August 1, 2025 • 52 mins
Episode 232
We know MTSS can feel like one more acronym and maybe one more thing on your plate. But what if it was the thing that helped everything else run more smoothly instead?
In this episode, we chat with Stephanie Stollar and Sarah Brown, authors of MTSS for Reading Improvement, who help us rethink what strong systems of support actually look like. Together, we explore how to move beyond one-off interventions and start building aligned, school-wide systems that support every reader.
You’ll hear:
- The difference between MTSS and intervention
- Why Tier 1 instruction is your most powerful lever for change
- What it looks like to work within your reality, not around it
- How class-wide supports and smart teaming can lead to huge growth
- Ways teachers (even without formal leadership roles) can spark change
RESOURCES
- MTSS for Reading Improvement by Stephanie Stollar and Sarah Brown
- Reading Science Academy with Stephanie Stollar
- MTSS Data Academy with Sarah Brown
- Schoolwide Reading MTSS Collaborative
- The Reading League Book Study for MTSS for Reading Improvement (You can still sign up for recordings!)
We answer your questions about teaching reading in The Literacy 50-A Q&A Handbook for Teachers: Real-World Answers to Questions About Reading That Keep You Up at Night.
Grab free resources and episode alerts! Sign up for our email list at literacypodcast.com.
Join our community on Facebook, and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, & Twitter.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Melissa (00:01):
If you're like us, you've wondered what strong
systems of support actually looklike in practice.
Schools need efficient, alignedsystems that support all
learners and lead to real growth.
But how do Tier 1 instructionand Tier 2 and Tier 3
interventions all work?
Lori (00:18):
together.
In this episode, stephanieStoller and Sarah Brown, authors
of MTSS for Reading Improvement, help to break it all down.
They'll clear up commonmisconceptions about MTSS, share
success stories and offerpractical tips to help your
systems run smoothly so you canstart seeing the growth you've
(00:39):
been working toward.
Hi teacher friends.
I'm Lori and I'm Melissa.
We are two educators who wantthe best for all kids, and we
know you do too.
Melissa (00:52):
We worked together in Baltimore when the district
adopted a new literacycurriculum.
Lori (00:57):
We realized there was so much more to learn about how to
teach reading and writing.
Melissa (01:02):
Lori, and I can't wait to keep learning with you today
how to teach reading and writing.
Lori, and I can't wait to keeplearning with you today.
Hi everyone, stephanie, we areso excited to have you back on
the podcast and you brought afriend and your co author today.
Sarah, we are so excited totalk to you both today.
All about MTSS.
Stephanie Stollar (01:22):
Thank you both so much for inviting us.
Lori (01:24):
Thank you, Of course.
Well, let's jump right in.
I would love to just ground ourlisteners and ground this
conversation in what we meanwhen we say systems level
support.
Right, we're talking about MTSS, multi-tiered systems of
support.
What do systems level supportor what do?
(01:46):
What does systems level supportmean?
Sarah Brown (01:50):
So imagine that we heard about an accident, a car
accident at an intersection inour town.
Right, we could ask questionsabout.
The first things that might popto our mind are oh, was the
driver distracted?
Was somebody else rightillegally in the intersection,
like what happened?
Right, we could ask questionslike that.
We could also take a step backand ask some questions from a
(02:14):
system perspective and we couldsay you know how many accidents
have been at this intersectionthis year?
How does that compare to otherintersections in our town with
similar traffic patterns?
And that's really what we'retalking about when we talk about
in this book, taking a systemlevel perspective.
(02:34):
So the individual questionsabout individual students and
how they're doing and how theirprograms are working, what they
need next, are really importantto have.
But to get school-widesustained improvement, we also
need to really be honing in onsome of those larger picture
questions that are going to tellus overall what our system
(02:55):
needs to support educatorsbetter, to help all learners be
successful readers.
Stephanie Stollar (03:01):
Yeah, I think it's those systems of support
that need to circle around theclassroom teacher and his or her
students.
So you think about the thingslike the daily schedule, things
like how others in the schoolsupport the classroom teacher.
(03:23):
You think about things liketime to plan and meet together
in teams, things likeinstructional materials, things
like materials and processesaround intervention that
teachers can access for theirstudents, the interaction
between special education andgeneral education or
(03:44):
multilingual support and generaleducation.
So those are some examples ofsome of the systems of support
that surround that classroom.
So, as Sarah said, we're sortof zooming out and not expecting
teachers to manage the successof their students on their own,
but to think about thatclassroom as nested within these
(04:07):
interacting systems within theschool environment.
And so we want to get people tothink about and talk about how
are the ways that they're doingbusiness in those systems
impacting that individualstudent learning and how do we
take an approach that's not justfocused on one student at a
time, but zoom out and get oursystems lined up in place for
(04:32):
every student to be successful.
Melissa (04:34):
That is really helpful.
And my next question for you isabout the difference between
MTSS and intervention, and Ifeel like they're often used
synonymously.
Right, they're the same thing.
Mtss is intervention.
But even just what you justshared in that little bit, I'm
thinking that MTSS is thisbigger picture zoomed out.
More than intervention might beincluded in that, but it's even
(04:57):
more than that.
Am I on the right track?
Stephanie Stollar (05:00):
Yes, that's exactly right.
So some people use response tointervention or RTI and MTSS
interchangeably, but we sort ofthink about response to
intervention cases as a set offorms, a set of meetings, a set
(05:28):
of procedures for movingstudents through tiers of
intervention.
And you can't actually do thatunless you have all of these
other aspects of your schoolsystem functioning correctly,
effectively aligned with eachother and aligned with the
(05:48):
research and what students need.
So yes, you hit it right on themoney.
Sarah Brown (05:54):
You'll see the different components key
components of an MTSS frameworkas different things, but we
think of them as things like thetargeted interventions at every
tier of support, right, so itmight be tier one interventions
as well as those interventionsthat you mentioned.
Part of it is collaboration andteaming and leadership around
(06:14):
that.
Part of it is the assessmentsthat we have that help us answer
the question and address ourneeds, where we have them at the
right time, and how we'remaking decisions using those
interventions, and so there aredifferent pieces.
