Following California’s Dyslexia Guidelines and increased adoption of research-based reading intervention, California is moving toward universal screening for young students. Once this screening starts, school districts will need to begin thinking about implications for child find and the IDEA.
One option will be to focus on the adoption of reading intervention as a universally available general education intervention (if not core instruction) and move to possible assessment for special education for only those students who struggle with reading programs.
Staff should be prepared to give thoughtful analysis of a student’s response to reading intervention as part of Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (“MTSS”) or Response to Intervention (“RTI”).
A panel of reading experts has designated the tests that school districts can use to identify reading difficulties that kindergartners through second graders may have, starting next fall.
