Nothing distinguishes special from general education as much as special education's attention to students as individuals. D. Fuchs and Fuchs (1995) described individualized education as the "signature feature of effective special education practice" (p. 528). Four essential attributes distinguish special education: (a) identifying goals that address educational needs specific to an individual with a disability, (b) designing and implementing instruction formulated specially for that individual and those goals, (c) monitoring and evaluating the individual's progress toward the goals, and (d) adjusting instruction when the individual's progress is unsatisfactory. For special education to have integrity, both legally and conceptually, all four attributes are essential--and they are central features of the individualized education program (IEP). Monitoring progress for purposes of instructional decision making may be the key ingredient of the IEP; it functions as a self-correcting mechanism for imperfect planning and instruction. This research sought answers to three fundamental questions regarding the amount of measurement needed to obtain valid estimates of reading growth: Is validity of growth estimates degraded by measuring progress less often, by minimizing the number of scores per measurement occasion, or by minimizing the number of scores used to assess baseline--in other words, by reducing the demands of progress monitoring?
