Free Math Intervention Strategies

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If your students are still counting from one instead of counting on, this video is for you.

We walk through exactly how to move struggling learners — and your high flyers — toward the counting on strategy for addition. Whether you're working in a Tier 1 classroom, pulling a small Tier 2 group, or doing intensive Tier 3 intervention, these techniques are designed to be scaffolded to meet any learner where they are — within an RTI or MTSS framework.

Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program 

Practice with Games: Reinforce counting on with our Counting & Number Line Games 

Still seeing students count every single object from one? This video shows you exactly how to break that habit.

We walk through how to teach the counting on strategy — guiding students to start from the larger addend instead of counting all over again from one. It's one of the highest-leverage shifts you can make for early addition, and we show you how to make it stick even for your most struggling learners.

Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program 

Practice with Games: Reinforce counting on with our Addition & Subtraction Games 

Make Ten is one of the most powerful addition strategies you can teach — and most students are ready for it in first grade.

This video walks you through exactly how to teach it: starting with hands-on materials your students can touch and manipulate, then gradually moving toward mental computation. Along the way, students build the number decomposition skills they need to compose a ten and build from it confidently — a foundational piece of base ten thinking that pays off for years. Works for Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3 — and we show you how to adjust it for each.

Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program 

Practice with Games: Reinforce Make Ten with our Addition & Subtraction Games  and Part-Part-Whole Games 

 If your students are stuck on basic addition facts within 20, the Doubles Strategy is one of the fastest ways to get them unstuck.

Instead of counting up from one, students learn to decompose one number to make a double with the other — so 9 + 8 becomes 8 + 8 plus one more. It's a mental shortcut that clicks quickly, especially when introduced with a twenty frame as a visual anchor. We walk you through the hands-on introduction phase step by step — because when students can touch and see the strategy first, it transfers to mental math much faster.

Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program 

Practice with Games: Reinforce doubles with our Addition & Subtraction Games →

Before you teach the standard algorithm for addition, teach this.

The Splitting Strategy bridges place value understanding and addition skills — making it one of the most natural next steps in a student's math progression. Instead of jumping straight to the formal algorithm, students learn to split numbers by place value and recombine them, building the kind of number sense that makes the algorithm actually make sense when they get there. It works across Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3 within both RTI and MTSS frameworks.

Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program 

Practice with Games: Reinforce splitting and place value with our Place Value Games and Addition & Subtraction Games 

 The Jumping Strategy turns a number line into one of the most powerful tools in your intervention toolkit.

Before students are ready for this strategy, they need a basic understanding of place value and split counting — so if you've been teaching those foundations, this is the natural next step. Once they're ready, the number line gives them a concrete, visual way to jump through numbers in chunks rather than counting one by one. It's a strategy that builds real number sense — the kind that sticks.

Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program  

Practice with Games: Reinforce jumping and number line skills with our Counting & Number Line Games  and Addition & Subtraction Games.

The Splitting Strategy is one of the most effective bridges between place value understanding and the formal subtraction algorithm. Rather than jumping straight to column-by-column subtraction, students learn to decompose numbers by place value — separating hundreds, tens, and ones — and subtract each part separately before recombining. This approach makes the regrouping process visible and meaningful rather than procedural and mysterious. Students who understand why they are breaking apart a ten are far better prepared to apply the standard algorithm accurately and independently. Research consistently supports teaching mental math strategies like splitting before or alongside the formal algorithm to build genuine conceptual understanding.

Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program 

 Practice with Games: Reinforce splitting with our Place Value Games  and Addition & Subtraction Games.

 The Jumping Strategy uses a number line to make subtraction visible and spatial. Rather than removing objects or counting backward from a written number, students hop backward along the number line in jumps of tens and ones — keeping the number whole and reasoning about distance rather than digits. This is particularly powerful for subtraction with regrouping because students can see the relationship between the minuend and subtrahend rather than wrestling with borrowing procedures they don't understand. Students need a foundational understanding of place value and split counting before this strategy is introduced — if those foundations are in place, the number line gives them a concrete and reliable tool they can use independently.

Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program 

Practice with Games: Reinforce number line jumping with our Counting & Number Line Games  and Addition & Subtraction Games 

(Teacher Video) This video explores multiple instructional approaches for teaching part-whole relationships through the benchmark number of 5. We walk through hands-on methods designed to help students deeply understand how numbers can be broken apart and put back together within five — the foundational structure behind early addition, subtraction, and algebraic thinking.

→ Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program 

Practice with Games: Reinforce part-whole reasoning with our Part-Part-Whole Games

(Student Video) The Part-Part-Whole relationship illuminates how any number can be broken into smaller parts — and how those parts relate back to the whole. By learning to work within the benchmark of 5, students build the kind of number sense that supports early addition, subtraction, and the connection between the two operations. Understanding how parts compose a whole is one of the clearest on-ramps to algebraic thinking in the early grades.

Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program 

Practice with Games: Reinforce Make 5 with our Part-Part-Whole Games 

(Teacher Video) This instructional video walks through different methods and strategies for teaching the part-whole relationship using the benchmark number of 10. The benchmark of 10 is the cornerstone of our base-ten number system — students who understand how numbers compose and decompose around 10 are better equipped for addition facts, place value, and mental computation strategies at every grade level.

Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program  

Practice with Games: Reinforce Make 10 with our Part-Part-Whole Games → and Addition & Subtraction Games →

 (Student Video) This video helps students see how any number can be broken into two parts that together make 10 — one of the most important number relationships in early math. Understanding part-whole relationships around 10 lays the groundwork for mental math, addition strategies, and the kind of flexible number thinking students need throughout their math education.

Intervention Program: This strategy is part of the Primary Numeracy Intervention Program 

Practice with Games: Reinforce Make 10 with our Part-Part-Whole Games → and Addition & Subtraction Games →