Ambitious Growth Rates and RTI Goals

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Did you know there was a such thing as realist and ambitious growth rates in students?  I had no clue!!!  I’ve been writing RTI goals for years and now that I am over RTI paperwork for the county, I’ve discovered that I have been in the dark for WAY too long!!!  I’m so excited to share with you all today all about how growth rates, the differences, and how you use them to impact student achievement.  Take a look at how ambitious growth rates and RTI goals can change your paperwork.

Are you setting RTI goals for your RTI interventions? Let's take setting goals in the classroom to the next level! rti reading / rti forms / setting goals

 

What is realistic and ambitious growth rates?  What is the difference?

Realistic growth rate is the rate at which most students develop in a given Tier 1 classroom.  This is growth due to the normal classroom setting instruction, interventions, and support for students.  Ambitious growth rates is the predicted rate of growth for students receiving intensive and targeted interventions for a specific skill.  A highly effective teacher who has a strong background in differentiation and flexible groups sees ambitious growth rates in his/her students.  Generally, ambitious growth rates are used to predict growth in students in Tier 2 and 3.  

How to set student goals using ambitious growth rates.

 

How do you find the ambitious growth rates for students?

I researched and tried to find consistent rates for all the following areas:

letter names
letter sounds
phoneme segmentation
word fluency
reading fluency
comprehension maze passages
number identification
computation fluency
I’ve compiled the skills and created spreadsheets for all of them per grade level (where applicable) into a TPT file named Ambitious Growth Rates for RTI Goal Setting.  
How to set student goals using ambitious growth rates.

How do you use growth rates to set student growth goals?

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Ambitious-Growth-Rates-for-RTI-Goal-Setting-1462815
Step 1: Determine which students you should monitor (or monitor all students) and match them with a tool based on their grade level or need.
 K – Letter or Letter Sounds and Number Fluency
1st Grade – Segmentation or Reading Fluency 
2nd Grade – Reading Fluency or Comprehension Maze Passages and Computation Fluency
3rd Grade – Reading Fluency or Comprehension Maze Passages and Computation Fluency
4th Grade – Reading Fluency or Comprehension Maze Passages and Computation Fluency
5th Grade – Reading Fluency or Comprehension Maze Passages and Computation Fluency
If your county does not have access to a database for pulling probes like these check out Easy CBM!  It’s completely free!

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Ambitious-Growth-Rates-for-RTI-Goal-Setting-1462815

Step 2:  Assess the student(s) for the very first time using the tool that you selected.  Score the assessment as directed.
How to set student goals using ambitious growth rates.
Step 3:  Using the score that the student received, graph the data on a form.  (You can use mine from my best selling RTI/Data Notebook if you don’t have forms already.)
How to set student goals using ambitious growth rates.
Step 4:  Decide how long you are going to serve the student with interventions and pick an intervention that is appropriate.  Generally, Tier 2 is for 8-12 weeks.  I like 8 weeks because you get an idea of if the interventions are being affective and can change them if they aren’t.  Pick a research based intervention in the targeted area of need for the student.  For example, if you are using a segmentation probe you should pick a program that focuses on phonics instruction.
How to set student goals using ambitious growth rates.
Step 5:  Set the goal by adding the projected growth + their initial assessment score.  Draw a line so you can watch the data and see if they meet their goal by the end of the determined time period.  This will keep you and the student focused on the goal and where they need to go!  Anytime that a child is focused on the end goal then the growth is targeted and accelerated.  You will watch the student skyrocket!!!

22 letters in a minute + 9 = a goal of 31 letters in a minute

  

That’s RTI and ambitious growth rates in a nut shell!  Be sure to checkout all of my RTI materials that I have available by clicking here!
 

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8 Comments

    • Thanks Laura for the compliment and for visiting!

  • I wish I found your blog sooner. I’m going to use the probes from the free resource you suggested but if I am testing every other week should I use a different probe, or use the same one for a couple tests? Right now we test with Read Well and I’m setting goals based of that but the complexity and timings change so it’s hard to set consistent goals!

    • It is best Michelle to use a cold read (new passage) each time you progress monitor. That really gives you a good idea of how their fluency has been impacted without the student just memorizing the same text.

  • Hi there,

    This is extremely helpful. Out of curiosity – how did you come up with these numbers? Thanks!

    Suzanne
    Reading Specialist
    Philadelphia, PA

  • Hi there,

    This is extremely helpful. Out of curiosity – how did you come up with/figure out these numbers? Thanks!

    Suzanne
    Reading Specialist
    Philadelphia, PA

    • Hi! You can google Ambitious Growth Rates and find a ton of rates based on research from different universities. I just used the rates to calculate the growth overtime to set goals by 🙂

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