uh.
We showed him a picture of uhhammer with a big h on it.
(19:08):
He knew hammer started withright.
So I was able to show him the hand say this says hammer.
Hammer starts with what good.
This is the other.
That makes that sound.
Basically, and you know, I didthat with him during the first
lesson and taught him what itsaid.
And at the end of the lessonheld up an h.
He looked at it and went it wasthe first time he'd ever gotten
(19:29):
it right, ever gotten one right, and it was really fun to see,
because the teacher and thekid's teacher and my, my coach
part of this grant were off tothe side and they saw that.
They both looked at each otherand exploded into tears.
It was so cool.
Now the cool story about thislittle guy, though, is okay.
We finally figured it out, andso we just kept doing that.
(19:50):
He learned all his lettersounds pretty quickly after that
.
But I make that sound so Idon't want to belittle this Like
we spent weeks trying to teachthe work with this kid.
We could not get anything anyprogress, and once we figured it
out and went back to reallyreally focus on the scaffolding
and modeling, that's when thekid finally took off and he's
got a happy ending to the story.
(20:11):
This was in his kindergartenyears, a three-year grant.
During kindergarten, he wasreferred for special ed because
you know he wasn't doing well.
That was a reasonable referral,and they tested him and found
out he had an IQ of like 65.
I forget the exact number, butin the intellectual disability
range.
So they're at the IEP.
I was not at the IEP.
(20:32):
I want to be really clear.
I was not there.
I'm telling you what I heard Atthe IEP.
They said okay, your son has anintellectual disability, would
like to start special edservices, and the mom said, well
, he can still keep doing thestuff with Dr Burge's stuff,
right?
And the principal said no.
Now the reason the principalsaid no was this was a
(20:52):
prevention grant project, itwasn't a special ed project.
So that was the right answer.
But we would have kept workingwith them.
There's no way we would havethrown this little kid away, but
anyway.
So the principal said no andthe mom thought about it and
said you know what?
No, this is working.
I want to keep trying this.
We can come back next year ifwe need to.
And they're like yeah, ofcourse, yeah, course, yeah, no,
(21:13):
let's keep trying this.
And so, during, during, well, atthe end of second grade, I was
cut right at the end, at the endof second grade, this little
kid who was intellectualdisability.
In this school they use the,the um, dra, the nwa map and
aimsweb, all three of those.
He was a grade level reader bythe end of second grade and took
(21:35):
a lot of work.
I don't want to, you know, butthis little kid was supposedly
an intellectual disability byjust really focusing on what he
needs.
We got him there and that tooka lot of work.
It took time, but we got himthere.
We saw huge growth.
Once we figured it out, we keptseeing really huge growth.
It just took him a couple yearsto catch up to grade level.
Melissa (21:51):
Yeah, that's amazing, and because you found exactly
what he needed.
I mean that that's the key,because I could see that going
poorly.
Even I'm thinking about itbecause next year I'm actually
going to volunteer with my son'skindergarten teacher, so I'll
be right there with the aphonemic awareness issue, right?
And, like you said, you wentand phonemic awareness was not
(22:18):
an issue, right?
So so you can't even justassume like, oh well, then I
have to go back to this otherskill that they must not have,
right?
You have to see if that's whatthey have or not.
I'm wondering, though, forspecifically since we're talking
about kind of phonicsinstruction right at the moment,
is there are there any otherideas you have for that modeling
part?
Because I could see that'swhere people might get stuck,
like, okay, what else do I do tomodel this?
(22:40):
There's only so many things toshow them the sound.
Matt Burns (22:45):
So I did a it's not a grant I have.
I'm going out observingclassrooms and I observed a
kindergarten classroom and itwas a great teacher,
everything's cool.
But she entered, she, she hadlittle kindergartners come up
and sit on the floor and shegoes okay, kids, we're going to
learn something new.
And she put up a letter of a tand put you a t, you know, on
the smart board, say, okay, whoknows what this is?
(23:06):
And they all kind of stared ather for like 10 seconds.
Then they're kindergartners,right, so they start getting out
kindergarten.
Right, they start screwingaround, raise their hand, so
totally relevant stuff, you knowum.
And so she okay, this is, thisis a letter.
Who knows what letter it is?
Um, same thing happened about10 seconds.
So I'll get kind of squirmy intheir kindergartens.
And then she's okay, this is aletter t.
(23:27):
Who knows what sound it makes?
Now, at this point I might havegiven up, right, like, they
don't know what it is, theydon't know the bit, they're it,
they're not going to know theletter name, but she still, or
the letter sound, she stilltried it.
Same thing 10, 15 seconds ofthe kids getting kindergartenery
, and you know.
And then she says okay, this,this makes the sound.
Now, I would have done this.
This is okay Class friends.
(23:50):
Where was called um?
We're gonna learn a new letter.
This is the letter t.
Everyone say it.
The kids say t.
Let's say okay, t makes the tsound.
Everyone say that.
Kids would say good, okay, um,let's say it again.
T makes the t sound right, whatsound kids say t?
Good like in the word top topstarts with t.
This t turn your partners.
(24:11):
Think of a word that startswith t.
Right, like.
That took about 15 seconds andthen we'll learned it much
better.
So when I'm answering yourquestion, melissa, which is,
yeah, I get it, but you'd besurprised how often that step
gets skipped in the learning.
And we talk now about productivefailure and there's a
(24:34):
meta-analysis.
I could pull up the citation ifyou want it, but there's a
meta-analysis that's found formath that productive failure had
a positive effect and amoderate effect.
So I went and looked at thestudy in more detail and what I
found was that it was math andsome of the dependent variables
were things like physics andchemistry and et cetera.
And when you look at the agegroups, the largest effects were
(24:57):
for students in undergrad ormaybe high school, but we looked
at elementary school, gradestwo through five.
The effect size was negative,did more harm than good.
So productive failure, rememberthose phases of learning
Acquisition, fluency,generalization, problem solving,
adaptation.
It's that final phase whereproductive struggle might be
(25:18):
helpful.
It is not helpful in initiallearning.
And so in high school kidslearning chemistry or something,
sure that's a differentconversation Little kids
learning their letter sounds orwhatever it is.
No, you have to have modelingfirst.
So I do think oftentimesreminding teachers of the
importance of modeling, goingback and just simply saying
first, can really be the issue.
(25:39):
Now I will say, like for thislittle boy we mentioned earlier,
the kindergartner we model, weprovide a more scaffolding by
giving that letter the pictureof a hammer.
So I do think teachers canbrainstorm ways to model more.
Think teachers can brainstormways to model more, and I don't
think any is worse than otherswhen it comes to modeling.
As long as they're, you know,showing it first and having the
(26:00):
kid immediately responding andcorrecting any errors, right
then it should be fine.
But there are also other waysto do it.
But I think oftentimes you'vegot to get back to really just
doing actual modeling duringinitial learning.
Lori (26:13):
Yeah, that's really important.
You're making me think aboutthe older students, Do you think
it's because they're moreapplication?
Like, for example, if I wasdoing a chemistry lab, I would
have had to teach somethingbeforehand as the teacher in
order to get my students readyfor that lab, or they would have
had to read somethingbeforehand or prepare.
They don't just walk into thatlab and willy-nilly just go for
(26:37):
it.
So there is that element ofwhen they are doing.
I'm just thinking of an exampleof when they might fail.
Right, If they were havingproductive, failure could be in
a situation like a chemistry lab.
Melissa (26:47):
That's what I was thinking, lori.
I'm like they have at least 12years of school behind them
right and knowledge.
Lori (26:52):
Is that like it?
Do you think it's more becauseit's the application piece at
that point?
Matt Burns (26:56):
Yes, Well, I think it absolutely comes to it Now.
I'm sure there are some initiallearning that has to happen in
a chemistry class, I'm surethat's true, but it's it's at
the upper level.
It's much more.
I mean, think about what you're, what you might think about the
test you take.
(27:16):
You know elementary schoolversus older grades.
You know oftentimes it'smultiple choice elementary
school, it's essay in highschool.
Why?
Because you're tapping into theapplication side of it.
Essays are application.
So I think you're exactly right.
I think some of those moreadvanced courses with older kids
, it's all about application.
Lori (27:30):
Yeah, I mean okay, even if we think about something as
simple as us as adults you know,make baking or making a meal we
have prerequisite skills there.
I know how to measure with ameasuring cup, you know, I know
how to cut with a knife, I canput all that together and, yeah,
there will be some element offailure.
Perhaps I burn the garlic, butI live and learn right next time
.
But it's more that applicationpiece.
(27:51):
I've got the prereqs to get meto the point of I can actually
try this out now.
