Just-in-Time Supports: Moving Beyond Remediation to Accelerate Learning

• Examine research on how to support learners furthest from opportunity

• Identify what just-in-time supports look like for grade-level content

Schedule:

5 minutes –     Settle in, take attendance, Intro question: Have you ever started watching a movie or TV show halfway through?  Under what circumstances could you catch up and understand what was going on, and what would necessitate you having to stop and start over from the beginning?

10-15 minutes –    Participants’ implementation share-out

3-5 minutes –     Transition into current module, connection between concepts: Think of a time when you were surprised by a class’s lack of prior knowledge concerning a particular topic or concept.  What did you do?  How did it go?  What, if anything, would have been different if you could have better anticipated the difficulty with the prerequisite content?    

10-20 minutes –     Workbook reflection:  

1. How often do you unexpectedly need to insert a whole group lesson for prerequisite content?  How do you adjust your calendar to accommodate these needs without sacrificing grade level content?  

2. The activity in part 2 asks you to determine the prerequisite skills needed for a particular task.  How often do you formally list these out for tasks you give in your class?  Did anything about the process of formally listing these out surprise you, like the number of necessary skills, the difficulty in explicitly naming them, or how much time it took to list them all out?

3. Were there any prompts in this section of the workbook that you wanted to discuss with the rest of the group? What about them were you looking to explore further?

20-30 minutes –     Application discussion prompts: 

1. What types of out of class support does your school/institution build into its structure to assist students who need more time with prerequisite content?  How can the support structures and the classroom ensure that they are on the same page concerning each of the students’ needs?

2. How does the culture of your school/institution encourage communication between teachers to share data regarding students’ critical knowledge from prior grades?  In what ways could this be improved? 

5-10 minutes -     Wrap up: Each individual brainstorms "What can you do between now and our next meeting to incorporate or emphasize this topic more in your classroom?" and a few participants volunteer for the next session’s implementation share-out