Tips to Deliver Effective Intervention
Combating Learning Loss

The data from NWEA and NAEP painted a challenging picture of the effects of the last two school years. Many classroom teachers are helping students master grade-level standards while also trying to close gaps that span several grade levels. The decline in test scores was even more significant for students with disabilities.

Districts are implementing various strategies to give students the best opportunity to succeed. However, when it comes to helping students close gaps, data shows that evidence-based, simple intervention processes are incredibly effective.

Let’s review three vital steps for delivering an effective intervention.

1. Academic Screening of All Students
Screening is step one! Effective screening uncovers students’ strengths and gaps.

Effective screening serves four purposes:

1. Provides valid and reliable data to identify students who need interventions.
2. Suggests tier supports for each student based on their percentile ranking.
3. Offers dynamic grouping recommendations by strand for the classroom teacher.
4. Gives a high-level view of the strengths and weaknesses of your tier one curriculum.

Choose highly validated screeners like those on the National Center of Intensive Intervention (NCII) Academic Screeners Tools Chart.

2. Easy-to-Use Progress Monitoring
Once you have identified which students need to receive additional support, it’s important to determine how you will track their progress.

Formal progress monitoring, such as CBM probes, are an effective way to determine if students are responding to the interventions. However, tracking rate of improvement can be a manual, time-consuming process. Again, the NCII Progress Monitoring Tools Chart is great for finding a valid and reliable tool.

Keep in mind, lengthy weekly tests take up valuable instructional time. Short probes (15 minutes or less) are effective and provide the data to determine what is and isn’t working with a student’s interventions. Automatic rate of improvement graphing will save you time and cumbersome manual tracking.

For example, Classworks automatically assigns short probes to students. You have a picture of skill retention and future progress in only three administrations with automated rate of improvement graphing. Learn more.

3. Meaningful Interventions
Data is valuable for determining who needs support and whether programs are working; however, the interventions impact student performance.
Impactful interventions have three key elements:

1. The intervention takes a different instructional approach than the core curriculum.  
2. The intervention is customized to meet every student where they are ready to learn.
3. The intervention is evidence-based and research-proven.

Moreover, interventions should be data-driven. For example, in Classworks, all student test data informs and adapts their learning path. Students are always working on the most relevant skills based on their most recent screener and progress monitoring test data.

Want more? Read our newest guide, 10 Steps for Effective Intervention.

About Classworks
Classworks is the solution to automatically identify gaps and deliver individualized lessons to each student that address missing skills. We’d love to show you how Classworks can help! Feel free to chat with us at the bottom right of your screen.