The DISD/IFL NSI Instructional Model  is built around a set of change ideas that was adapted and adopted by our network for school improvement (NSI) teachers over the course of five years. These teachers are from 14 schools and teach grades six through nine. Teachers who enacted components of the model had students who had significant growth in reading from the beginning of the year to the middle of the year using a standardized assessment. This was true of students in both middle school and high school. The full report on teachers use of the instructional model and student growth can be found here. 

We invite you to try out and adapt the change packages to meet the needs of your classroom. The instructional model is built around the idea that comprehension work lays the foundation for success on any subsequent task that you invite students to complete. With that in mind, we suggest beginning with student-centered routines to get students used to the expectation that they are responsible for learning and helping each other learn, and then moving to the comprehension work. After you've adapted and adopted the comprehension work for your students, you can then engage in any of the other tests of change. The goal is to create a coherent sequence of text-based work for students that takes students deep into important aspects of each text.