How they look in each schoolwill be different, which is
sometimes the tricky part, right, but but it's also, I think,
(06:35):
part of the beauty in an.
MTSS is that it can lookdifferently depending on your
system and your resources.
But but how?
But those components are thereevery time.
I my hobby is girls trips and Ioften say, like the framework
of a girls trip right, like it'sgoing to look different every
time.
But there's some things that wehave to do every time.
We have to decide where we'regoing to stay.
We have to decide how we'regoing to get there.
(06:56):
I personally have to decidewhere are we going to eat.
Those are my favorite parts,and so those we're always going
to have to.
We can't skip any of thosedecisions.
Those all have to be part of asuccessful girls trip, and the
same is true for an MTSS.
If you're going to see asuccessful MTSS, you have to
address each of these pieces ofthe framework, but how they look
in your school might bedifferent.
Lori (07:17):
Yeah, sarah, I think so much hits home for me there.
I love the analogy, that's funand also very true.
But that's that's, to me, thestuff that is very frustrating
to teachers.
Like I think, when we hear froma lot of teachers, the things
that they're frustrated with arenot necessarily the classroom
teaching right, like themajority of teachers that come
(07:38):
to me and Melissa askingquestions and I'm sure come to
you all I see you nodding Likethey love working with students,
like teachers love teaching,and I will say the same too.
You know, when I was in theclassroom, the part that was
frustrating was typically notthe teaching part.
It was all the other stuffsurrounding it that were broken
systems that were very, verytricky to work with, because
(08:03):
you're working within a brokensystem and then it broken system
and then broken systems don'tnecessarily function to the
highest quality.
So I'm thinking now we've kindof set this foundation and
understanding here of systemsand of MTSS versus intervention.
So we thought we would jumpinto some questions from
(08:24):
listeners, questions that we'rehearing from teachers every day.
Does that sound good to youboth?
Yes, all right, sounds great.
So we hear teachers asking thisquestion.
We've learned about the scienceof reading, but I'm not seeing
results translate into studentgrowth.
What do you suggest?
Stephanie Stollar (08:42):
Yeah.
So the part that is central toMTSS that we don't always see
schools doing is elevating thebarriers.
So for classroom teachers tosurface what's in their way and
for the rest of the educators inthe school and district to
understand that their role is tohelp eliminate those barriers
(09:04):
for the teacher to be successfulin their classroom.
So for us we use a specificdatabase decision-making
framework in our book thecollaborative improvement cycle.
That is the meat and potatoesof MTSS.
And again, it's something wedon't always see happening.
Even when schools or districtssay they're doing MTSS, they're
(09:31):
not getting together in thesecollaborative teams to use their
assessments in a structureddecision-making process.
So our book is really orientedto support people to make that
shift and lots of tools, meetingagendas, templates for having
those conversations.
There are often meetings inschools but people are not
(09:52):
talking about this and we wantto really direct people to
surfacing the barriers.
What would teachers say is intheir way?
Why are they not getting betterresults?
What's in their way, and thensystematically as a
collaborative group, writingaction plans to eliminate those
(10:13):
barriers.
We don't want the science ofreading to be these one-off
actions Like all we have to dois get some professional
development and then we're done,we're good to go.
All we have to do is adopt somenew program and then
everything's going to bedifferent.
That's what people areexperiencing is not happening
(10:34):
and from our experience we couldhave told you that would be the
case.
So we want people to have theright expectations that it's not
these simple actions.
You can't expect to continue tooperate in the same way in your
school and expect a differentoutcome.
Sarah Brown (10:51):
I think everything Stephanie said I agree with the
other another thing that I seelike in terms of why schools
aren't getting outcomes and andteachers, reading specialists
they're frustrated by that right, Like they've done the things.
They've invested a lot of timeand money in this work.
I see two things happeningregularly.
(11:12):
One is that teachers, we haven'tnecessarily connected the
learning that teachers have donethrough about science of
reading to their curricularmaterials, and so if you are an
expert, if you are listening topodcasts like this fantastic one
, right then you might bethinking about that and doing
that naturally on your own, butit takes work to do, and so how
(11:37):
are we as a system asStephanie's saying right
supporting teachers to be ableto do that?
The second thing that I see isthat we're still approaching
supporting students student bystudent, and so in schools where
we have large numbers ofstudents who need additional
support, who are at-risk readers, we're still trying to provide
all of them additionalintervention, when, in reality,
(12:01):
in order to get really largegains as a system, we also need
to look at what we're doing astier one, in terms of what I
would call tier one interventionintervention at that first
class, wide level in order toaccelerate overall learning.
So those are two commonbarriers that I see and I agree
with everything.
Stephanie said that I would usedata and conversations with
teachers to identify what arethe specific barriers in our
(12:23):
school and how do we do that.
Those are two common ones, Isee.
Melissa (12:26):
Yeah, that's great, and I'm also.
I'm thinking now, you know,another question we get a lot is
about, you know, I'm trying allthese things, I'm doing, we're
doing all these interventions,but the data isn't showing it
and or, like we try to, and likethe data even went down, like
there was a little dip in our inour data.
And I'm wondering.
(12:49):
Oftentimes, I feel like what wehear is people like, okay,
what's next?
Right, like we're going tothrow those things out and we
got to try a new thing.
But I'm wondering, like, whatshould people be doing
differently in terms of, likelooking at their data, if
they're not seeing the successthat they hoped for by
implementing these things thatthey thought were going to work?
Sarah Brown (13:01):
So the first thing I would say is stay the course.
If you're using something thatis evidence-based, then let your
data, and then theconversations around those data,
help you identify specificallywhat are the barriers to those
things being successful rightnow and how can we address those
barriers.
When you started by talkingabout intervention, I'll just
(13:22):
give a brief example from ourbook about how we would suggest
doing that.
So, instead of startingintervention conversations,
looking at student by studentand saying, ok, this student
didn't make enough progress,what do we need to change?
Ok, this student didn't makeenough progress.
What do we need to change?
Look at the intervention as awhole and say, ok, if there were
seven students getting thisintervention and five of them
(13:42):
didn't make enough progress, weactually need to talk about the
intervention itself, not aboutthese students.
