Learning Styles: Structure of Intellect

SOI Adds Perceptual Development

by Richard Tracey

For 35 years, individual teachers have adapted the Structure of Intellect (SOI) instruments and methods of Dr. Mary Meeker and Dr. Robert Meeker (Meeker, 1969) to develop students' cognitive abilities on a pupil-by-pupil basis. This was mainly within gifted programs, a paradox implying only the gifted require cognitive development. Thus, school reformers of the 1990s asked, "Curriculum reform???? Look no further than your gifted program for help" (Gurcsik, 1992).

Faced with sweeping cognitive diversity in every classroom, teachers sought a group-based, site-managed SOI design to develop age/developmental-level cognition in all students, while dedicating the pupil-by-pupil approach to at-risk students. Concurrently, Meeker & Meeker created the IPP (Individualized Practice Protocol) method, whereby teachers may remediate certain perceptual and motor dysfunctions that often impair students' abilities in comprehension, which is the most basic mental operation in the SOI Model; i.e., attention, concentration, focus, mindfulness (Meeker & Meeker, 1992)

So Meeker & Meeker created the Bridges program, to unite SOI with IPP, and to develop age-suitable cognition and perception in all students, centrally managed within each school. Unlike the original SOI Model, Bridges includes the significant IPP component. Whereas SOI develops the cognitive dimension of comprehension, IPP develops its perceptual and sensory integration dimensions. And, whereas SOI is widely available to individual teachers, IPP is narrowly available to clinics and clinical settings within schools. Further, Bridges includes program evaluation, support services, and structured staff development qualitatively different from the training delivered by SOI Systems – none of which is associated with the original SOI Model.

Since 1995, Bridges has been marketed by Intellectual Development Systems, a company founded by former US Secretary of Labor William Brock to market nationwide the research-proven SOI, which had lost visibility after the semi-retirement of Mary Meeker. The Bridges team is currently 55 full-time employees of Intellectual Development Systems (sales, support and evaluation) and SOI Systems (publishing and fulfillment). Intellectual Development Systems is headquartered in Annapolis, Md. (www.bridgeslearning.com); and regional offices are in Oregon, Texas and California. SOI Systems is located in Vida, Ore. (www.soisystems.com). Nationwide, there are some 2,000 SOI-trained educators and clinicians.

The Bridges SOI/IPP Program

Most 'programs' or 'reforms' focus on content, methods, or technology. In contrast, Bridges focuses on the student's cognition—on his/her developable abilities to learn content, benefit from methods and use technology.

·         Comprehensive In-Classroom Cognition: For about 15 minutes daily during the middle 7 months of the school year, all students undertake SOI activities that develop the mental abilities which teachers assume each student brings to the classroom; e.g., attention span, memory and recall, comparison/contrast thinking, process orientation, symbol decoding, contextual comprehension, etc. In addition, Bridges includes SOI activities that develop advanced cognitive abilities in such domains as creativity, algorithmic logic, systems analysis, cause/effect reasoning, and decision-making. Such activities stretch students' minds in areas not often exercised by the curriculum.

·         Learning Development: A 'Bridges Lab' is established within the school for students particularly challenged as determined by the experience of teachers or others. Any student may be referred there for assessment of learning abilities whose basis is cognitive, perceptual, or psychomotor. As indicated by assessment results, students attend the Bridges Lab for at least 40 minutes, 2 times a week, to work on their individualized plan of IPP intervention activities. They develop the comprehension, sensorimotor, focusing and reading/learning style abilities that empower classroom participation. The duration of Bridges Lab varies pupil-by-pupil because his/her IPP intervention plan is individualized. The range is typically 5 to 9 months.

·         Career Discovery: Secondary students receive career awareness/counseling based on their individual cognitive profiles. The learning and thinking profiles of various careers and vocations are compared to the students' profiles. Students increase occupational potential by developing SOI and IPP abilities.

