It’s a familiar scene. A young student is struggling, but can’t get caught up. They sit in Reading class, and there’s a knock at the door. It’s the interventionist, pulling them out of class for some one-on-one phonics practice. All of the students turn to look as the student gets up from their desk and walks out of the room.

Some time later, they return. All of the other kids are now reading silently, as they’ve just finished a new lesson. Imagining yourself as that student, how do you feel? Likely embarrassed, frustrated, and feeling like you will never be able to catch up.

With good intention, this is how intervention may look in your school, or schools you’ve been at in the past. This is the experience observed by Stephanie McConnell when she led an elementary school in Texas.

And her intentions were good. She knew that school wasn’t one-size-fits all, she knew that she needed to provide intervention. But the common approaches to intervention were just not working.

Young student heads out the classroom door for an intervention.

How Common Interventions Can Widen Learning Gaps

Let’s briefly talk about a couple of the systems she tried, and why they didn’t work. Maybe you can identify with them, and see why something different may be in order.

Before or After School Help Sessions

Offering help for students before or after school may seem like the easiest solution. But, not every student is able to be at school early or stay late. Many students, often the ones who need support the most, rely on buses to get to school and get home. They may also have responsibilities outside of school, or extracurriculars, that make it impossible to get help at these times.

Added to that, this puts pressure on teachers to arrive even earlier or stay later, often outside of their contract hours. Both teachers and students will likely be tired for these types of interventions.

Tired student sits on the school bus looking out the window.

‘Pull-Out’ Interventions

The next conclusion a school may come to is that interventions need to happen during the day. So, the students who need it most are identified, and assigned to an interventionist or a special service. Students are then pulled out of class to receive that intensive support.

But what is wrong with this picture? The reasons were defined in our intro; students miss important instructional time, falling even further behind grade level, and they are singled out, feeling labelled as a low-performer.

The end result with both of these interventions? Gaps are widened, not closed. So what can help?

Making Time for What Students Need

It’s true that students need time for extra help during the school day. But instead of pulling them out of core classes, create a designated time for ALL students to get what they need.

This time period is often referred to as WIN, or What I Need Time. WIN Time is its own period, separated from instructional time. It occurs at the same time of day for all students.

But what if students don’t need intervention, you may ask? WIN Time isn’t just about intervention. It’s also a great opportunity to provide enrichment. All students can benefit from access to both extra help, and opportunities to pursue a creative project or extend their learning.

WIN Time can be used to support students who need any tier level of intervention. And the best part is that this is in addition to Tier 1 instruction. This allows students to access grade level instruction, and scaffold on top of that.

How do we schedule WIN Time?

At the K-5 level, adding WIN Time to the schedule means adjusting your current master schedule. This could be slightly extending the day, or taking just a few minutes from each class to create a separate WIN class.

While this may raise concerns about missed instructional time, the important thing to remember is that WIN Time ensures that students get the time they need. If a student already ‘gets it’, they don’t need those extra few minutes. For a student who is struggling, they now have a a dedicated chunk of time to get support.

In elementary and early middle schools, this also creates an opportunity for teachers to share students, and create a more collaborative school culture. It teaches students from an early age that they can get the help they need, which will give them increased confidence as they head into secondary school.

To learn more about what WIN Time looks like at a secondary level, check out this article.

Student stands confidently looking out over the mountains.

Intervention That Works

Want to hear more about this topic, and get support for implementing WIN Time at your school?

Stephanie McConnell, mentioned previously, was recently a guest on the Reimagining Time podcast. She talks all about the journey of WIN Time at her school, why it’s been the way to intervention success, how to overcome challenges, and the amazing benefits.

You can listen to her episode, or watch this exclusive video content from the interview.