Right, and figure out what thebarrier is.
Maybe the interventionist wasbeing pulled regularly to sub
and we just weren't gettingthrough an intervention.
Or maybe we can only meet acouple times a week for 15
minutes a day because we have somany students we're trying to
serve and we're really onlygetting through about a lesson a
(14:04):
week.
Right, I wouldn't expect reallygreat growth from that.
And so, thinking about andtaking a step back and looking
at what are our data and why arewe seeing success?
Most of the time there'ssomething related to
implementation or becauseschools are hard, complex places
, or dosage, like being able toget enough of that really good
(14:27):
stuff.
We're teaching that.
We see there are other thingstoo, but those are two really
common ones.
Lori (14:33):
And it's the reality of it , right, Sarah?
That's the real stuff.
Like you can put the stuff onpaper and the goals, but then in
reality it's like, oh, there'ssomebody out sick and we need to
pull this person for that, andthen we're not getting the
dosage that we thought we were.
And on paper it looks like this, but then reality says this and
there's a big gap.
So I'm so glad that you pointedthat out, because I feel like
(14:54):
that's the reality of everyteacher's life, right?
Stephanie Stollar (14:57):
And it's no one's fault.
No, I was just going to addthat in the book we try to help
people understand that thereality isn't going anywhere.
Your reality isn't going tochange.
You have to work within yourreality.
Oh, so good, so good.
Sometimes people throw up theirhands like we can't even do
(15:19):
MTSS in our school because ofour reality, and we want people
to understand.
This is the process ofcontinually revisiting your data
, revisiting your implementationand making adjustments and
improvements over time to get adifferent result.
So I think just being veryupfront about that is important.
Lori (15:43):
I think of it so much in terms of like the analogy of
like a health and fitness right.
If you're looking to add someexercise to your schedule and
you only have, you know you've30 minutes a day but you're not
doing any at this point.
You don't start with those full30 minutes, you start with five
or 10 and you build up fromthere and you get momentum and
(16:04):
you work within your reality andthen perhaps once you've got 30
going, you're like for a longwhile you're like, oh hey, I
actually could do a little bitmore, because my systems now
have shifted and now I, you know, or maybe 30 is good and maybe
I want to tackle something else.
So that's such a good point, towork within your reality and I
think that that's actually thething that is a big barrier,
(16:26):
that is the miss right.
Stephanie Stollar (16:28):
So if you're trying to adopt those healthy
behaviors, you would have someway of measuring Did you make
any progress?
You might have a coach.
You might have to adjust yourschedule.
You might buy some newequipment that helps you right
Like to accomplish that.
You might have some incentivesbuilt in to that or some
(16:49):
consequences built into that.
All of those supports will helpyou make that behavioral change
and everybody can relate tothat with some kind of you know
analogy, like some healthybehavior.
Same is true for changing theway we teach reading and our
reading outcomes in schools.
Lori (17:08):
Yeah, and such a good point, Like you know, say
there's a day where there's amiss, that doesn't mean that
then every day forward we'rejust like well, whatever it's
like, make a plan for failure,right, Because there will be
that failure there.
And how do we?
Sarah Brown (17:21):
create the culture where it's okay to say I planned
on 30 minutes a day for thisbut it's really not happening.
And I have this group and I'mreally trying to get them some
extra practice in readingconnected texts and I'm and I'm
just not getting to it, or, oryou know, it doesn't seem like
they're ready for these books orwhatever it is Like.
(17:43):
We need to create a culturewhere we feel confident to say
I'm winning right, like here aremy wins, but also that we feel
confident saying like here arethe things that are that are
hard for me right now and I needI need help.
Lori (17:55):
Okay.
So for me right now and I needhelp, okay.
So, along those lines, I thinkthis is kind of a difficult
question I'm going to ask youbut we get this question and I'm
sure you do too how do leaders,how do you recommend leaders
respond when people in thesystem are not doing what they
said they would do or what theyagreed to do?
(18:16):
You know, I know there's thosemeetings that happen and it's
like we're going to invigorateeveryone to do this, and then,
you know, people are like, oh mygosh, yet again there's this
other thing that's happening andI really want to do this.
So I guess, how can we besupportive of teachers and
support staff who, like, mightbe the only ones who see a path
(18:39):
forward?
Right, there's maybe there,there's a teacher listening
who's like I am one of the onlyones doing what I said I would
do, and then there are teachersaround me who perhaps aren't.
And I think this is trickybecause we say no or yes to
things for a variety of reasons.
So I just want to say that,like, not there's no shame in
this question, just it's anhonest question.
(19:00):
So how do we respond as leadersand how can we support teachers
to who are out here listeningLike I'm one of those yes people
and I'm I'm on board, butthere's other people around me
who perhaps aren't.
Sarah Brown (19:13):
As a leader, the first thing to think about is is
this the same way we would withstudents?
Is it a student issue or asystem issue?
The same thing I'll ask aboutimplementation of change.
Is it one or two teachers whoare struggling to implement or
is it most?
Teachers need right and when wethink about doing new things
(19:38):
like I'm just going to go backto, like motivation theory,
right, expectancy, value andcost.
So do our teachers expect thatthey will be successful if they
implement and make these changes?
And there's lots of reasons wecan expect that it might not be
successful.
Maybe I'm not confident withthe skills or the materials that
I have, or the time that I haveto teach it in, or the student
needs in my class.
(19:59):
Maybe I don't expect it becauseI haven't ever actually seen it
be successful.
I've never actually seenstudents who started the year at
risk grow enough not to be atrisk right.
So that's the expectancy.
Value is how valuable is thisto me to do so?
Like is it worth my effort?
And then cost is what am Igiving up?
And I think thinking about allof those things as a leader is
(20:21):
important to consider.
Okay, if we've identified thatthis is a system level issue in
our building, then I need toidentify what are the reasons
that teachers aren't able totalk to teachers and listen to
them and then build the supportsand give them what they need in
order to be able to supportstudents.
Stephanie Stollar (20:41):
Yeah, I agree with that.
I think the leaders have to setthe vision and they have to
stay the course.
