Psychology in the Schools, Vol. 49(3), 2012 C  2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. View this article online at wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/pits DOI: 10.1002/pits.21595 MODIFYING INSTRUCTION WITHIN TIERS IN MULTITIERED INTERVENTION PROGRAMS SARA KUPZYK, EDWARD J.DALY, III, TANYA IHLO, AND NICHOLAS D.YOUNG University of Nebraska-Lincoln Response to Intervention provides a continuum of instruction across intensity levels through multitiered intervention models. A lot of work to date has been devoted to how to configure tiers to ensure the appropriate increases in intensity. Much less work has been devoted to making adjustments within tiers to attempt to forestall the need for moving students to a more intense level of instruction when the student is not making adequate progress. This article provides a simple model for evaluating the current instruction to look for areas in which it can be adjusted before more restrictive measures are taken. The model draws from the literature on functional assessment of academic performance. Teachers and consultants are advised to check (a) the skills targeted for instruction, (b) guided practice, (c) independent practice, (d) implementation fidelity, and (e) the motivating conditions that are present during instruction. The role of each area in student learning and progress is discussed, and recommendations are made for adjustments. C  2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Multitiered intervention models such as Response to Intervention (RtI) are designed to en- hance students’ learning rates and skill development across the full continuum of student ability levels, from those with the weakest skills to those with the strongest skills. Common features that characterize RtI models include: (a) screening of all students to identify those who need more or different types of instruction; (b) use of data and objective decision rules to inform instructional placement; (c) provision of high-quality, evidence-based instruction matched to student needs; and (d) ongoing progress monitoring using reliable and valid indicators of skill proficiency to determine the effectiveness of the instruction for individual students (National Association of State Directors of Special Education, 2008). Unfortunately, as is the case with most educational innovations, achieving conceptual clarity about what needs to be done is much simpler than grappling with the realities of actual implementation in schools. For example, many schools are not prepared to use assessment data to make instructional decisions without external supports guiding their efforts (Gersten & Dimino, 2006). Furthermore, teachers’ knowledge and skill in using data and implementing interventions varies considerably from teacher to teacher (Piasta, McDonald Connor, Fishman, & Morrison, 2009), meaning that some teachers do not know what changes should be made to match instruction to a student’s actual skill level. In a multitiered intervention system, screening and progress-monitoring data are used to make decisions about student placement across tiers of instructional intensity. For example, Tier 1 in reading may be regular classroom instruction in a core curriculum, Tier 2 may be a standard intervention protocol that increases the length and intensity of reading instruction, and Tier 3 may be more individualized instruction (e.g., special education). The RtI literature is replete with recommendations for ways to configure tiers and select curriculum and intervention packages (e.g., Marston, 2005; Shinn, 2007). The overarching goal of RtI is to create a fluid and flexible continuum of services to maximize all students’ progress. Each tier must provide the highest quality instruction for the resources that are devoted to it, with intensity of instruction increasing as a student is moved to higher tiers. If a student fails to progress at a tier, a more intense (and therefore more restrictive and costly) form of instruction must be delivered at a higher tier. In other words, the nonresponsive student is placed in a higher tier. Correspondence to: Edward J. Daly, III, Educational Psychology Department, 33 Teachers College, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, NE 68588-0345. E-mail: edaly2@unl.edu 219