Matt Burns (27:56):
I think the classic example is driver's training.
You're not going to useproductive failure in driver's
training Like, yeah, you put thekid in a challenging situation
perhaps, but you've alreadyassessed to know they have the
basic driving skills rightbefore you and you're going to
teach it to them, have thempractice it and arrange
simulations et cetera.
Then they go on the road right,it's, it's.
You don't apply it until untilyou can do it.
Lori (28:19):
So we're thinking about writing instruction and you know
early writing is definitelydifferent than more advanced
writing or older writers.
So how do we help a studentwho's just getting started
versus one who's trying to write, maybe independently, but needs
support organizing orelaborating?
Because I could see thisframework being really helpful.
Matt Burns (28:38):
Well, I agree.
Now I've never studied it forwriting.
I studied it for math andreading, but never writing.
But my three sort of go-tos ifthey're struggling to learn it
in the first place.
I go back to early writingskills and there's a program
called Early Writing Project atthe University of Minnesota and
University of Missouri.
I'm not sure, I think it'sprobably on both their websites
Early Writing Project at theUniversity of Minnesota and
University of Missouri, althoughI'm not sure, I think it's
probably on both their websites.
(28:58):
Early Writing Project.
It's all about how to do that,initial instruction in basic
writing, the application, and Iwill say I'm hypothesizing that
we'll see application breakdownsin writing more than in reading
.
But that's where we drive intoSRSD, the self-regulated
strategy development.
Those strategies are ideal forhelping kids apply writing
skills.
So that's, if you, if you'vegot a kid who's really
(29:19):
struggling to apply writingskills, that's it.
That's a go-to I use quite abit and in between it's just
practice.
But stuff like practicing, uh,copying, practicing writing
sentences, that type of stuff,uh is sort of in between.
It does apply well to writingand, by the way, I know this is
literacy, but I really kind ofstarted on this in in math.
Many years ago I was teachingkids um a.
(29:42):
I did research on somethingcalled incremental rehearsal,
which is a way, a reallyintensive way, for kids to
practice stuff, for kids withmemory difficulties to remember
things, and it works really well.
But I was I wanted to try thiswith kids with intellectual
disability, to teach them theirmath facts, and so I was simply
teaching, you know, single digitmultiplication, three kids,
(30:04):
late elementary school,intellectual disability, and
they learned them no problem, itwas easy.
And I went back to the teacherand saying look, here are the
data.
You know, the kids did greatand the teacher went oh, that's
fine, but that's not what theyneed.
Like, what do you mean?
He goes they need to understandit better conceptually.
Okay, well, show me what youmean.
So she had the kid come over andgave him three times three and
(30:25):
I'm going to try and make some Iknow this is audio, so I'll try
and make some audio sound andthe kid counted out his fingers.
He went one, two, three, four,five, six, seven, eight, nine
Not that loudly, but then wrotedown the answer nine.
She said see, he needs tounderstand it better
conceptually.
I said well, wait a minute,isn't going?
One, two, three, four, five,six, seven in your head, showing
you he understands itconceptually.
(30:46):
So that really got me startedon this line of how to
individualize math interventionsbased on where the kids are,
and it follows kind of the sameframework, except conceptual
understanding.
Is the footy-mick awareness ofmath right?
If they really struggle withbasic numeracy, go back and look
at basic conceptualunderstanding.
And it worked really well.
So I've never studied withwriting, studied with the other
(31:07):
two and it applies.
Melissa (31:09):
Yeah, since we're talking about where this applies
, I'm wondering how it appliesto comprehension, because I can
really see it with our you knowthe phonics skills and getting
more fluent with them.
But I'm wondering and we alwaystalk about how comprehension is
different.
It's much more nuanced.
There's so many things that gointo comprehension.
If students are struggling withcomprehension, could you use
(31:29):
this framework with that as well?
Matt Burns (31:31):
Yes.
So the more discreet the skill,the easier it is to apply, to
apply this framework.
So, yes, it makes much moresense.
But for fun.
I still like comprehension.
But remember, comprehension isdiscrete skill.
So if the kid's not, you'retrying to teach them
comprehension strategy, forexample, and they're struggling
(31:52):
to learn it in the first place,go assess the prerequisite
skills and I'll tell you fromexperience.
I was about to say nine timesout of 10, which seems a little
high, but I bet it's not wrong.
Most of the kids I work with inschools who have comprehension
deficits don't havecomprehension deficits, they
have fluency deficits.
Thank you for saying that whenwe assess the prerequisite skill
and we see it's a fluency issue.
(32:14):
When you really focus on thatfluency issue, the comprehension
is better.
So that's learning it in thefirst place.
Then you have a kid who, yeah,they learn the strategy, for
example.
See what I've just done.
By the way, I should say thisI've just taken comprehension
and made it a discrete skillbecause I'm talking about a
strategy.
So if I'm trying to teach astrategy, it works.
If I'm trying to teachcomprehension other than
(32:36):
assessing prerequisite skills,it doesn't work quite as well.
So you to first, then make it adiscrete skill and so I want to
make it their.
You know a strategy thatthey're learning.
So, yeah, they can do it in thefirst place or not.
If they can't look at theirfluency skills, if they can, if
they have good fluency, thenmaybe do more modeling and let
(32:56):
them use the uh, teach them the,spend more time teaching on the
strategy to begin with, thenmore time practicing it and then
actually have them go and applyit.
And one thing we did, a study wedid, was we found a bunch of
middle schoolers.
They're trying to teach um,comprehension strategies to the
ones from reciprocal teachingyou know, paraphrasing,
summarizing, questioning anywayand they taught it to them and
(33:19):
the kids did fine during thelesson and then uh, but then
when they went to go use it outin the skill, it didn't improve
their comprehension.
When they had to go apply, itdidn't improve their
comprehension.
So we came in and said, youknow, yeah, they, they could do
it accurately when they'resitting there and guess what?
The next day they stillremember it.
They started to apply it.
So we started giving themfeedback.
After we had them, uh, readwhatever was an answer
(33:40):
comprehension.
We asked them read whatever itwas and answer comprehension.
We asked them these questions,a series of questions about if
they're using the strategies ornot and use that to help them
understand.
Oh, I could use that there.
Oh, I should have done thatthere.
And then their comprehensiontook off.
So I think it doesn't.
The more discreet the skill,the better it works for this
framework.
But comprehension is a seriesof discreet skills.
Just pick out which one you'refocusing on.
Lori (34:02):
Yeah, so what I just heard you say was metacognition and
application.
In that case, yeah.
Matt Burns (34:06):
Yeah, in that case, yes, metacognition for
application is really important.
Yeah, all right.
Melissa (34:09):
So we also want to talk about assessments, even though
I know we could talk aboutassessments forever.
But I do want to, just in theframe of what we're talking
about, talk about assessments,because sometimes teachers feel
like they have so much data fromso many different assessments
it's hard to even know what todo with it all.
But I'm hearing you, eventhrough this conversation, say
(34:31):
things like you know, justlooking at what they do at the
end of the lesson, right, thatthat's an assessment there.
Or even you said some at onepoint.
You know the teacher, of courseshe would know that, right?
You, just by watching herstudents, she would know that.
So I'm wondering about, like,between all the assessments
they're giving, between watchingwhat their students are doing
every day, you know, how canteachers use assessment data to
figure out where this breakdownis happening so they know where
(34:52):
to intervene in the right way?
Matt Burns (34:54):
So the type of data used depends on the question
being answered.
Depends on the question beinganswered and when I'm talking
about so, if I'm using the datato identify a child with a
learning disability or todetermine proficiency in a state
test which could be linked tobeing retained, those are really
important decisions.
We need very rigorous data forthat.
(35:14):
But when I'm talking aboutmodifying instruction or
intervention, those aren't Idon't need as rigorous data for
that.
So observational data can bereally helpful, and so there's a
couple of things you can lookat, and accuracy is important.
So I want to see if a studentcan't do at least 90% accuracy.
I'm not going to let thempractice it independently.
I want to see 90% accuracyfirst.
(35:36):
So, oh, what's the program thatdoes this?
Road to Reading, I think, isthe one that does this At the
end of every lesson and theirlessons aren't just one session,
they're over a couple of days.
They give the kid 10 words thatcontain what they just taught
them, and they have to readthose words and see if they can
(35:58):
get them right or not.
To me, those are invaluabledata because you can see, 10 is
a good number.
90% is my cutoff, so if theyget 9 or 10 right, they learned
it.
If not, they didn't.
So those types of assessmentdata if you're really worried
about the kid at the end of thelesson, give them this.
It becomes a measurement issuebecause if I give them 5 and
(36:19):
they get one wrong, that's 80%.