They have to have a way to geteverybody on board with the
urgency for change, and justabout every school in our
country has that urgency becauseso many students are struggling
(21:04):
readers or at-risk readers.
So, setting the expectation,setting a vision for change,
creating a plan that people havehad input in so that they're
going to buy into it it's notsomething that's put upon them
from the outside or from the top.
So giving teachers and alleducators a voice into what is
(21:26):
the plan, but then reallysticking to it and the
administrator not changingcourse when people are
disgruntled or unhappy orpushing back or not doing what
everybody agreed to do, butrecognize, as Sarah said, that
that just is.
It means the conditions aroundthose folks are not such that
they are supported to do thething, for whatever reason.
(21:48):
So, as Sarah said, ask them whythey're not doing it.
Ask them what they need to doit, what they need to do it.
Don't let them just cycle andcomplaining and, you know,
spinning their wheels, butremind them that this is what we
all agreed that we were goingto do.
But how can I support you to doit, because it seems to be a
(22:11):
struggle for you for whateverreason.
So those are the kinds ofconversations I've found to be
most helpful, because change ishard and, as we've already said,
changing people's behaviorabout teaching reading is not
any easier than any otherbehavior change.
So we shouldn't expect thatjust because we have a new
(22:33):
district policy, everybody'sgoing to jump on board gleefully
doing all the new things andknow what they should stop doing
so that they can start doingthe new things.
Like we just have to get ourexpectations lined up and
realistic.
Melissa (22:49):
I really love that idea of just you know, asking
teachers and listening to thewhy, Because, like Lori said
earlier, I mean, teachers wantto do a good job.
No, no one shows up at theirjob every day and says like I'm
just don't want to do it right,If they're not doing a thing,
it's because there's definitelyprobably a reason behind the why
they're not doing it.
So to hear it instead of, Imean, I feel like what happens
(23:11):
usually is people just say likethey like, say it louder, like
you have to do this thing andlike that's not going to work,
Just telling me more and morethat I have to do this isn't
helping.
The whatever it is that'sgetting in the way of me
actually being able to do it.
Whether it's time or people orresources, something's probably
getting in the way.
Stephanie Stollar (23:30):
That's the purpose of those collaborative
teams and, using thecollaborative improvement cycle,
that is the venue for people tospeak up and for the ask of why
are you not doing the thingthat we plan?
And for the additional supportsto be put around those teachers
.
Melissa (23:48):
And I'm so curious about.
I know most of our listenersare teachers and I'm wondering
you know this sounds likeleaders have a huge role in
making this work, but if you'rea teacher in a place where you
want this to be going well,right, you want the systems to
be going well, but they're not.
Do you have any advice forteachers about how they can, you
(24:09):
know, maybe step up or talk totheir leaders or do do something
within a place where it's notworking well?
Stephanie Stollar (24:16):
Yeah, we wrote the first section of the
book, the first three chapters,for school leaders who maybe
haven't had the sameopportunities to learn about the
science of reading or learnabout MTSS.
So that's a resource thatteachers can point their school
leaders to.
In my experience, what's workedwell for teachers to sort of
(24:40):
light, a spark for change intheir system is two things Find
a buddy so that it's not justyou, because when you feel like
you're the lone ranger who'strying to make this change, it's
very lonely and it feels verydiscouraging.
So find somebody else who'slike, minded, who's interested
in in facilitating this change,and then find out what your
(25:05):
school leader is interested in.
So again, asking leaders tochange is not any easier than
asking teachers to change.
So you have to understand itfrom their perspective.
One of the things that happenswhen teachers learn about the
science of reading is they geton fire, like.
I've seen this over and overand over again.
They have learned a bunch theyknow more in some cases than
(25:28):
their building administratorsand district administrators
about the science of reading andthey get so excited about it
and then they sort of bulldozeover people.
They want them to know all thethings at once and they want to
implement all the things at thesame time and that doesn't work
because that's threatening tothe school leaders in many cases
(25:50):
, because it points out, maybe,the gaps in their knowledge and
it's putting a lot of change infront of them that they might
not be comfortable to lead.
So, recognizing what is it thatthe school leader is already
setting for themselves as a goal?
So all building principals have, like reading, achievement
(26:11):
goals.
Every district administratorhas some kind of literacy
improvement goal.
District administrator has somekind of literacy improvement
goal.
Many states are putting thesekinds of accountability
frameworks on schools anddistricts.
So if you can find a way toconnect the change that you'd
like to see in your school tothe existing goals that your
(26:35):
school leaders are alreadytrying to accomplish, then you
will not be this annoying,overbearing, threatening force
in the school.
You will be seen as the personwho is trying to help that
leader meet their existing goals.
So maybe that soundsmanipulative.
I don't look at it that way.
(26:56):
I think it's just human naturethat every educator is busy and
potentially overwhelmed.
You don't want to contribute tothat with your enthusiasm about
the science of reading.
You want to become the personwho is a trusted, knowledgeable
partner who can sort of comealongside those leaders.
Lori (27:19):
That's so smart.
I hear you saying too that likeMTSS is very efficient and will
be helpful at all levels, right, so if I'm a teacher, I'm
looking to help.
I'm going to just zoom in onwhat my administrator, what my
district leader they're alreadyfocusing on so smart.
So when I think aboutefficiency, I also think about
(27:39):
classroom teachers listening anddoing this work, and they might
be feeling overwhelmed.
So how can teachers do thiswork so it's like the most
efficient and not overwhelmingto them?
So maybe, like, let's elevatethat triangle of efficiency here
.
Sarah Brown (27:58):
Yeah, a couple ideas.
So one is I would, I would leanon, lean on a collaborative
network, right.
So it might be like, likeStephanie said, right, your
buddy who's kind of working likeyou're doing this with, but
also your grade level team,assuming you have right that or
kind of cross grade level teamif you're at a single section
school and and really be usingso we provide agendas and data
(28:19):
protocols in the book.
I think that takes a lot of thekind of prep work out of those
conversations, right, if I'musing universal screening data
three times a year and I'mrunning every day to plan and do
things I don't necessarily beknowing you know, which report
am I supposed to pull up?
