A SUPER SIMPLE INTERVENTION

I was lucky enough to attend the Ohio Kindergarten conference in Columbus, Ohio January 13th and 14th.  I was star struck to get to meet big named bloggers like Deanna Jump and DeeDee Wills.  I came back with a ton of great information that I am excited to try out.

Those of you who have followed me for awhile know that I am not a kindergarten teacher but I am an interventionist that works with kinders.  I firmly believe that early intervention is KEY in preventing academic difficulties in at risk students.

At the conference, I was also fortunate enough to get to hear Shannon Samulski speak who has a background in special education.  She has a blog called Interventions on the Go if you would like to check it out.  For her blog post about "Sandwiching" Information click here. 

Do you have that student who you could do everything even stand on your head and the information just does not ever seem to go into the student long term memory?  If you have ever had this happen to you then you will understand why I found the following information PROFOUND.  It is so simple.  Why did I not think of it???

Surround the brain with KNOWN information and it will help the UNKNOWN information STICK. 

As my teenager would say, "I know, right?"  It is so simple and makes total sense.

Are you ready for it?? It gets even simpler.  All you need are ten cards and a metal ring and you are ready to get started with this intervention.

1.  Assess the student to determine known and unknown information
2.  Write/type the known information on 7 of the cards and make sure that these cards have a symbol in the corner to show that this is KNOWN information.
3.  Then on the other three cards write/type three bits of information that you want your student to learn.
4.  Then hole punch and place on the ring using the following sequence: 
known known unknown known known unknown known known unknown known
5.  Once the unknown information becomes known either move the card to a known slot or remove it from the ring.

This intervention can be used for letters, sounds, shapes, colors, sight words, fry phrases, math facts, science concepts, social studies concepts, etc.  This intervention also has no age limit!!  It will work for kinders but it would also work for high school students.  The information being used would just be different.

Don't stress and think that every student in your class needs an intervention ring.  Only about 3-5 students from your class should need this intervention:)

I have a student in kinder that is struggling to retain her shapes, numbers, and sight words.  She does know 24/26 letters and sounds but still does not perform well on AIMS probes when she is timed.

Here are the cards I came up with for her intervention ring.  I am going to have a ring for sight words, one for shapes, and one for numbers. 

I put three stars on the concepts she still needs to learn so that we can color them in as she demonstrates she has retained it. 

I put a smiley face on the concepts she already knows.

I can't wait to get started using this intervention next week!  Just in case you want to try this super simple intervention yourself, I created a little something to get you started! An editable template so you can add your own concepts!!

Enjoy, friends!

If you would like a hard copy explanation about this researched based click here.
(**this was not created by me.  I located it on the internet.)