If I give them 10, they get onewrong, that's 90%.
So if they got one wrong out of10, I'm happy.
One wrong out of five, I'mconcerned.
So that's why it gets to be alittle difficult.
But teachers can also use whatthey know about the kids as well
.
If they want to use five, butgive them some sample of the
behavior and see if they can doit 90 accuracy.
(36:39):
If they can move on now, thenext day, give them that same
assessment and see if they cando 90 accuracy again.
So when I say assessment, Imean you know a list of words
that they contain the graphemeyou just taught them um, a, a
spelling words that you justtaught them those types of
things, and just see if they canaccurately do it.
(37:00):
90.
If they can do it right afterlesson, they've got it.
If they can accurately do it,90%.
If they can do it right afterthe lesson, they've got it.
If they can do 90% the next day, they've got it.
So those are the types ofassessments that I think are
really, really important forintervention design.
Lori (37:11):
Matt, do you mean literally the same?
The next day the same words.
Yep.
Matt Burns (37:16):
Okay, I feel like every teacher listening would be
like.
Lori (37:19):
Does he mean the same, the exact same, or should I change
it?
Matt Burns (37:23):
No, no, I'm glad you asked, no, I do.
Yes, keep it simple.
So it's really interesting towatch.
As a researcher, I sometimesget excited about bad things and
I always feel guilty afterwards, like if I'm going to work with
a kid and I find a kid with areally severe problem, like oh
great, let's dive in.
And I realize, oh, I justcelebrated the kid having a
problem.
I don't mean that.
(37:46):
So sometimes I get excitedabout things I might come across
as strange.
But yeah, I want to keep itreally, really simple and I've
seen kids when I say the samewords the next day, I see
basically a bimodal.
I see two things happen.
Either the kids fly through it,no problem, or they get like
(38:08):
two right, you never get the kid.
I should say never.
You hardly ever see a kid geteight the day before they got
nine.
Hardly ever happens.
And so if they're worried aboutpractice effect, well, okay,
that's a legitimate concern.
I'm just telling you from myexperience.
It's hardly ever a factor.
They either know or they don't.
The next day they remember nineagain, or 10, or they remember
(38:28):
two or less.
Melissa (38:31):
So you're really just catching those kids that had it
the one day and then the nextday it's gone, it's apparent.
Matt Burns (38:39):
It is clear.
That's the thing I'm a longbutt working with kids is they
tell you what they need.
We just have to do a better jobof listening and the kid you
know you'll have them, the kidnext day.
We get two out of ten.
They're clearly showing youwhat they need and they will do
that.
They will clearly show you whatthey need.
We just have to do a better jobof listening.
Lori (38:57):
That's awesome.
Matt Burns (39:16):
All right, I love that.
This is such a great tip forteachers listening.
So if teachers are listeningand they love this idea, matt
and they're like.
But the most recent one is in ajournal called Learning
Disabilities, amultidisciplinary journal.
It's there.
We also have an article in theCommunique which is published by
the National Association ofSchool Psychologists Easy to get
.
We have an article coming outin Perspectives, the IDA journal
(39:43):
, about this.
So that's there, and also myYouTube channel.
I talk about my YouTube channel.
Just go to YouTube searchMatthew Burns.
I'm the first Matthew Burnsthat comes up, which I'm very
proud of.
Anyway, I have a couple ofvideos on there about how to do
this as well.
Lori (39:57):
Okay, great, and we'll be sure to link those in our show
notes.
So if you're listening, you cango to the show notes, click
them, find Matt, and then youknow, email me, I'm happy to
help, If you like.
Matt Burns (40:06):
This one teacher called me up out of the blue.
I spent quite a bit of timewith that teacher, but you know,
usually it's a five, 10 minuteconversation.
Email me, I'm happy to try andsupport them.
But I but I mean it's threequestions At the end of the
lesson can they do it the nextday, do they remember it and can
they apply it?
So really, if you just startthere and really identify what
(40:29):
the kid needs, there are manyways you could probably match
that and I'm not convinced oneis better than the other.
There are lots of ways,Although oh no, I'm going to say
this oh my gosh, I almost gavebad advice.
All practice is not equal.
There is bad practice.
There is more effectivepractice.
In order to be effectivepractice, there has to be
(40:52):
repetition, has to be generationand, I would argue,
interleaving.
So repetition means youobviously got to practice it
more than once.
So again, coming back to mathfacts, I had a teacher like
fourth grade I think it was.
I'd finally convinced her thatmath facts were important.
So she was going to have herkids practice math facts.
So they sat in the room andthey all sat there and she would
point to a kid and say, youknow, Jimmy, three times three.
And they each had their littlemath fact sheet.
You know numbers going acrossthe top and the side.
(41:14):
You just go top, three timesthree, find the three, the three
on the side, and it's nine.
They all had that.
So little Jimmy would go three,three, nine, Nine, good, okay,
thanks, Tommy.
What's four times four, 16,good, 16, thanks.
And that was almost a completewaste of time.
First of all, there's norepetition.
Just saying it once doesn'thelp.
(41:36):
I shouldn't say it doesn't help, but it's not.
You gotta say it more than once, obviously.
And, by the way, if I say, okay, Jimmy, what's three times
three, what's every other kiddoing?
Nothing right, they're not,they're all didn't call me Good,
so not getting repetition.
Yeah, exactly.
Number two you have to generatethe answer yourself.
Recall, practice effect.
(41:56):
One of the best ways to retainthings is just practice,
recalling over and over again.
But looking at an answer andreading it is not generating the
answer.
You have to generate the answeryourself.
And so they have to look atwhatever the stimulus is like,
look at the T, and they have tobe the one to say T, you can't
say it for them.
So if I were to have a shortkid, the T five times and every
(42:18):
time I said T as they listened,or every time they said T,
they're going to retain it waybetter if they're the ones that
said the sound.
And then, lastly, interleavedInterleave, practice multiple
skills at once, and I like tohave I think it's more effective
if you have easy or reviewbuilt in there.
So if I'm teaching you t andI'm practicing t, I'm going to
(42:39):
have four other sounds that youalready know as we practice them
together.
So repetition, interleaving andgeneration Most of the things
really should be there.
And so if I'm a teacher and Iknow my kid learns in the first
place but just needs morepractice with it, all right,
let's see.
Anything I do that builds inrepetition with generation and
(42:59):
some interleaving, is going tobe fine, and there's 10 ways to
do it, if not more, and it'sprobably going to be fine as
long as you follow those threerules.
And then generalization oh,there's a hundred ways to do
that and I love, when workingwith teachers and teams, to see
the creative ways they come upwith helping kids build for
transfer, build forgeneralization, teach you how
you want them to use it, andthat's oftentimes really fun.
(43:21):
Teachers have fun with that one.
I think it's the hardest one.
It's the one teachers thinkhave the most fun with.
So, yeah, just you want tostart this.
Just start looking for this,looking for at the end of the
lesson.
Can the kid do it the next day?
Do you remember it and then canthey apply it.
Melissa (43:47):
And how.
What you do with thatinformation can vary, as long as
you're matching what the kidneeds Way to leave us with some
gems there at the end.
Those are great, thank you, andI will be emailing you if I
have any kindergartners nextyear that I'm having trouble
with.
But no, thank you so much forthis.
This I mean Lori and I reallydid.
After we talked to you at thepre-call, we're like, oh my gosh
, this totally changed our wayof thinking about intervention
and it seems so simple.
But the way you framed it justreally is helpful, and I'm
(44:09):
really hoping it's helpful for alot of teachers out there as
well.
So thank you for sharing.
We really appreciate it.
Matt Burns (44:14):
Thank you, this was fun.
Lori (44:18):
To stay connected with us, sign up for our email list at
literacypodcastcom, join ourfacebook group and follow us on
instagram and twitter if thisepisode resonated with you, take
a moment to share with ateacher friend or leave us a
five-star rating and review onapple podcasts just a quick
(44:38):
reminder that the views andopinions expressed by the hosts
and guests of the Melissa andLori Love Literacy podcast are
not necessarily the opinions ofGreat Minds PBC or its employees
.
We appreciate you so much andwe're so glad you're here to
learn with us.
Thank you.
Lori, we had some real aha moments getting ready to
chat with Matt Burns aboutintervention.
Lori (00:08):
Totally.
If you've ever wondered why astudent isn't picking something
up or quote just isn't gettingtraction, this episode is for
you.
Melissa (00:17):
And the key is figuring out where the learning is
getting stuck.
Are they not learning it, notremembering it or not applying
it?
Lori (00:25):
Each one needs a different kind of support Researcher Matt
Burns shares a framework thathelps you figure out what
students really need, and you'llhear how it played out in the
classroom.