What questions do I want to askas I look at these screening
(28:42):
data, right, what that lookslike, and so we've tried to help
teams by providing some of thatto make it a little bit more
doable.
And then for the day-to-day, Iwould be like using that
collaborative network that Ihave.
I find in most schools that Igo to around the country that
teams are really used to talkingabout standards and what
(29:03):
they're going to teach, but lessused to having conversations
about how they teach and thenlike day to day what that's
going to look like and that canbe a huge support to teachers to
make their planning moreefficient, to make their
outcomes more effective, whenthey're able to have those types
of conversations within theirgrade level team or their PLC.
Stephanie Stollar (29:26):
One of the great efficiencies in the MTSS
model is the fact that we zoomout and don't just look at
individual students.
So I would encourage teachersto adopt that perspective and,
rather than looking at theirscreening data to identify the
individuals who are struggling,to look for the patterns.
So what percentage of studentsin your class are struggling to
(29:51):
read text for meaning?
What percentage are strugglingwith basic decoding or phonemic
awareness?
So look for those trends andpatterns and then approach the
magnitude of that problem eitherwith a class-wide strategy or
with grouping students who havethe same concern.
(30:12):
You know, in many of the old RTIapplications, teachers would
look at screening data and thenmake a referral for intervention
for every individual studentRight, and that is surely
overwhelming.
It's overwhelming to theteacher, it's overwhelming to
the intervention system.
(30:33):
So the alternative to that thatwe really elevate in MTSS is
does anybody else score in thissame way?
And again, look in yourclassroom.
But also, if you have a partnerfirst grade teacher or a grade
level team, ask during thatmeeting hey, you know, I've got
two kids who are reallystruggling to read text
(30:54):
accurately and fluently.
Does anybody else have kids whoare struggling with that?
Right?
And so then take that ontogether, rather than each
individual teacher thinking thatthey have to support individual
students.
Look for the opportunities tobuild in those class-wide
routines and approaches toinstruction when you see
(31:17):
patterns and multiple studentswho have the same need.
Melissa (31:21):
Yeah, and this comes back to what I talked about,
mtss and intervention often get,you know, put in the same
bucket, whereas and I thinkoftentimes we don't think of
what do you do for tier one inthis right and you guys
mentioned that this interventionand differentiation can happen
in tier one right you don't haveto wait until tier two and tier
three and have it all happenthere Because, like you said,
(31:43):
that's just too many students todo all that work.
It's too overwhelming and notefficient in any way.
Stephanie Stollar (31:51):
The best approach is to consider tier one
instruction first.
It's the place where studentsspend most of their reading
instructional minutes andactually its job in MTSS is to
reduce the number of studentswho need intervention.
That is like the stated role oftier one reading instruction,
so we don't have enoughconversations about that.
Sarah Brown (32:16):
And I've seen schools in one year's time get
incredible growth 30% of studentlike, increase in percent of
students who meet targetbenchmarks in one year by
implementing class-wideintervention.
It's an evidence-based strategy.
That's amazing.
Melissa (32:34):
Easily, but yeah, yeah, closing gaps between student
groups and so much easier thangetting more interventionists
and more people to supportoutside.
I mean, you're doing it rightthere in your actual instruction
not only easier, but itactually works better.
Yeah, it's like a double bonus,yeah, so you?
(32:57):
So you all talked about I mean,we're talking about efficiency
here, but I know another thingthat you all brought up was this
idea of prevention.
So how, how would a school, ifthey're focusing on prevention
instead of you, know whathappens?
I taught this and it didn'twork.
Now, what do I do?
How does that look different ifthey're going in with this like
lens of prevention instead ofwhat's?
(33:18):
What's a word I'm looking forhere?
Not prevention, butintervention, intervention,
reaction.
Lori (33:23):
Yeah, um how did proactive versus a reactive?
There you go.
Melissa (33:27):
I think you're getting it exactly so how does this
proactive prevention um lenslook different for schools?
Sarah Brown (33:35):
yeah.
So a lot of it is in thequestions that we ask.
I mean, that's some of the mostimportant things that we do are
the road that we go down.
The path that we go down isgoing to be different depending
on the questions we ask.
When I talked about I give thatanalogy right of an accident.
If I'm asking questions abouthow that accident happened that
time, that's what I'm going toreact to.
(33:55):
If I ask questions about theintersection as a whole, it's
going to take us down adifferent road.
So I think that's a big piece ofit is asking some questions
about how, if it's kindergartenin the fall, I want to compare,
I want to get those screeningdata right away, right, and then
I want to compare how thiskindergarten class's patterns
(34:18):
look compared to our previousyears, because that's going to
tell me how intensive our tierone instruction needs to be in
order to help students besuccessful and make the most
growth in kindergarten aspossible.
And so a lot of it is theperspective that we take and the
questions that we ask.
I mean, universal screening isa preventative practice in and
(34:39):
of itself.
I don't see schools makedramatic improvements in reading
outcomes without havinguniversal screening in place, so
not only having it.
A place to start would be, ifyou have universal screening
data, seeing how you're using itright.
Like a number of schools that Iwork with have had these data
for years and they haven'treally had the resources, the
(35:01):
protocols, the conversations toreally take action with those
data in a proactive manner.
Stephanie Stollar (35:07):
So asking the question after universal
screening, how many students areat risk, how many students
scored low on screening?
How many students scored low onscreening?
That's the key for me tofocusing on prevention.
So making sure that that's thefirst question, not which
students are at risk, but howmany students are at risk or
(35:28):
struggling readers.
Other actions that lean towardsprevention would be things like
putting resources intokindergarten and first grade,
putting resources into pre-K.
Not putting all of yourresources into the testing
grades, third grade and aboveright.
Another action would be notwaiting until students are
(35:53):
behind.
So this can be enacted inthings like not making students
go through tier one, tier two,tier three to get intensive
support so noticing in the datawhen students might need very
intensive support from the verybeginning, even from the
beginning of kindergarten, fromthe beginning of kindergarten,
(36:15):
and not making kids, you know,fail before they get intensive
support.
Not waiting to take action.
Sometimes kindergarten teachersare reluctant.
Well, this is their firstschool experience.
