WHO ARE SCHOOL PSYCHOLOGISTS? HOW CAN THEY HELP THOSE OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM? Christine Mitchell-Endsley, Ph.D. School Psychology

WHO ARE SCHOOL PSYCHOLOGISTS? HOW CAN THEY HELP THOSE OUTSIDE THE CLASSROOM? Christine Mitchell-Endsley, Ph.D. School Psychology

Presentation Goals Ensure a better understanding of what school psychologists do Explain how school psychology and education has changed Ensure you know how to seek out help from a school psychologist Provide information regarding how school psychologists might be able to assist the children you see Open the lines of communication regarding our changing populations of students; how can we better work together

Who are School Psychologists? (NASP definition) School psychologists are uniquely qualified members of school teams that support students' ability to learn and teachers' ability to teach. They apply expertise in mental health, learning, and behavior, to help children and youth succeed academically, socially, behaviorally, and emotionally. There is even a component of neuropsychology that is growing in the field of school psychology. School psychologists partner with families, teachers, school administrators, and other professionals to create safe, healthy, and supportive learning environments that strengthen connections between home, school, and the community.

I chose a school psychology program rather than a typical psychology program after looking at a number of programs because school psychologists receive specialized advanced graduate preparation that includes coursework and practical experiences relevant to both psychology and education.

More specifically, school psychologists are trained in Data collection and analysis Assessment Progress monitoring School-wide practices to promote learning Resilience and risk factors Consultation and collaboration Academic/learning interventions Mental health interventions Behavioral interventions Instructional support Prevention and intervention services Special education services Crisis preparedness, response, and recovery Family-school-community collaboration Diversity in development and learning Research and program evaluation Professional ethics, school law, and systems

This is why I recently said that if you ask 20 different people what I do, you may get 20 different responses because we do so many different things.

Where do we work? According to the National Association of School Psychologists (NASP), the vast majority of school psychologists work in K-12 public schools. We serve students from 3 through 22.

They can provide services in other settings, including: Private schools Preschools School district administration offices Universities School-based health and mental health centers Community-based day treatment or residential clinics and hospitals Juvenile justice programs Independent private practice

For the sake of this presentation, I am going to focus on schools. And, I want to talk about what I do in order per se starting with 3 year olds. There are three ways that I would come to work with a 3 year old. They will either be transitioned to a school setting from Early Intervention (EI), referred to me by a doctor, Head Start, etc., or I will find them during preschool screenings or while attending a siblings IEP meeting, for example.

Preschool screenings are important!!! Even if you are not sure if you want to send your kiddo to preschool, I ask that all parents have them screened. Even if your school does not have a free program, I ask that you have them screened. I want to see everyone. We look at fine motor, gross motor, cognitive processing, pre-academic skills, language and articulation, adaptive skills, and social/emotional functioning. Even if there are not significant concerns, we can give parents pointers, as to what they need to work on! If there are no preschool slots or they do not think they will be able to transport, parents may not pursue preschool screenings.

Why do I care so very much about seeing these little ones???

Early learning begets later learning and early success breeds later success The later in life we attempt to repair early deficits, the costlier remediation becomes James Heckman, Nobel Prize-Winner, Economics, 2000

My concerns I am getting too many kiddos that are four plus years old or even five with delays and ready to enter Kindergarten. If they do not initially qualify for Early Intervention, they do not follow up when concerns persist. Or, they may not understand how to seek out Early Intervention or when. I would rather be proactive and check it out than hope they outgrow it. The earlier I can intervene, the better.

My Concerns Continued I am getting more gross motor concerns, than ever. I have Kindergarten students that cannot sit up during carpet time or even at their desk. What do you think is going on? How many of you see infants left in car carriers? How many of you drive by homes in the summer and see few kiddos outside playing ball? Who do you think is at the greatest risk? Students living in trauma Why do I care? Gross motor skills are linked to later reading skills (i.e., core strength). If your baby does not crawl or develop core strenth or has visual deficits, there could be an impact on later reading and writing, as well. (kitty cat study) They may need access to an occupational therapist or vision teacher.

More concerns related to motor skills According to LancansterOnline, The New York Times reported in February 2015 that public schools in New York City saw a 30 percent increase in the number of students referred to occupational therapy, with the number jumping 20 percent in three years in Chicago and 30 percent over five years in Los Angeles. (http://lancasteronline.com/features/trending/losing-our-grip-more-students- entering-school-without-fine-motor/article_c0f235d0-7ba2-11e5-bf0d- 5745f74f9717.html) A teacher in Denver estimated that only 2 out of 20 of her Kindergarten students showed up with the necessary fine motor skills.

Fine motor concerns continued What is going on with fine motor skills? Are students living in homes with trauma at greater risk? Fine motor skills and visual motor coordination are linked to later reading skills. According to Clark (2010) at Iowa State University, there is a strong relationship between reading and handwriting skills. Descriptive analysis, statistical tests, correlations, and multiple regression support the belief that handwriting skills are related to a students understanding of basic literacy concepts of phonological awareness and alphabetic principles.