You'll leave with a superpractical way to target your
instruction for the students whoneed it most.
Hi, teacher friends.
I'm Lori and I'm Melissa.
(00:46):
We are two educators who wantthe best for all kids, and we
know you do too.
Melissa (00:52):
We worked together in Baltimore when the district
adopted a new literacycurriculum.
Lori (00:57):
We realized there was so much more to learn about how to
teach reading and writing.
Melissa (01:02):
Lori, and I can't wait to keep learning with you today.
Hi, matt, welcome back to thepodcast.
We are so excited to have youback.
You were one of our mostpopular episodes last year,
great.
Matt Burns (01:17):
Thank you, very happy to be here.
Thank you.
Melissa (01:19):
And we can't wait to talk about intervention today,
and especially, I mean when wetalked to you before, it sounded
like you're going to talk aboutintervention today, and
especially I mean when we talkedto you before it sounded like
you're going to talk aboutintervention that really
actually works to meet the needsof students.
So we can't wait to dive intothat.
Great Thanks.
Lori (01:34):
All right.
So, Matt, you've done someamazing work with something
called the Skill by TreatmentInteraction Framework.
That sounds really scary.
You're going to help us workthrough it today, but that's
grounded in the learninghierarchy.
Now we know that.
You know, again, it sounds alittle bit academic, but really
it's just about how people learnand what we can do when
learning breaks down.
Matt Burns (01:56):
Yeah, exactly Right.
Melissa (01:58):
Yeah, so let's just start with the basics of this.
You know, lori gave it all thetechnical names, but just walk
us through.
Like, how does learningtypically happen?
For and we, you know we arealways talking about literacy,
but this really applies toeverything so how does learning
typically happen and what can gowrong along the way?
Matt Burns (02:17):
Well, there's so when I work with teachers I hear
them talk about this a lot.
They'll have a kid and they'llrecognize the kid's problem.
Like you know, I had a kid justlike that two years ago and I
did this research basedintervention and it worked
really well.
And so I'm going to try thatwith this kid and it didn't work
so for years, that's that'sfascinated me.
(02:38):
There's something about theindividual kid that makes the
intervention effective or not,and for decades we've been
trying to study the individualkid more Like.
Is it a working memory issue?
That's the problem.
Is it a processing speed issue?
And we've never found researchthat shows those types of
variables adequatelydifferentiate intervention
(02:59):
effects.
So a really long story to me.
Very short was a few years agoI was part of a grant and myself
, lori Hellman and JenniferMcComas at University of
Minnesota, and we had each role.
So we were building MTSS andLori was tier one and Jennifer
was tier three and I was tiertwo, basically.
(03:20):
So Jennifer developed thisreally cool way to do a brief
experimental analysis to seewhat problems kids were having,
and so what we'd do is we'd comein and assess a couple of
hypotheses, as kids are learningas anyone learns anyone in the
world.
Anything you learn, you gothrough four very specific
phases.
This is a hearing in Eden Hallin 1978, if interested.
(03:43):
But you go through veryspecific phases.
First of all, you start off inthe acquisition phase.
You've got to learn it, you'vegot to do initial learning and
you have to first becomeaccurate.
And the best way to buildaccuracy is through modeling and
explicit instruction.
So build accuracy.
Then, once you're sufficientlyaccurate, then we have to worry
about how quickly do you do it?
That's your second phase.
(04:04):
You go from initial learningacquisition to fluency building,
proficiency building phase,where you really got to get
faster.
And the goal there is practice,practice, practice, practice.
Get them faster at the skill.
Now teachers push back to meall the time Do we really need
kids to do it faster?
Well, no, what we need is forkids to do it with automaticity.
(04:25):
If you can't do it withautomaticity, you can't
generalize the skill.
How do we know if it'sautomatic Speed?
So yes, we do have to get themfaster, but that's really just
so we know it's automatic.
And then, once they learn it inthe first place, then they're
fluent in it, then they cangeneralize it.
And so if they aren't fluent,they can't take it and put it in
(04:46):
a different setting ordifferent stimulus, or they
can't do that.
So we have to first get themaccurate, fluent, and then they
can generalize it.
Once they can generalize it,that's when we use information
to solve problems.
And I know as teachers that'swhere we want our kids to be,
where we want our kids to besolving problems.
But if they're still in theinitial learning they can't do
(05:07):
that.
So we have to build modeling,build accuracy, then build speed
, help them to generalize it andthen they can apply it to solve
problems.
So to answer the questioninitial question, which was one
of the phases in where canthings go wrong?
Any step along the waysomething can go wrong.
The kids might not learn in thefirst place, or they might
learn it but then forget it thenext day, or they might learn it
(05:30):
and remember it but then can'tapply it, or they can't use it
to solve problems.
Now, with me as aninterventionist, I'm not dealing
with a kid who knows it, isfluent, can generalize it, just
doesn't use it to solve problems.
That's usually not a kid thatpeople call me about.
So I'm usually much morefocused on those first three
phases.
So I really focus on did theylearn it in the first place, did
(05:51):
they remember it and can theygeneralize it?
Lori (05:54):
Matt, why do you think it's those first three?
Matt Burns (05:57):
So that's a great question, I think I think I've
never tested this.
I've studied this framework anumber of times.
I've never tested what I'mabout to say.
I think it's because if theyget through those first two,
most of the time they cangeneralize it and use it to
solve problems.
Why it happens in those firsttwo I don't know, but I think
(06:19):
that's where they're notlearning it well in the first
place or they can't retain it.
That's why they're not gettingto the last two.
Almost any time I've got thatkid through the fluency phase,
they generally hit those lasttwo really easily.
Now, with generalization, withreading, I don't see it much.
I haven't studied this, it'sjust experience.
I don't see it being as much ofa problem in reading, but it is
(06:39):
occasionally a problem in math.
The kid knows, can do the skill, can do the skill fluently, but
then they go to apply it andthey really struggle with that.
So we do see that there.
So why that's the case I don'tknow.
But I do think most of the timekids are struggling to learn it
in the first place or rememberit.
Melissa (06:56):
Yeah, I just wanted to say you mentioned that teachers,
like, often see this researchand then they try it with
students and it works for someand it works for others.
And I just wanted to mentionthat that can be really
frustrating for teachers, youknow, to feel like you're doing
what the research said to do andit's not working.
And I just wanted to say thatso that we can say, like as we
(07:19):
talk today, like we're reallygoing to talk about the reasons
why it might not be working forcertain students.
It's not because the researchis bad and you want to throw it
all away, but because things arehappening for those students
and we're going to actually givesome things that they can do to
help those students.
So you don't feel so lost.
Matt Burns (07:37):
I'm so glad you said that Because, remember, most of
the intervention research isdone with, you know, 50 kids or
something, and what we don't see, we see on average it works
really well, but when you lookat the data, there might be five
kids in that group it didn'twork well with, or something
like that, but that doesn'treally come out in the data.
So that's why most of theresearch I do is single case
design.
We're actually looking atindividual kids and, by the way,
(07:59):
so we developed this.
I first wrote about this in2010.
No-transcript.
Not long ago, maybe five yearsago, a teacher called me.
A teacher was in a differentstate, called me up and said hey
(08:22):
, look, I've been doing soundpartners.
Sound partners is a goodintervention.
I talk about sound partners alot.
That's why he thought to callme.
And at the same time, in 2017,lynn Fuchs had this great
article come out about how tointensify interventions and she
used like five or six strategies.
He was just picking one or twostrategies and trying them and
they didn't work.
And he called me up frustrated.
He's like okay, burns, I'vebeen trying this thing, it's not
(08:49):
working.
I got this article that didn'thelp.
You talk about sound partners,what do I do?
And this frustration was clear.
I'm saying it a bit facetiously, but his frustration was clear.
I said, okay, let's talk to thekids.
And we found, in talking andseeing where they were and such
that he just happened to pick,got unlucky and picked two ones
that didn't match the kid' needs.
And once we picked that onethat did match the kids' needs,
they took off.
Lori (09:06):
Okay, before we dive in a little bit further, can you tell
us what didn't match the kids'needs?
I'm just curious.
I'm not going to be able tosleep until I know this.
Matt Burns (09:16):
So let's talk about these two kids.
So if you're not familiar withSound Partners, it's a finance
intervention.
It's oftentimes done one-on-oneor in a small group.
It's a fine intervention.
It's oftentimes done one-on-oneor in a small group.
It's a fine intervention.
Now, so there were two kids wewere talking about.
Both had different issues whichworked out well for me.
The first kid really struggledwith initial learning.