I shouldn't, you know, doanything, maybe I shouldn't even
screen until the middle ofkindergarten, and I disagree
(36:38):
with that.
I think that kind of thinkingis from that old approach of
something outside of theclassroom in an intervention
framework is going to happen asa result of the screening, and
so we're asking folks to shifttheir thinking there and use the
screening data even at thebeginning of kindergarten to
(36:58):
take action through classroomreading instruction first and
foremost, and to not wait andsee.
That's what got us in troublein the past, because we know
that reading is not just goingto magically emerge from
students.
We have to take an active rolein guaranteeing that literacy
(37:18):
for all of our students.
So acting early, acting inkindergarten and early in every
single grade.
Melissa (37:25):
And Stephanie, you're not saying that.
You know we should be pushingour kindergartners to be able to
read early fall, but what I'mhearing you say is we're
screening them for things likeletter names, letter sounds, you
sounds, phonemic awareness,things like that that are really
going to help them when they'relearning to read.
Stephanie Stollar (37:45):
Yes, we're screening on those things
because they are predictive ofreading comprehension, right,
like they are the age or gradeappropriate indicators of the
student being on track or not ontrack, and we should pay
attention to that.
It's the reason to spend all ofthat time doing universal
screening so that we don't justsay, oh sorry, you're not
(38:06):
predicted to be okay, I'm sorryfor your luck, you know.
But that we actually act onthat information with age and
grade appropriate instruction,not pushing the curriculum, you
know, ever downward, earlier andearlier, but supporting them
with lots of language and thenlots of print as well.
Sarah Brown (38:28):
So, for example, if we saw in kindergarten in the
fall that we had a large numberof students who didn't have the
phonemic awareness skills thatthey should have at the
beginning of kindergarten, right, they were identified as at
risk.
I'm not looking to label thosestudents.
I'm not saying all of thesestudents need to be pulled out
from the classroom for readinginstruction, right, and let's
(38:48):
make some referrals for specialeducation evaluations Absolutely
not.
We're asking about the systemright now of kindergarten
instruction.
And so what I'm going to say isoh, this year I'm not going to
do the same intensity ofphonemic awareness practice that
we did last year.
I'm actually going to add insome more.
So when we're walking in thehallways, when we're standing at
the, you know like, maybe I didit once or twice a week before
(39:10):
and we were standing waiting forthe bat, Now we're going to do
it every single time, right.
And so it's telling me, as ateacher and the grade level
really, what do our studentsneed this year in order to grow
enough to be on track at the endof this year?
But nobody's looking to make,nobody wants to make
kindergartners or kindergartenteachers cry Like that's not the
(39:32):
goal, that's not, that's neverthe goal.
Lori (39:35):
And so much of what you're both talking about is going to
come out later this month too.
We have a kindergarteninterventionist, I guess SLP,
who talks a lot about this ideaof proactive kindergarten work,
and I'm so glad that you broughtthat up.
And then we also talked with Iguess we'll talk with, if you're
(39:58):
listening Michelle Hasp, andshe talks a lot about making
sense of reading, assessmentsand like this idea of universal
screener.
So if you're listening rightnow and you want to hear more
about what Stephanie and Sarahare saying about universal
screeners, be sure you tune infor the rest of the month and
also grab their book that willlink in the show notes.
Melissa (40:17):
All right, before we wrap up, I know we know we
talked a lot about some, somemisunderstandings between like
what is what is actually MTSS?
And I know that you allprobably hear way more than we
do about some misunderstandingsof MTSS and what it is and what
it's not.
So I'm going to just open thefloor for you all to talk about.
(40:38):
What are some things that youhear come up that you're like we
want to just dispel that rumor.
Now, that's not what MTSS is.
So what are they?
Stephanie Stollar (40:48):
Well, I'll start with one.
Mtss is not a rigid set ofprocedures that must look the
same in every school, gradelevel or every district.
It is not a set of proceduresthat you put in a binder or a
flow chart and then push out toeverybody and expect consistency
(41:10):
in.
It is a framework and, bydesign, there are these
components Sarah mentionedearlier that might be called
different things, you know,based on different people
implementing MTSS, but thosecore components exist in the
school, but how they look, even,will vary grade by grade within
(41:34):
a school, because it's allabout making decisions based on
student data and students lookdifferent.
The resources are different inevery school.
What it takes to get change tohappen will look different in
every school.
So I would encourage people torecognize that this is, by
(41:57):
design, a flexible framework andthey need to contextualize
what's in the research to thereality of their school and the
needs of their students.
Sarah Brown (42:10):
I love that.
Stephanie, one of the thingsthat I hear often is confusion
about the pyramid, and itcircles around a lot of this
conversation that we've hadtoday.
But the MTSS pyramid we oftenthink of as containing the
students in our schools.
So we hear school leaders andeducators say all of our tier
(42:32):
three students or our yellowstudents, or we have an upside
down pyramid, right, and we knowexactly what that means.
We can see the picture in ourhead of what I know what that
means for that school.
It changes, though it's not atall.
It's not what an MTSS isintended to be, and if we shift
to a different perspective, itactually is more effective and
(42:52):
efficient.
The pyramid does not containstudents.
It contains our resources, andso when we think back to those
classes, melissa you mentionedearlier, it's an interesting way
to think about class-wideintervention to your one
intervention, as opposed togetting more interventionist
right.
If I think I have anupside-down pyramid, then I
think I need moreinterventionist right and more
(43:14):
time and a different schedule.
Maybe I need all of that If Itake the perspective of oh, we
have a lot of students who havea lot of needs.
Where do we have the mostresources in our system, tier
one.
So now we're going to look tosee how we can support with the
resources that we have.
That also includes then.
It helps in several differentways because it also keeps us
(43:36):
from thinking about oh, thestudent's getting tier three,
there's a tier three student sothey don't need tier one, some
of those other things that arekind of encompassed in that.
But that's a big thing that Isee that I think is helpful to
reframe.
Lori (43:50):
That's groundbreaking.
I know I'm sure a lot ofteachers out there are listening
like, oh my gosh, my school hasbeen putting students into
those categories.
And yeah, let's think about itin terms of resources.
I love this.
