Date of Conferral

2021

Degree

Doctor of Education (Ed.D.)

School

Education

Advisor

Nancy Williams

Abstract

Collaboration among teachers positively affects both teachers’ professional development and students’ reading achievement. However, teachers face challenges in collaboration with colleagues. Current research focusing on the collaboration experiences between general education classroom teachers and reading interventionists is absent. The purpose of this study was to understand teachers’ perceptions of the challenges they face in collaboration with shared goals in a reading Response to intervention (RTI) model. Collaboration theory served as the framework of this basic qualitative study. Research questions were designed to understand the perceptions of general education classroom teachers’ and reading interventionists’ collaborative experiences in a reading RTI model. Four general educators and five reading interventionists were interviewed. Data were analyzed using Saldana’s code-to-theme approach. The findings revealed three themes: teacher interactions, student support, and structures and limitations. The results from this study indicated that participants experienced challenges, including time constraints, scheduling conflicts, initial lack of teacher buy-in, and lack of administrative support as well as felt the mandatory reporting form for weekly meetings was limiting. All participants perceived teacher meetings based on a shared goal provided an instructional focus and benefited students’ reading achievement. It is recommended that teacher preparation programs and school districts plan for all teachers to receive professional development and continuous support focused on working collaboratively to increase student achievement in early reading skills. The social impact will support early reading achievement for at-risk students in Title 1 schools and move towards closing the achievement gap, resulting in all students making academic gains in reading.

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