(09:37):
He would sit down with the kidand, let's say, taught the
grapheme CH that day I'm justmaking that up and then at the
end of the lesson we'd the chand he couldn't do it.
He didn't know what that meant.
He's like you know, they justtaught it to you 10 seconds ago
and you interacted and did it,but now you don't, you don't
know it.
So for that kid it wasn'treally the skill he needed.
(10:00):
He wasn't quite ready for thatintervention that we had to back
it up to really focus more onbasic freedom of awareness and
then to teach the skill and abunch more modeling, a lot more
modeling.
Now the second kid, when he'ssitting there with him doing the
lesson, at the end of thelesson he did fine, no problem.
Then the next day he forgot it.
(10:21):
So for that kid right afterlesson practice, practice,
practice, practice.
So after we're done.
We had a little drill technique.
I used that once he taught himwhatever skill that was that day
they'd practice it over andover and over again so he
remembered it.
So one kid needed more modeling.
We had to match it up to thekid's skill level better I
(10:43):
shouldn't say word skill level.
We had to match it up to theskill better.
And that kid needed more basicframework awareness and then
more modeling of the skill,whereas the other kid just
needed a lot more practicebecause they just weren't
retaining it very well.
And, by the way, those are thetwo most common that I see.
I said that briefly a secondago, but those two just not
learning in the first place orjust not remembering it.
Lori (10:58):
When students need more support, which you just gave a
great example of two studentswho did.
Teachers want to know what do Ineed to do differently, what
can I do differently?
And I think what I'm hearingyou say is it really depends
where the breakdown is right.
Are they not learning it, arethey not remembering it, or can
they just not apply it yet?
Are they struggling to apply it?
Can you say more about that?
Matt Burns (11:19):
Yeah, as I said, in 2010 or so, we were doing this
hour long or so briefexperimental analysis and I went
to the teacher afterwards andshowed her what we, what we did,
and the teacher, I said so,this kid's really struggling to
remember it.
And the teacher said I couldhave told you that, and she's
walking me.
I thought about it and Ithought she could have.
(11:40):
She could have told me that.
She could have easily told methat.
Why didn't I think of that?
And so then we had this ideawhere we started just asking the
teacher these three things.
So what I'm saying here, I'mstating the questions we asked.
These are three things to lookfor when you're working with
kids.
Number one at the end of thelesson can the kid do it?
So you just talk to him, yousit down, can the kid do the
(12:01):
skill you just taught?
And the answer to that is yes,everything else is a no.
Because oftentimes I askteachers that and they'll say
well, sometimes that's a no,inconsistently that's a no.
It depends.
Those are all no's.
Yes, everything else is a no.
So I ask at the end of thelesson can the kid do it?
No, okay, then that's where thebreakdown is occurring.
(12:22):
Two options there Either well,I don't want to say either.
First, assess theirprerequisite skill.
If you're focusing on fluencyand the kid's not learning in
the first place, go reassesstheir Phymex.
If you're assessing, if you'redoing Phymex and the kid's not
learning in the first place, goassess phony-week awareness.
From experience I haven'tstudied this from experience I
(12:45):
think 75% of the time that's theissue.
It's to not doing the rightskill.
If they had the prerequisiteskill and this is what we need
to work on with this kid thenyou have to add in a lot more
modeling.
So think of this, think of atthe end of the lesson can the
kid do it?
If the answer is no, assess theprerequisite skill.
If it's low, back it up.
If it's low, back it up.
(13:06):
If it's not, add in moremodeling.
Now, if the answer to thatquestion at the end of the
lesson can do it, the answer isyeah, sure, no problem.
The next question is the nextday, does he remember it?
Again, yes, everything else isa no.
So if the yeah, he learned itin the first place, but the next
day he's forgotten it, okay,that kid.
Practice, practice, practice,practice.
We talk a lot about dosage inintervention, research and
dosage is important, but I'm notconvinced dosage is always the
(13:29):
answer.
If the intervention is notworking.
Doing it more may not help, butin this example, where the kid
is getting it and they're justnot retaining it, that's the
most important thing you can do.
Give that kid as much practiceas possible and then, yeah, at
the end of the lesson the kidlearns it the next day does he
remember it?
Yeah, okay, then is hestruggling to apply it?
(13:50):
And of the three, that's theone that's the most difficult.
I just tell teachers your bestbet is teach it how you want
them to use it.
So you know, the kid learns thegrapheme and then goes to read
words and text.
They struggle with it.
Okay, well then, really focuson teaching that grapheme within
(14:10):
a word and then have the kidread sentences that contain that
word as part of the lesson.
So my advice to teachers goingforward, interventionist, going
forward look for those threethings.
Can they do it at the end ofthe lesson?
And it doesn't have to be ahundred percent, but I want to
see 90%.
Do the next day?
Do they remember it?
And again, some forgetting isnormal, but I want to see 90%
(14:33):
retention, and then can theyapply it, just as you're working
with kids.
Look for those three things andif the intervention is not
working, that'll help you figureout how to intensify it.
Lori (14:44):
So good, okay, I feel like the thing that we go to the
most is we skip over all thebeginning stuff you said and we
go right to the practice.
Is that right?
Yes, okay.
So I'm hearing you say you knowmore is not necessarily the
answer.
It depends on what the need is.
And if we don't match this likeright instruction to the actual
(15:05):
need, I'm assuming there couldbe some dire consequences.
Right, like we're just havingkids do more, do more, do more,
but that's not really helping.
You're actually, matt, this isa silly analogy, but I teach
fitness classes at the gym and Iteach body pump and you know,
in that you lift weights.
Well, it's like when peoplecome to class week after week
(15:26):
and you know, I do like reallycorrect them, because I do think
there's that we're not learningit in the first place.
If they come week after weekand every time they go to do a
tricep kickback, they'rebringing their arm all the way
back into their shoulder.
They could come week after weekfor the next five years.
They're never going to definetheir triceps.
So more practice isn't actuallygoing to get them right.
(15:47):
What we need, the outcome thatwe need.
You got to stop to keep thetension.
You got to stop that weightlike right at your hip and keep,
you know, kick it back fromthere.
You can't just fling it around,and so we could do more
practice all day, but it's notgoing to matter.
So if we're not matching theinstruction to the actual need,
it makes sense in like thisgreater context, but I think
(16:08):
often in a classroom settingwhere it might be tricky
sometimes to get to the actualneed of the students right, like
I'm hearing you.
What I'm hearing you say is wereally have to analyze this.
Matt Burns (16:25):
You really do, you really have to think about it
Now.
So if I'm willing to acceptthat there's a lot of kids for
whom just more practice might behelpful, but if they practice
it wrong, that does more harmthan good.
First of all, if they'repracticing and it's not helping,
you're just wasting time.
You're better off just to youknow, find out what the kid
actually needs and really focuson that.
So that's in and of itself.
But number two, if it's amismatch, you might actually do
more harm than good.
And so I think it's absolutelyfine if teachers start with
(16:48):
dosage first, but if thatdoesn't work, switch right away
to something else, and you'rebetter off to try and really
pinpoint it at the beginning.
Melissa (17:01):
Yeah, so that makes so much sense and I think, like you
said, it's it's almost aninstinct to just like keep doing
more, more, more, more, but tonot waste too much time doing
that.
Right if it's not working andcome back to what's really
happening.
I think you, I think told usthat you have a story about a
kindergarten class that youwanted to tell us about.
That's an example of this.
You gave us a lot of examplesalready, but I want to hear what
(17:22):
this really looks like in aclassroom.
Matt Burns (17:24):
Yeah, it wasn't in a classroom, it was a kid, it was
a kindergartner, okay, and itwas the first kid we built this
with.
So again 2010 or so, we had alittle guy who came to in
kindergarten is, you know, verylow, very low skills, and we he
had very little foot, almost nofooty McEwan.
So we worked with him to buildthat and he learned that really
(17:44):
quickly.
Now, in the meantime, we'realso trying to work on just
basic letter sounds and I havenever seen a kid struggle
learning the letter sounds likethis kid did, and it was.
It was.
It was really kind offrustrating because you would
literally teach him the letter t, right, and say this is t, it
makes it sound, and at the endof the lesson, okay, ready,
what's this letter?
I mean this letter t, whatsounds it make you look at and
go, we have no idea.
(18:06):
We just taught it to him.
He didn't.
He during the lesson, did justfine.
In fact, weeks we tried thisand, um, we couldn't.
Uh, he.
Every time we taught the lesson, at the end we show him the
card or whatever, and he nevergot it, never got right,
literally not even once.
And so that's, we started todevelop this framework, uh.
(18:27):
And we said we gotta figure outhow this kid.
So we went to basic, went backto basic learning theory,
thought about these three phasesas we sat down this kid now,
the good news was he wasn't.