Social/Emotional and Sensory Concerns Preschool screenings also give me a glance in at the world of social/emotional functioning. I can tell a lot about students from how they interact during that period of time. I am getting more and more Kindergarten students that struggle with failure and self-regulation. What do we think is happening?

Children s adjustment in the first three years of life and later emotional health and social competence has been shown to be a significant predictor of academic achievement in elementary school even when controlling for the effects of IQ (Teo, Carlson, Matheiu, Egeland, & Sroufe, 1996).

How do intervene with preschoolers? Walk in special education services Preschool with Response to Intervention (RtI) Preschool with small group special education services part of the day Small group special education or intervention services (10 or less)

Let s talk about K-8 th grade now (aka Elementary Students).

Elementary Students Much has changed with the introduction of Response to Intervention (RtI) and Multi-tiered Symptoms of Supports (MTSS) http://www.readinghorizons.com/blog/what-is-the-difference-betweenrti-and-mtss We can now do so much more, earlier, than what we could ten years ago. We used to have to wait for students to fail before we could intervene. I now do hundreds of screenings, observations, and collaborative meetings a year now where I am able to mediate concerns often almost immediately. We are able to meet students needs without ever having to write an Individualized Education Program (IEP). And, parents are involved in this process.

What if a student needs more? If we cannot meet their needs, we will move to a referral for special education. However, we will likely not have to wait 60 school days. We typically have enough data to move forward, as soon, as we meet. I used to fear for kids not getting help. In my current districts in Illinois, I do not have to worry about the dreaded discrepancy model where a student s IQ score might prevent them from getting help. We also do not have to wait, as long. I want everyone to use this model effectively!

How many of you are familiar with RtI and MTSS?

Prior to Response to Intervention and Multi Tiered Symptoms of Supports Students had to have Average cognitive abilities to qualify for services under a specific learning disability considering standard deviation. So, a student that had an IQ score of 84 might have been considered a slow learner, who was refused help. As student with Average abilities had to have a significant discrepancy, often a standard deviation and a half. So, say you have an IQ score of 100, you would still have to be pretty delayed to get support. However, if you have an IQ of 90, you would have to be even more delayed. If you had an IQ of 89, you would have to be delayed even further. Hence, one would really have to be behind. And, standardized assessments are not that sensitive for younger students. Hence, we often had to wait for students to fail before we could assist them.

What have we learned over the years? 88% of poor readers in first grade will continue to be poor readers in fourth grade (Juel, 1988). We have learned that.. for 90% to 95% of poor readers, prevention and early intervention programs that combine instruction in phoneme awareness, phonics, fluency development, and reading comprehension strategies, provided by well trained teachers, can increase reading skills to average reading levels. However, we have also learned that if we delay interventions until nine-years-of-age, (the time that most children with reading difficulties receive services), approximately 75% of the children will continue to have difficulties learning to read throughout high school. (Lyon, 1998)

Multi-Tier Model of Prevention and Intervention Tier 1 Primary Prevention: School/Classroom- Wide Systems for All Students, Staff, & Settings ~ 5% ~ 15% Tier 3 Tertiary Prevention: Specialized Individualized Systems for High-Risk Students Tier 2 Secondary Prevention: Specialized Group Systems for At-Risk Students ~80% of Students

Students are benchmarked at the beginning of the year and at least two additional times a year to ensure that all students are on target.

Dynamic Indicators of Basic Early Literacy Skills Classroom Report Tier 1 Students Http://www.dibels.uoregon.edu

That data is used to determine, who might benefit from intervention.

Steps of Problem-Solving Problem Identification 1 2 Problem Analysis Plan Evaluation 5 4 3 Plan Development Plan Implementation

Problem Solving Approach to Service Delivery Individualized Instruction General Education With Support Amount of Resources Needed To Solve Problem General Education Intensity of Problem

Progress Monitoring General Education With Support Individualized Instruction Intensive Monitoring (2x/week) Amount of Resources Needed To Solve Problem General Education Benchmark Monitoring (3x/year) Targeted Monitoring (Biweekly) Intensity of Problem

After interventions are developed and students are placed, progress monitoring data is collected to monitor the intervention. For social/emotional concerns, attendance is monitored, as well as referrals and grades.

Response to Intervention: Case Example

Bart Simpson 3rd Grade Student General Education Classroom Macmillan/McGraw-Hill Reading (2003) Benchmark Data: Oral Reading Fluency = 23 wc/ minute (3rd grade material) Benchmark for Fall 3rd grade = 35 words correctly per minute Decision 1: Implement Strategic Intervention (Supplemental material from reading series) for 30 minutes daily in addition to core classroom reading instruction in small group (7 students) with classroom teacher. Decision 2: Implement Intensive Intervention (Great Leaps/ Read Naturally ) for 90 minutes daily in addition to core classroom instruction individually with reading teacher. Decision 3: Decrease to Strategic Intervention (Supplemental material from reading series) for 30 minutes daily in addition to core classroom reading instruction in small group (7 students) with classroom teacher. Decision 4:????