Sarah Brown (44:04):
You're not alone.
If your school is doing it,you're not alone.
But the podcast isn't all aboutthe pyramid and so I don't want
to go.
But we start to expect andaccept that some students are
going to be forever at risk inreading because they're tier
three students, as instead ofour tier two and our tier three
(44:26):
resources, we put a lot of timeinto and a lot of work into and
a lot of like love into for ourinterventionists and our folks
who support right Like in thoseresources, and so we need.
We do that because we need toaccelerate student progress, not
because they're a tier threestudent and they're always going
to be a risk.
Lori (44:47):
All right.
Well, I know one thing that isimportant to all of us.
This is a really toughconversation in terms of like
understanding for teachers.
Right, we have teachers outthere listening who might feel
like, okay, I'm in my classroom,I have a broken system around
me, I'm going to think aboutwhat I can control within my own
system.
Maybe there's a teacherlistening who's thinking, okay,
(45:10):
I'm in a system that's, you know, trying to trying to work.
It's maybe on toward workingtoward the right track here, you
know we're work.
It's maybe working toward theright track here, you know we're
all on board, we're going forit.
So there's a variety oflisteners out there.
But I think it might be helpfulfor everyone, regardless of
where you are in your MTSSjourney, to think about what's
working, and you two are thebest people to share because
(45:32):
you're out there doing this workwith schools and districts all
the time.
So I'm hopeful that you canshare some bright spots around
strong systems and what workswithin those systems, like
what's going well.
Stephanie Stollar (45:46):
Yeah, thank you for asking this because I
don't think we bring thosebright spots forward enough and
Sarah and I are reallyprivileged and honored to get to
be working and walkingalongside of schools that are
getting tremendous results.
So, just off the top of my head, some of the things that I see
working are individual teachersbeing brave enough to just start
(46:12):
something right, and sometimesthis happens in a kind of
revolutionary, rebellious way,like you all know, just close
your door and do somethingdifferent, and sometimes it's
more part of a school-wideeffort, right, but showing the
results.
So teachers who will dosomething different demonstrate
(46:35):
improvement, better outcomes fortheir students, and then they
will quietly share that, maybejust with other teachers at
their grade level, maybe with atrusted interventionist or
school psychologist within theschool, maybe with the principal
, and then people take notice,right, like what are you doing
over there?
That's getting results?
I have kids just like yours andI didn't get results like that.
(46:58):
You know what are you doingover there?
That's been really powerful.
Like Sarah mentioned earlier, wesee school systems that are
getting tremendous improvementsacross one school year, even
doubling their percentage ofstudents who are on track.
And don't be afraid to startsmall in your own classroom or
(47:22):
do something like a pilot.
I've seen this be very, veryeffective.
If you are a school leader oryou're working with a school
leader who's willing to givethis a try, demonstrate at a
single grade level that you canimprove outcomes, or just within
your school, and then take thatsuccess to the rest of the
(47:43):
district so that you don't haveto try this like across the
board at every grade level inevery school in your district as
a starting place.
So I've observed that sort ofincremental change, sharing the
success stories, sharing thedata improvement, to be a really
effective strategy.
Sarah Brown (48:06):
I also really appreciate you asking this
question, so I'll just sharethis year one of the schools
that I was.
I was a special educationdirector in my last role in a
school district and I never getlike celebration emails and now
in my current work as aconsultant I get some
celebration emails and it'sreally exciting for me.
So one of those this year was aschool that I work with that
(48:28):
shared their data and they hadgone after having learned they
had.
Everybody was trained in thescience of reading several years
ago.
They've had a research-alignedgood program as part of their
Tier 1 for several years now andthey've been using screening
and progress monitoring forseveral years and they were
seeing pretty stagnant growth.
And this year they put in placetwo things.
(48:51):
So one, they did class-wideintervention, which we've talked
about, and two, they really didintentional data team meetings,
like supporting and havingconversations not just about the
data but what to do next,helping teachers move past kind
of looking at the data to takingaction on it.
And then, when they did havecelebrations, attributed those
(49:12):
celebrations and just said lookat what we achieved, but here's
what we did to do it right.
Like asking that next questionof oh, what did you do in your
classroom to get that, so thatwe don't just attribute it to
students?
It kind of finally clickedright for the student but like,
oh, we worked really hard, let'stalk about that so that we can
replicate it.
And in this school they managedto.
(49:33):
They had a four-sectionkindergarten.
They grew their percent ofstudents who were on track
between from the last severalyears it was stagnant to over
30% growth in one year and everysingle section reached over 80%
of students.
Every single section had atleast like 13% or 15% of student
growth because of one year ofchange.
(49:55):
And they talk about obviously,celebrating the student outcomes
is the best part, but they alsotalk about that having the
conversations as a team andbuilding that teamwork around
data use and taking action andreading also has changed their
culture around reading,improvement and data use to help
(50:18):
them support, support theirstudents, and so I think both of
those things are hugecelebrations that I've heard,
obviously from that school thatI described, but other schools
too that I also am veryfortunate to to get the
opportunity support.
But those are.
Those are things that I seethat I think are helpful for
students but also great for thesystem right and great for
(50:39):
teacher teachers happiness andwellness.
Melissa (50:42):
Yeah, I just have to say I mean you all, I know MTSS
can.
Even for me, sometimes it'slike okay, this is getting ready
for this podcast.
I was like this feels like adaunting topic, right, it does
feel like it's a little moreintense, right, it always feels
that way and this conversationreally made me realize like it
is hard, right, but the reasonit's hard is like because we're
(51:04):
asking people to make changesand I love the things you said
and they're probably all throughyour book of like, if we're
asking the right questions andwe're thinking about MTSS in
this big systems way and what'sworking and what's not working,
and being open to making thosechanges, doesn't have to be as
daunting and it can really leadto some great success.
(51:26):
So thank you all for sharingeverything today and helping me
feel like MTSS isn't as dauntingas it seems sometimes.
Stephanie Stollar (51:35):
Well, thank you for inviting us and for
asking such great questions.
It was a pleasure to talk withboth of you.
Sarah Brown (51:42):
Truly a pleasure, thank you.