The bad news was he wasn'tlearning in the first place, he
really struggled.
And so we just remember I justsaid the other lesson couldn't
do it.
So, um, we assessed hisphonemic awareness.
(18:48):
And there was, when we taughthim his phonemic awareness, that
was fine.
So for this little guy, hereally just needed a lot more
modeling.
So we did with him is we tookthe a picture.
Now again, freedom of awarenesshelps so much.
So, for example, teachingletter h, we had uh.
We showed him a picture of uhhammer with a big h on it.
(19:08):
He knew hammer started withright.
So I was able to show him the hand say this says hammer.
Hammer starts with what good.
This is the other.
That makes that sound.
Basically, and you know, I didthat with him during the first
lesson and taught him what itsaid.
And at the end of the lessonheld up an h.
He looked at it and went it wasthe first time he'd ever gotten
(19:29):
it right, ever gotten one right, and it was really fun to see,
because the teacher and thekid's teacher and my, my coach
part of this grant were off tothe side and they saw that.
They both looked at each otherand exploded into tears.
It was so cool.
Now the cool story about thislittle guy, though, is okay.
We finally figured it out, andso we just kept doing that.
(19:50):
He learned all his lettersounds pretty quickly after that
.
But I make that sound so Idon't want to belittle this Like
we spent weeks trying to teachthe work with this kid.
We could not get anything anyprogress, and once we figured it
out and went back to reallyreally focus on the scaffolding
and modeling, that's when thekid finally took off and he's
got a happy ending to the story.
(20:11):
This was in his kindergartenyears, a three-year grant.
During kindergarten, he wasreferred for special ed because
you know he wasn't doing well.
That was a reasonable referral,and they tested him and found
out he had an IQ of like 65.
I forget the exact number, butin the intellectual disability
range.
So they're at the IEP.
I was not at the IEP.
(20:32):
I want to be really clear.
I was not there.
I'm telling you what I heard Atthe IEP.
They said okay, your son has anintellectual disability, would
like to start special edservices, and the mom said, well
, he can still keep doing thestuff with Dr Burge's stuff,
right?
And the principal said no.
Now the reason the principalsaid no was this was a
(20:52):
prevention grant project, itwasn't a special ed project.
So that was the right answer.
But we would have kept workingwith them.
There's no way we would havethrown this little kid away, but
anyway.
So the principal said no andthe mom thought about it and
said you know what?
No, this is working.
I want to keep trying this.
We can come back next year ifwe need to.
And they're like yeah, ofcourse, yeah, course, yeah, no,
(21:13):
let's keep trying this.
And so, during, during, well, atthe end of second grade, I was
cut right at the end, at the endof second grade, this little
kid who was intellectualdisability.
In this school they use the,the um, dra, the nwa map and
aimsweb, all three of those.
He was a grade level reader bythe end of second grade and took
(21:35):
a lot of work.
I don't want to, you know, butthis little kid was supposedly
an intellectual disability byjust really focusing on what he
needs.
We got him there and that tooka lot of work.
It took time, but we got himthere.
We saw huge growth.
Once we figured it out, we keptseeing really huge growth.
It just took him a couple yearsto catch up to grade level.
Melissa (21:51):
Yeah, that's amazing, and because you found exactly
what he needed.
I mean that that's the key,because I could see that going
poorly.
Even I'm thinking about itbecause next year I'm actually
going to volunteer with my son'skindergarten teacher, so I'll
be right there with the aphonemic awareness issue, right?
And, like you said, you wentand phonemic awareness was not
(22:18):
an issue, right?
So so you can't even justassume like, oh well, then I
have to go back to this otherskill that they must not have,
right?
You have to see if that's whatthey have or not.
I'm wondering, though, forspecifically since we're talking
about kind of phonicsinstruction right at the moment,
is there are there any otherideas you have for that modeling
part?
Because I could see that'swhere people might get stuck,
like, okay, what else do I do tomodel this?
(22:40):
There's only so many things toshow them the sound.
Matt Burns (22:45):
So I did a it's not a grant I have.
I'm going out observingclassrooms and I observed a
kindergarten classroom and itwas a great teacher,
everything's cool.
But she entered, she, she hadlittle kindergartners come up
and sit on the floor and shegoes okay, kids, we're going to
learn something new.
And she put up a letter of a tand put you a t, you know, on
the smart board, say, okay, whoknows what this is?
(23:06):
And they all kind of stared ather for like 10 seconds.
Then they're kindergartners,right, so they start getting out
kindergarten.
Right, they start screwingaround, raise their hand, so
totally relevant stuff, you knowum.
And so she okay, this is, thisis a letter.
Who knows what letter it is?
Um, same thing happened about10 seconds.
So I'll get kind of squirmy intheir kindergartens.
And then she's okay, this is aletter t.
(23:27):
Who knows what sound it makes?
Now, at this point I might havegiven up, right, like, they
don't know what it is, theydon't know the bit, they're it,
they're not going to know theletter name, but she still, or
the letter sound, she stilltried it.
Same thing 10, 15 seconds ofthe kids getting kindergartenery
, and you know.
And then she says okay, this,this makes the sound.
Now, I would have done this.
This is okay Class friends.
(23:50):
Where was called um?
We're gonna learn a new letter.
This is the letter t.
Everyone say it.
The kids say t.
Let's say okay, t makes the tsound.
Everyone say that.
Kids would say good, okay, um,let's say it again.
T makes the t sound right, whatsound kids say t?
Good like in the word top topstarts with t.
This t turn your partners.
(24:11):
Think of a word that startswith t.
Right, like.
That took about 15 seconds andthen we'll learned it much
better.
So when I'm answering yourquestion, melissa, which is,
yeah, I get it, but you'd besurprised how often that step
gets skipped in the learning.
And we talk now about productivefailure and there's a
(24:34):
meta-analysis.
I could pull up the citation ifyou want it, but there's a
meta-analysis that's found formath that productive failure had
a positive effect and amoderate effect.
So I went and looked at thestudy in more detail and what I
found was that it was math andsome of the dependent variables
were things like physics andchemistry and et cetera.
And when you look at the agegroups, the largest effects were
(24:57):
for students in undergrad ormaybe high school, but we looked
at elementary school, gradestwo through five.
The effect size was negative,did more harm than good.
So productive failure, rememberthose phases of learning
Acquisition, fluency,generalization, problem solving,
adaptation.
It's that final phase whereproductive struggle might be
(25:18):
helpful.
It is not helpful in initiallearning.
And so in high school kidslearning chemistry or something,
sure that's a differentconversation Little kids
learning their letter sounds orwhatever it is.
No, you have to have modelingfirst.
So I do think oftentimesreminding teachers of the
importance of modeling, goingback and just simply saying
first, can really be the issue.
(25:39):
Now I will say, like for thislittle boy we mentioned earlier,
the kindergartner we model, weprovide a more scaffolding by
giving that letter the pictureof a hammer.
So I do think teachers canbrainstorm ways to model more.
Think teachers can brainstormways to model more, and I don't
think any is worse than otherswhen it comes to modeling.
As long as they're, you know,showing it first and having the
(26:00):
kid immediately responding andcorrecting any errors, right
then it should be fine.
But there are also other waysto do it.
But I think oftentimes you'vegot to get back to really just
doing actual modeling duringinitial learning.
Lori (26:13):
Yeah, that's really important.
You're making me think aboutthe older students, Do you think
it's because they're moreapplication?
Like, for example, if I wasdoing a chemistry lab, I would
have had to teach somethingbeforehand as the teacher in
order to get my students readyfor that lab, or they would have
had to read somethingbeforehand or prepare.
They don't just walk into thatlab and willy-nilly just go for
(26:37):
it.
So there is that element ofwhen they are doing.
I'm just thinking of an exampleof when they might fail.
Right, If they were havingproductive, failure could be in
a situation like a chemistry lab.
Melissa (26:47):
That's what I was thinking, lori.
I'm like they have at least 12years of school behind them
right and knowledge.
Lori (26:52):
Is that like it?
Do you think it's more becauseit's the application piece at
that point?
Matt Burns (26:56):
Yes, Well, I think it absolutely comes to it Now.
I'm sure there are some initiallearning that has to happen in
a chemistry class, I'm surethat's true, but it's it's at
the upper level.
It's much more.
I mean, think about what you're, what you might think about the
test you take.
(27:16):
You know elementary schoolversus older grades.
You know oftentimes it'smultiple choice elementary
school, it's essay in highschool.
Why?
Because you're tapping into theapplication side of it.
Essays are application.
So I think you're exactly right.
I think some of those moreadvanced courses with older kids
, it's all about application.
