CS1 programming courses often exhibit low academic performance. One way to address this issue is by implementing early interventions for students. In higher education, various theories have contributed to the topic of intervention, one of which is Vygotsky’s zone of proximal development. However, there is no consensus in the results, and more studies are needed to evaluate early interventions in CS1 courses. The objective of this research is to examine the effect of an early intervention on students’ academic performance in a CS1 course. The study involved 49 students from a Logic Programming course, with 24 in the experimental group and 25 in the control group. Two stages of the zone of proximal development were used, including group tutoring and the development of a programming reinforcement workshop. Additionally, the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) was used to identify the learning and motivation strategies employed by students in a CS1 programming course. The quantitative results of the experimental group show a positive correlation between the percentage of attendance at group tutoring sessions and the student’s final grade. Furthermore, a positive correlation was identified between the percentage of submitted reinforcement exercises and the student’s final grade. In the control group, significant improvements were identified in four subscales of the selected learning and motivation strategies questionnaire, even though no intervention strategy was applied.