This image cannot currently be displayed. DIBELS Progress Monitoring Graphs Name: Grade: Simpson, Bart Third T-2 T-3 T-2 Decision Time: Consider Special Education

Eligibility Considerations Alternative framework is conceptualized as non-responsiveness to otherwise effective instruction by IDEA 2004 Thus using a dual discrepancy model - Level is below classmates & - Rate of learning is below classmates CBM If learning rate is similar to other classmates, student is profiting from the regular education environment. Environment If a low-performing student does not grow where other students are thriving, special intervention should be considered. Alternative instructional methods must be tested to address mismatch between student learning requirements and requirements in instructional programming. Dr. Lynn Fuchs and Dr. Pam Stecker National Center on Student Progress Monitoring

Social/Emotional Concerns More and more of my K-8 th graders are struggling socially/emotionally. We have to have interventions in place for the entire group. Most schools have PBIS models or similar Character models in place, which addresses the need for whole group support. Longitudinal research according to NASP has demonstrated that interventions that promote students bonding to school contribute to positive outcomes in terms of academic performance and social competence. (We will revisit this with high schooler students.)

Continued We must remember that it is not just what kids are exposed to on a regular basis (acts of commission) but also acts of omission. (true from birth on ) Think about parents of a newborn, an 8 year old, and an 18 year old. What might dinner time look like? What might bath time or bed time look like? Think about a family where a parent is an alcoholic. Not all of our students have the same number of assets Some have a lot of family members Some have no one

Bullying We are also constantly addressing this new era of bullying. How has bullying changed? Do you think that are kids are being affected? In 2007, 10% of students 12-18 reported that someone at school had sued hate-related words against them, and 35% has seen hate-related graffiti at school.

Finally high school students

Some Priorities for High School Students My goal for high school students is to keep them safe during this difficult period of time, screening for social/emotional concerns as needed, keeping an eye on attendance. If a student is missing a lot of school or frequently ill, we should probably talk. Attendance and, who they are spending time with, are huge pink flags. We have more students than ever that are struggling, facing adult challenges with adolescent brains. We have also learned when we look at school shootings there is one thing that everyone had in common or was missing no one reportedly had a close bond to anyone at school.

More Priorities I mentioned bullying earlier. At this stage, social media has become a greater challenge with issues such as sexting, for example. Drug use has also become a hot topic with students asking lots of questions about whether marijuana is safe, as it is legal in places like CO.

After High School When we have dealt with all of the social/emotional stuff, I also help them plan for careers and college. If they need updated testing, we get that done so it is current; and they do not have to pay out of pocket. We might also explore CVIP experiences or for my life skills students work and learn experiences. Students with IEPs can stay until their 22 nd birthday.

If you ever have any concerns, please contact your school psychologist so that we can better meet the kiddo s needs.

How Do I Contact a School Psychologist? Every school has access to the services of a school psychologist. Although, some school psychologists serve two or more schools so may not be at a particular school every day. Most often, school psychologists can be reached by inquiring at the school directly, the district's central office, or locating contact information on the school or district website. While you can contact Belleville Area Special Services Cooperative (BASSC), for example, that is just the first step. You want to find out who the school psych is for that child s school. Then, you or the parent contacts them directly.

A few things that school psychologists want medical professionals to know that I might not have addressed: Referrals need to go to the child's home school. One can feel free to contact BASSC to find out who that might be; but they, then, need to contact the home school. School psychologists really want medical professionals to communicate with them: Don't rely (solely) on parent report of how things are at school. Have parents sign a release and get school based information. I wish they did more thorough evaluations before just diagnosing things like Autism or ADHD. If they don't do a full evaluation, they should refer them out for one or contact us. We can work together.

Continued They need to know (the new) LD criteria and need to communicate with the school...ask for teacher input before writing a script for an IEP or evaluation special ed is not always the answer. :) The RTI process in Illinois!!! (MO is still using the discrepancy model.) Be careful when requesting or writing a script for a dyslexia evaluation and sending it to school. We are discussing any students that struggles, reviewing data, and assessing, when appropriate through RTI. This request could create conflict between "the expert" (the doctor) and the school. We see the student everyday, all day and are reviewing the data and understands the student. The parent typically is then very frustrated if the school's opinion or course of action differs from the doctor's. Call us so we can discuss the data and help explain our thought process. I would want them to know that we welcome their input and suggestions; but in the end, decisions regarding testing are made by the IEP Team not even school psychologists alone. Let parents know that they are part of the team. We want them to be part of that team.

We can do no great things, only small things with great love. Mother Teresa

Together, we can make a difference in the lives of children. Questions?