Lori (27:30):
Yeah, I mean okay, even if we think about something as
simple as us as adults you know,make baking or making a meal we
have prerequisite skills there.
I know how to measure with ameasuring cup, you know, I know
how to cut with a knife, I canput all that together and, yeah,
there will be some element offailure.
Perhaps I burn the garlic, butI live and learn right next time
.
But it's more that applicationpiece.
(27:51):
I've got the prereqs to get meto the point of I can actually
try this out now.
Matt Burns (27:56):
I think the classic example is driver's training.
You're not going to useproductive failure in driver's
training Like, yeah, you put thekid in a challenging situation
perhaps, but you've alreadyassessed to know they have the
basic driving skills rightbefore you and you're going to
teach it to them, have thempractice it and arrange
simulations et cetera.
Then they go on the road right,it's, it's.
You don't apply it until untilyou can do it.
Lori (28:19):
So we're thinking about writing instruction and you know
early writing is definitelydifferent than more advanced
writing or older writers.
So how do we help a studentwho's just getting started
versus one who's trying to write, maybe independently, but needs
support organizing orelaborating?
Because I could see thisframework being really helpful.
Matt Burns (28:38):
Well, I agree.
Now I've never studied it forwriting.
I studied it for math andreading, but never writing.
But my three sort of go-tos ifthey're struggling to learn it
in the first place.
I go back to early writingskills and there's a program
called Early Writing Project atthe University of Minnesota and
University of Missouri.
I'm not sure, I think it'sprobably on both their websites
Early Writing Project at theUniversity of Minnesota and
University of Missouri, althoughI'm not sure, I think it's
probably on both their websites.
(28:58):
Early Writing Project.
It's all about how to do that,initial instruction in basic
writing, the application, and Iwill say I'm hypothesizing that
we'll see application breakdownsin writing more than in reading
.
But that's where we drive intoSRSD, the self-regulated
strategy development.
Those strategies are ideal forhelping kids apply writing
skills.
So that's, if you, if you'vegot a kid who's really
(29:19):
struggling to apply writingskills, that's it.
That's a go-to I use quite abit and in between it's just
practice.
But stuff like practicing, uh,copying, practicing writing
sentences, that type of stuff,uh is sort of in between.
It does apply well to writingand, by the way, I know this is
literacy, but I really kind ofstarted on this in in math.
Many years ago I was teachingkids um a.
(29:42):
I did research on somethingcalled incremental rehearsal,
which is a way, a reallyintensive way, for kids to
practice stuff, for kids withmemory difficulties to remember
things, and it works really well.
But I was I wanted to try thiswith kids with intellectual
disability, to teach them theirmath facts, and so I was simply
teaching, you know, single digitmultiplication, three kids,
(30:04):
late elementary school,intellectual disability, and
they learned them no problem, itwas easy.
And I went back to the teacherand saying look, here are the
data.
You know, the kids did greatand the teacher went oh, that's
fine, but that's not what theyneed.
Like, what do you mean?
He goes they need to understandit better conceptually.
Okay, well, show me what youmean.
So she had the kid come over andgave him three times three and
(30:25):
I'm going to try and make some Iknow this is audio, so I'll try
and make some audio sound andthe kid counted out his fingers.
He went one, two, three, four,five, six, seven, eight, nine
Not that loudly, but then wrotedown the answer nine.
She said see, he needs tounderstand it better
conceptually.
I said well, wait a minute,isn't going?
One, two, three, four, five,six, seven in your head, showing
you he understands itconceptually.
(30:46):
So that really got me startedon this line of how to
individualize math interventionsbased on where the kids are,
and it follows kind of the sameframework, except conceptual
understanding.
Is the footy-mick awareness ofmath right?
If they really struggle withbasic numeracy, go back and look
at basic conceptualunderstanding.
And it worked really well.
So I've never studied withwriting, studied with the other
(31:07):
two and it applies.
Melissa (31:09):
Yeah, since we're talking about where this applies
, I'm wondering how it appliesto comprehension, because I can
really see it with our you knowthe phonics skills and getting
more fluent with them.
But I'm wondering and we alwaystalk about how comprehension is
different.
It's much more nuanced.
There's so many things that gointo comprehension.
If students are struggling withcomprehension, could you use
(31:29):
this framework with that as well?
Matt Burns (31:31):
Yes.
So the more discreet the skill,the easier it is to apply, to
apply this framework.
So, yes, it makes much moresense.
But for fun.
I still like comprehension.
But remember, comprehension isdiscrete skill.
So if the kid's not, you'retrying to teach them
comprehension strategy, forexample, and they're struggling
(31:52):
to learn it in the first place,go assess the prerequisite
skills and I'll tell you fromexperience.
I was about to say nine timesout of 10, which seems a little
high, but I bet it's not wrong.
Most of the kids I work with inschools who have comprehension
deficits don't havecomprehension deficits, they
have fluency deficits.
Thank you for saying that whenwe assess the prerequisite skill
and we see it's a fluency issue.
(32:14):
When you really focus on thatfluency issue, the comprehension
is better.
So that's learning it in thefirst place.
Then you have a kid who, yeah,they learn the strategy, for
example.
See what I've just done.
By the way, I should say thisI've just taken comprehension
and made it a discrete skillbecause I'm talking about a
strategy.
So if I'm trying to teach astrategy, it works.
If I'm trying to teachcomprehension other than
(32:36):
assessing prerequisite skills,it doesn't work quite as well.
So you to first, then make it adiscrete skill and so I want to
make it their.
You know a strategy thatthey're learning.
So, yeah, they can do it in thefirst place or not.
If they can't look at theirfluency skills, if they can, if
they have good fluency, thenmaybe do more modeling and let
(32:56):
them use the uh, teach them the,spend more time teaching on the
strategy to begin with, thenmore time practicing it and then
actually have them go and applyit.
And one thing we did, a study wedid, was we found a bunch of
middle schoolers.
They're trying to teach um,comprehension strategies to the
ones from reciprocal teachingyou know, paraphrasing,
summarizing, questioning anywayand they taught it to them and
(33:19):
the kids did fine during thelesson and then uh, but then
when they went to go use it outin the skill, it didn't improve
their comprehension.
When they had to go apply, itdidn't improve their
comprehension.
So we came in and said, youknow, yeah, they, they could do
it accurately when they'resitting there and guess what?
The next day they stillremember it.
They started to apply it.
So we started giving themfeedback.
After we had them, uh, readwhatever was an answer
(33:40):
comprehension.
We asked them read whatever itwas and answer comprehension.
We asked them these questions,a series of questions about if
they're using the strategies ornot and use that to help them
understand.
Oh, I could use that there.
Oh, I should have done thatthere.
And then their comprehensiontook off.
So I think it doesn't.
The more discreet the skill,the better it works for this
framework.
But comprehension is a seriesof discreet skills.
Just pick out which one you'refocusing on.
Lori (34:02):
Yeah, so what I just heard you say was metacognition and
application.
In that case, yeah.
Matt Burns (34:06):
Yeah, in that case, yes, metacognition for
application is really important.
Yeah, all right.
Melissa (34:09):
So we also want to talk about assessments, even though
I know we could talk aboutassessments forever.
But I do want to, just in theframe of what we're talking
about, talk about assessments,because sometimes teachers feel
like they have so much data fromso many different assessments
it's hard to even know what todo with it all.
But I'm hearing you, eventhrough this conversation, say
(34:31):
things like you know, justlooking at what they do at the
end of the lesson, right, thatthat's an assessment there.
Or even you said some at onepoint.
You know the teacher, of courseshe would know that, right?
You, just by watching herstudents, she would know that.
So I'm wondering about, like,between all the assessments
they're giving, between watchingwhat their students are doing
every day, you know, how canteachers use assessment data to
figure out where this breakdownis happening so they know where
(34:52):
to intervene in the right way?
Matt Burns (34:54):
So the type of data used depends on the question
being answered.
Depends on the question beinganswered and when I'm talking
about so, if I'm using the datato identify a child with a
learning disability or todetermine proficiency in a state
test which could be linked tobeing retained, those are really
important decisions.
We need very rigorous data forthat.
(35:14):
But when I'm talking aboutmodifying instruction or
intervention, those aren't Idon't need as rigorous data for
that.
So observational data can bereally helpful, and so there's a
couple of things you can lookat, and accuracy is important.
So I want to see if a studentcan't do at least 90% accuracy.
I'm not going to let thempractice it independently.
I want to see 90% accuracyfirst.
(35:36):
So, oh, what's the program thatdoes this?
Road to Reading, I think, isthe one that does this At the
end of every lesson and theirlessons aren't just one session,
they're over a couple of days.