Unlike programs commonly labeled compensatory, developmental, remedial or resource, the IPP component of Bridges has measurable goals to exit students back to the regular classroom, usually within a single school year. In the words of Superintendent Pat Smith of the Lenoir City School District (Lenoir City, Tenn.): "The benefit of the Bridges program is that there is a definite beginning and a definite ending, according to the student's own individualized program" (Intellectual Development Systems, 1999).

Bridges Staff Development
Bridges provides high‑quality, continuous staff development and training. Teachers and staff gain core understanding of cognitive diversity inherent in students, such as how students differ in abilities to decode symbol systems, comprehend contexts, compare and contrast, and orient themselves within a process. Teachers able to identify the thinking and learning profiles of a student can tailor teaching to exploit his/her strongest SOI abilities. Even the most homogeneous group can include wide differences in cognitive abilities, strengths of various intelligences and schemata diversification. Bridges addresses this with an initial training program presenting the theory and practice of SOI assessments and interpretation and the IPP activities undertaken in the Bridges Lab. Subsequent to this training is an extensive, hands‑on training course by Bridges trainers, in specific l learning-development activities in the Bridges Lab. Periodic onsite reviews are conducted after these two intensive initial training sessions. In addition, periodic inservice programs are given by Bridges trainers. As appropriate, teachers and aides as trained by Bridges trainers to use the SOI materials and the appropriate computer technology at the Bridges SOI training sessions.
Student Academic Achievement
Since 1997, the Rosenberg, Tex., implementation of Bridges has been evaluated. Analyzing elementary-level 1993-98 longitudinal data for three suburban schools, Dr. Robert Meeker (1999a) established that Bridges is moving TAAS-measured Reading and Math performance significantly closer to the district's goal of TAAS mastery for their total populations. In all cases where a comparison can be made, the TAAS scores of Bridges students were significantly higher after the design was implemented than before. Earlier evaluations, conducted by the district (Bradfield & Slocumb, 1997a, 1997b), found Bridges positively impacting learning for all student groups, particularly low-SES and Hispanic, with 'considerable' to 'substantial' increases in achieving TAAS passing rates. Low-SES students in Grades 4 and 5 participating in Bridges materially outperformed comparison groups by surpassing the threshold of significance in year-to-year TAAS Reading and Math growth (Tracey, 1997).

Dr. Dorothy Sisk (1998, 1999) evaluated the Bridges program as implemented for the first two years by six rural schools in the Paris (TX) Independent School District, in 1997-98 and 1998-99. Her findings are that the program is consistently making a significant difference with at-risk students. In both years, Sisk's data found significant increases in achievement on ITBS scores for Grade 2 and on TAAS scores for Grades 3-12. Of particular interest is her analysis of students who participated in Bridges, as compared to students who participated in that program as well as in as many as five other programs overlaid on their schools' curricula. Among these 'Bridges Only' students in both years studies, the majority showed year-to-year TAAS improvements in both math and reading, and most were above the Texas standard score that represents one year's growth in one school year.
Pamela Di Salvo & Dr. William Stock (1999) investigated implementations of the Bridges program in five rural Arizona schools. DiSalvo & Stock analyzed survey data from the schools' staffs and scores on the Stanford Achievement Test, 9th Edition ("SAT9"), for students continuously enrolled in these five Arizona schools for two successive years, and with SAT9 scores in these same two years. Year-to-year gains in observed SAT9 scaled scores were compared to the year-to-year gains in average (50%ile) scaled scores expected nationally by the publisher of the SAT9 (The Psychological Corp.). Across Years 1 and 2, at-risk students posted a statistically significant difference in reading, while demonstrating increasing math gains over the national averages. These greater rates of change for program students is positive evidence for the efficacy of the Bridges.

Summarizing the first 15 years of the IPP component of Bridges, Dr. Robert Meeker (1999b) explains that the median duration of any student's individualized IPP treatment plan is 31 hours, with a range of 15 to 182 hours; thus, easily accommodated within a single school year. For the 1997-98 school year, of those IPP students who completed their treatment plans (e.g., were not moved or transferred, did not graduate or drop out), 98.34% (1,360 of 1,383) were judged successful by classroom teachers according to the criterion of having developed the ability to keep pace with mainstream instruction. He concludes that the IPP component is significantly more cost effective than traditional approaches to remedial education.

