Focal Skills - Outline

Outline

Upon entry into a Focal Skills program, the student is given a complete battery of Focal Skills assessments, including Listening, Reading, and Writing tests. These entry scores are used as a baseline for measuring student progress, but the student is immediately placed into the first module in the Focal Skills sequence for which the student has not attained the requisite threshold or pass-out score. If the student does not earn the needed score on the Listening Assessment, the student is placed into the Listening Module for instruction—whether the student has already reached the requisite threshold score in other skill areas or not. After each month of instruction in that module, the student is tested again with an alternate form of the Listening Assessment. Once the listening skill is mastered to the requisite threshold as evidenced by attainment of the pass-out score, the student’s placement moves on to the next skill module in which the student is not currently scoring at or above the threshold level. Skills already developed in the previous modules of the sequence are then maintained and further developed while the skill area of the next module is receiving focused instruction. Thus, a student testing out of the Listening Module and scoring below threshold in Reading at intake testing is given a new form of the Reading Assessment. The results determine whether the student has also attained the threshold score in Reading or will need to spend the next month in Reading Module classes, where—while focusing on reading skills development—the instructional methods will exercise and, so, further develop the student’s listening skills as well. Students meeting the threshold on Listening and Reading, but not Writing, are placed into the Writing Module, where they will be exposed to methods that use and further practice their listening and reading skills while focusing on developing their writing skills.