Editor’s note: This is the second in a series of posts from guest blogger Jeff Hartman on the Common Mistakes made in Math Intervention
Mistake #2: Not Differentiating Enough
In an effort to deal with classes that have many students at varying functional grade levels, some instructors will choose to group students by level to better focus small group instruction. But grouping only by functional level doesn’t necessarily put students with the same needs together. Even if all the students in a group are operating at the same level, they very probably have different skill gaps and need a study plan that is precisely mapped to their individual needs, otherwise some of the students in the group will be spending time on lessons that do not correspond to their needs. For intervention to be most effective, instruction needs to be precisely tied to a student’s demonstrated skill gaps, and material that a student doesn’t need to learn should be removed from their study plan.