They give the kid 10 words thatcontain what they just taught
them, and they have to readthose words and see if they can
(35:58):
get them right or not.
To me, those are invaluabledata because you can see, 10 is
a good number.
90% is my cutoff, so if theyget 9 or 10 right, they learned
it.
If not, they didn't.
So those types of assessmentdata if you're really worried
about the kid at the end of thelesson, give them this.
It becomes a measurement issuebecause if I give them 5 and
(36:19):
they get one wrong, that's 80%.
If I give them 10, they get onewrong, that's 90%.
So if they got one wrong out of10, I'm happy.
One wrong out of five, I'mconcerned.
So that's why it gets to be alittle difficult.
But teachers can also use whatthey know about the kids as well
.
If they want to use five, butgive them some sample of the
behavior and see if they can doit 90 accuracy.
(36:39):
If they can move on now, thenext day, give them that same
assessment and see if they cando 90 accuracy again.
So when I say assessment, Imean you know a list of words
that they contain the graphemeyou just taught them um, a, a
spelling words that you justtaught them those types of
things, and just see if they canaccurately do it.
(37:00):
90.
If they can do it right afterlesson, they've got it.
If they can accurately do it,90%.
If they can do it right afterthe lesson, they've got it.
If they can do 90% the next day, they've got it.
So those are the types ofassessments that I think are
really, really important forintervention design.
Lori (37:11):
Matt, do you mean literally the same?
The next day the same words.
Yep.
Matt Burns (37:16):
Okay, I feel like every teacher listening would be
like.
Lori (37:19):
Does he mean the same, the exact same, or should I change
it?
Matt Burns (37:23):
No, no, I'm glad you asked, no, I do.
Yes, keep it simple.
So it's really interesting towatch.
As a researcher, I sometimesget excited about bad things and
I always feel guilty afterwards, like if I'm going to work with
a kid and I find a kid with areally severe problem, like oh
great, let's dive in.
And I realize, oh, I justcelebrated the kid having a
problem.
I don't mean that.
(37:46):
So sometimes I get excitedabout things I might come across
as strange.
But yeah, I want to keep itreally, really simple and I've
seen kids when I say the samewords the next day, I see
basically a bimodal.
I see two things happen.
Either the kids fly through it,no problem, or they get like
(38:08):
two right, you never get the kid.
I should say never.
You hardly ever see a kid geteight the day before they got
nine.
Hardly ever happens.
And so if they're worried aboutpractice effect, well, okay,
that's a legitimate concern.
I'm just telling you from myexperience.
It's hardly ever a factor.
They either know or they don't.
The next day they remember nineagain, or 10, or they remember
(38:28):
two or less.
Melissa (38:31):
So you're really just catching those kids that had it
the one day and then the nextday it's gone, it's apparent.
Matt Burns (38:39):
It is clear.
That's the thing I'm a longbutt working with kids is they
tell you what they need.
We just have to do a better jobof listening and the kid you
know you'll have them, the kidnext day.
We get two out of ten.
They're clearly showing youwhat they need and they will do
that.
They will clearly show you whatthey need.
We just have to do a better jobof listening.
Lori (38:57):
That's awesome.
Matt Burns (39:16):
All right, I love that.
This is such a great tip forteachers listening.
So if teachers are listeningand they love this idea, matt
and they're like.
But the most recent one is in ajournal called Learning
Disabilities, amultidisciplinary journal.
It's there.
We also have an article in theCommunique which is published by
the National Association ofSchool Psychologists Easy to get
.
We have an article coming outin Perspectives, the IDA journal
(39:43):
, about this.
So that's there, and also myYouTube channel.
I talk about my YouTube channel.
Just go to YouTube searchMatthew Burns.
I'm the first Matthew Burnsthat comes up, which I'm very
proud of.
Anyway, I have a couple ofvideos on there about how to do
this as well.
Lori (39:57):
Okay, great, and we'll be sure to link those in our show
notes.
So if you're listening, you cango to the show notes, click
them, find Matt, and then youknow, email me, I'm happy to
help, If you like.
Matt Burns (40:06):
This one teacher called me up out of the blue.
I spent quite a bit of timewith that teacher, but you know,
usually it's a five, 10 minuteconversation.
Email me, I'm happy to try andsupport them.
But I but I mean it's threequestions At the end of the
lesson can they do it the nextday, do they remember it and can
they apply it?
So really, if you just startthere and really identify what
(40:29):
the kid needs, there are manyways you could probably match
that and I'm not convinced oneis better than the other.
There are lots of ways,Although oh no, I'm going to say
this oh my gosh, I almost gavebad advice.
All practice is not equal.
There is bad practice.
There is more effectivepractice.
In order to be effectivepractice, there has to be
(40:52):
repetition, has to be generationand, I would argue,
interleaving.
So repetition means youobviously got to practice it
more than once.
So again, coming back to mathfacts, I had a teacher like
fourth grade I think it was.
I'd finally convinced her thatmath facts were important.
So she was going to have herkids practice math facts.
So they sat in the room andthey all sat there and she would
point to a kid and say, youknow, Jimmy, three times three.
And they each had their littlemath fact sheet.
You know numbers going acrossthe top and the side.
(41:14):
You just go top, three timesthree, find the three, the three
on the side, and it's nine.
They all had that.
So little Jimmy would go three,three, nine, Nine, good, okay,
thanks, Tommy.
What's four times four, 16,good, 16, thanks.
And that was almost a completewaste of time.
First of all, there's norepetition.
Just saying it once doesn'thelp.
(41:36):
I shouldn't say it doesn't help, but it's not.
You gotta say it more than once, obviously.
And, by the way, if I say, okay, Jimmy, what's three times
three, what's every other kiddoing?
Nothing right, they're not,they're all didn't call me Good,
so not getting repetition.
Yeah, exactly.
Number two you have to generatethe answer yourself.
Recall, practice effect.
(41:56):
One of the best ways to retainthings is just practice,
recalling over and over again.
But looking at an answer andreading it is not generating the
answer.
You have to generate the answeryourself.
And so they have to look atwhatever the stimulus is like,
look at the T, and they have tobe the one to say T, you can't
say it for them.
So if I were to have a shortkid, the T five times and every
(42:18):
time I said T as they listened,or every time they said T,
they're going to retain it waybetter if they're the ones that
said the sound.
And then, lastly, interleavedInterleave, practice multiple
skills at once, and I like tohave I think it's more effective
if you have easy or reviewbuilt in there.
So if I'm teaching you t andI'm practicing t, I'm going to
(42:39):
have four other sounds that youalready know as we practice them
together.
So repetition, interleaving andgeneration Most of the things
really should be there.
And so if I'm a teacher and Iknow my kid learns in the first
place but just needs morepractice with it, all right,
let's see.
Anything I do that builds inrepetition with generation and
(42:59):
some interleaving, is going tobe fine, and there's 10 ways to
do it, if not more, and it'sprobably going to be fine as
long as you follow those threerules.
And then generalization oh,there's a hundred ways to do
that and I love, when workingwith teachers and teams, to see
the creative ways they come upwith helping kids build for
transfer, build forgeneralization, teach you how
you want them to use it, andthat's oftentimes really fun.
(43:21):
Teachers have fun with that one.
I think it's the hardest one.
It's the one teachers thinkhave the most fun with.
So, yeah, just you want tostart this.
Just start looking for this,looking for at the end of the
lesson.
Can the kid do it the next day?
Do you remember it and then canthey apply it.
Melissa (43:47):
And how.
What you do with thatinformation can vary, as long as
you're matching what the kidneeds Way to leave us with some
gems there at the end.
Those are great, thank you, andI will be emailing you if I
have any kindergartners nextyear that I'm having trouble
with.
But no, thank you so much forthis.
This I mean Lori and I reallydid.
After we talked to you at thepre-call, we're like, oh my gosh
, this totally changed our wayof thinking about intervention
and it seems so simple.
But the way you framed it justreally is helpful, and I'm
(44:09):
really hoping it's helpful for alot of teachers out there as
well.
So thank you for sharing.
We really appreciate it.
Matt Burns (44:14):
Thank you, this was fun.
Lori (44:18):
To stay connected with us, sign up for our email list at
literacypodcastcom, join ourfacebook group and follow us on
instagram and twitter if thisepisode resonated with you, take
a moment to share with ateacher friend or leave us a
five-star rating and review onapple podcasts just a quick
(44:38):
reminder that the views andopinions expressed by the hosts
and guests of the Melissa andLori Love Literacy podcast are
not necessarily the opinions ofGreat Minds PBC or its employees
.
We appreciate you so much andwe're so glad you're here to
learn with us.
Thank you.
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