A random sample of language arts, social studies, and science high school teachers (N = 361; 53% women) from the United States were surveyed about what their students wrote, their use of evidence-based writing practices, the adaptations they made for weaker writers, how they assessed writing, their preparation to teach writing, beliefs about the importance of writing, and judgments about their students’ writing capabilities. The findings from this survey raised some concerns about the quality of high school writing instruction. The writing activities they were assigned most frequently by teachers involved little analysis and interpretation, and almost one half of the participating teachers did not assign at least one multiparagraph writing assignment monthly. Although the majority of high school teachers did apply most of the evidence-based practices and adaptations included in the survey, they used these practices infrequently. Most teachers did not believe their college teacher education program adequately prepared them to teach writing. A sizable minority of language arts and social studies teachers indicated that their in-service preparation was inadequate too. For science teachers this was close to 60%.

The Behavior Education Program (BEP;Crone et al., 2004) is a modified check-in, check-out intervention implemented with students who are at risk for more severe problem behaviors. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effects of the BEP on problem behavior with 12 elementary school students. Results indicated that the BEP was implemented with high fidelity, led to a decrease in office discipline referrals for the majority of students who received the intervention, and had high social validity ratings. Limitations of the current study are presented, along with suggestions for future research.

The goal of the three-tiered response-to-intervention (RtI) model is to catch students who are at risk early and to provide an appropriate level of intervention. Although RtI has been recommended for academic and social behavior, to date there has been little discussion about the differences associated with implementing RtI across these domains. The purpose of this article is to compare similarities and differences in RtI for academic and social behavior. In addition, some of the primary challenges associated with the implementation of RtI for social behavior are discussed. Examples of how RtI has been implemented with social behavior are provided along with recommendations for future research.

Two hundred seven students in Grades 1 through 5 who were at risk for severe behavior problems participated in a 2-year study of the effects of the Check, Connect, and Expect (CCE) program. The CCE program combined the essential intervention procedures of the Check & Connect Program and the Behavior Education Program . A stratified random sample of students based on school assignment was used to compare the outcomes of 121 CCE program students with 86 comparison students. Sixty percent of the CCE students (n = 73) graduated from the program and 40% (n = 48) did not. Linear growth analyses of eight different outcome measures found that three standardized problem behavior measures significantly decreased to normative levels for CCE graduates. Social skills and academic measures did not significantly change over time. The discussion focuses on the comparative efficacy of CCE as a targeted intervention for students at risk for severe behavior problems.

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