Qualitative data from Teaching Research Division (1998, 1999) represent interim reports after 6 months, and after 18 months, of a three-year implementation of the Bridges program by 19 elementary schools in Oregon, in rural, suburban, and urban settings. The authors produced data that reveal positive opinions of Bridges among teachers, students and parents. Anecdotally, staff attributed some improved student behavior and self-esteem to the program; however, the authors cautioned that their interim report was too premature to determine detectable program effect in these areas from the Bridges program.

More confident was Pat Smith, Superintendent of the Lenoir City School District (Lenoir City, Tenn.), when interviewed by Intellectual Development Systems (1999). She reported noticeable improvements in behavior of individual students, enhancing the learning environment of whole schools: "We were surprised at how quickly we saw results from students' experiences in the [Bridges] Lab, especially in the areas of handwriting and in the areas of student behavior and student discipline."

References

Bradfield, P., & Slocumb, P. (1997a). Student performance in SOI Model Schools in the Lamar Consolidated Independent School District. Rosenberg, TX. Unpublished study.]

Bradfield, P., & Slocumb, P. (1997b). Travis Elementary: An interim evaluation report: Year Two. Rosenberg, TX. Unpublished study.

Di Salvo, P., & Stock, W. A. (1999). The Bridges Program in Five Elementary Schools in Arizona. Tempe, AZ: Statistical Consulting Services.

Gurcsik, B. (1992). Curriculum reform???? Look no further than your gifted program for help. Network News & Views, 11(5), 96-97.

Intellectual Development Systems (Producer). (1999). Bridges: Bridging the gap between desire to learn and the ability to learn [Promotional Video]. (Available from Intellectual Development Systems, Inc., 49 Old Solomons Island Road, Suite 206, Annapolis, MD 21401.)

Meeker, M. (1969). The Structure of Intellect: Its uses and interpretation. Columbus, OH: Charles Merrill.

Meeker, M., & Meeker, R. (1992). IPP (Integrated Practice Protocol: A treatment system for dysfunctional students. Vida, OR: SOI Systems.

Meeker, R. (1999a). Evaluating the SOI Model School program in the Lamar Consolidated School District, Rosenberg, Texas. Vida, OR. Unpublished study.

Meeker, R. (1999b). Results from the SOI/IPP program. Vida, OR. Unpublished study.

Sisk, D. (1998). Third Party Evaluation of the Effectiveness of the Structure of Intellect Model School Program in Paris Independent School District: Year 1 Report. Beaumont, TX. Unpublished study.

Sisk, D. (1999). Third Party Evaluation of the Effectiveness of the Bridges/SOI Model School Program in Paris Independent School District: Year 2 Report. Beaumont, TX. Unpublished study.

Teaching Research Division, Western Oregon University. (1998). Third Party Evaluation of the Effectiveness of the Structure of Intellect Model Schools Pilot Program: Year 1 Report. Monmouth, OR. Unpublished study.

Teaching Research Division, Western Oregon University. (1998). Third Party Evaluation of the Effectiveness of the Structure of Intellect Model Schools Pilot Program: Year 2 Report. Monmouth, OR. Unpublished study.

Tracey, R. (1997). High gains for low SES students: 1996-97 TAAS performance of SOI Model School treatment group compared to control group. Annapolis: Intellectual Development Systems. Unpublished study.

About the Author:

Dr. Richard Tracey, Ph.D. is Vice President of Intellectual Development Systems, Inc. After more than a decade as an English professor, he left the academic world for the commercial world of educational publishing, in search of a model of cognition and perception that would explain the intellectual diversity of 'normal' and even gifted students. For the last ten years, he has been an associate of Dr. Mary Meeker and Dr. Robert Meeker, researching and applying their SOI and IPP models in K-12, adult and continuing education. He can be reached via email at rtracey@bridgeslearning.com or via the Intellectual Development Systems website at www.bridgeslearning.com.

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