Melissa (51:47):
To stay connected with us, sign up for our email list
at literacypodcastcom, join ourFacebook group and follow us on
Instagram and Twitter.
Lori (51:57):
If this episode resonated with you, take a moment to share
with a teacher friend or leaveus a five-star rating and review
on Apple Podcasts.
Melissa (52:07):
Just a quick reminder that the views and opinions
expressed by the hosts andguests of the Melissa and Lori
Love Literacy Podcast are notnecessarily the opinions of
Great Minds PBC or its employees.
Lori (52:19):
We appreciate you so much and we're so glad you're here to
learn with us.
Thank you.
If you're like us, you've wondered what strong
systems of support actually looklike in practice.
Schools need efficient, alignedsystems that support all
learners and lead to real growth.
But how do Tier 1 instructionand Tier 2 and Tier 3
interventions all work?
Lori (00:18):
together.
In this episode, stephanieStoller and Sarah Brown, authors
of MTSS for Reading Improvement, help to break it all down.
They'll clear up commonmisconceptions about MTSS, share
success stories and offerpractical tips to help your
systems run smoothly so you canstart seeing the growth you've
(00:39):
been working toward.
Hi teacher friends.
I'm Lori and I'm Melissa.
We are two educators who wantthe best for all kids, and we
know you do too.
Melissa (00:52):
We worked together in Baltimore when the district
adopted a new literacycurriculum.
Lori (00:57):
We realized there was so much more to learn about how to
teach reading and writing.
Melissa (01:02):
Lori, and I can't wait to keep learning with you today
how to teach reading and writing.
Lori, and I can't wait to keeplearning with you today.
Hi everyone, stephanie, we areso excited to have you back on
the podcast and you brought afriend and your co author today.
Sarah, we are so excited totalk to you both today.
All about MTSS.
Stephanie Stollar (01:22):
Thank you both so much for inviting us.
Lori (01:24):
Thank you, Of course.
Well, let's jump right in.
I would love to just ground ourlisteners and ground this
conversation in what we meanwhen we say systems level
support.
Right, we're talking about MTSS, multi-tiered systems of
support.
What do systems level supportor what do?
(01:46):
What does systems level supportmean?
Sarah Brown (01:50):
So imagine that we heard about an accident, a car
accident at an intersection inour town.
Right, we could ask questionsabout.
The first things that might popto our mind are oh, was the
driver distracted?
Was somebody else rightillegally in the intersection,
like what happened?
Right, we could ask questionslike that.
We could also take a step backand ask some questions from a
(02:14):
system perspective and we couldsay you know how many accidents
have been at this intersectionthis year?
How does that compare to otherintersections in our town with
similar traffic patterns?
And that's really what we'retalking about when we talk about
in this book, taking a systemlevel perspective.
(02:34):
So the individual questionsabout individual students and
how they're doing and how theirprograms are working, what they
need next, are really importantto have.
But to get school-widesustained improvement, we also
need to really be honing in onsome of those larger picture
questions that are going to tellus overall what our system
(02:55):
needs to support educatorsbetter, to help all learners be
successful readers.
Stephanie Stollar (03:01):
Yeah, I think it's those systems of support
that need to circle around theclassroom teacher and his or her
students.
So you think about the thingslike the daily schedule, things
like how others in the schoolsupport the classroom teacher.
(03:23):
You think about things liketime to plan and meet together
in teams, things likeinstructional materials, things
like materials and processesaround intervention that
teachers can access for theirstudents, the interaction
between special education andgeneral education or
(03:44):
multilingual support and generaleducation.
So those are some examples ofsome of the systems of support
that surround that classroom.
So, as Sarah said, we're sortof zooming out and not expecting
teachers to manage the successof their students on their own,
but to think about thatclassroom as nested within these
(04:07):
interacting systems within theschool environment.
And so we want to get people tothink about and talk about how
are the ways that they're doingbusiness in those systems
impacting that individualstudent learning and how do we
take an approach that's not justfocused on one student at a
time, but zoom out and get oursystems lined up in place for
(04:32):
every student to be successful.
Melissa (04:34):
That is really helpful.
And my next question for you isabout the difference between
MTSS and intervention, and Ifeel like they're often used
synonymously.
Right, they're the same thing.
Mtss is intervention.
But even just what you justshared in that little bit, I'm
thinking that MTSS is thisbigger picture zoomed out.
More than intervention might beincluded in that, but it's even
(04:57):
more than that.
Am I on the right track?
Stephanie Stollar (05:00):
Yes, that's exactly right.
So some people use response tointervention or RTI and MTSS
interchangeably, but we sort ofthink about response to
intervention cases as a set offorms, a set of meetings, a set
(05:28):
of procedures for movingstudents through tiers of
intervention.
And you can't actually do thatunless you have all of these
other aspects of your schoolsystem functioning correctly,
effectively aligned with eachother and aligned with the
(05:48):
research and what students need.
So yes, you hit it right on themoney.
Sarah Brown (05:54):
You'll see the different components key
components of an MTSS frameworkas different things, but we
think of them as things like thetargeted interventions at every
tier of support, right, so itmight be tier one interventions
as well as those interventionsthat you mentioned.
Part of it is collaboration andteaming and leadership around
(06:14):
that.
Part of it is the assessmentsthat we have that help us answer
the question and address ourneeds, where we have them at the
right time, and how we'remaking decisions using those
interventions, and so there aredifferent pieces.
How they look in each schoolwill be different, which is
sometimes the tricky part, right, but but it's also, I think,
(06:35):
part of the beauty in an.
MTSS is that it can lookdifferently depending on your
system and your resources.
But but how?
But those components are thereevery time.
I my hobby is girls trips and Ioften say, like the framework
of a girls trip right, like it'sgoing to look different every
time.
But there's some things that wehave to do every time.
We have to decide where we'regoing to stay.
We have to decide how we'regoing to get there.
(06:56):
I personally have to decidewhere are we going to eat.
Those are my favorite parts,and so those we're always going
to have to.
We can't skip any of thosedecisions.
Those all have to be part of asuccessful girls trip, and the
same is true for an MTSS.
If you're going to see asuccessful MTSS, you have to
address each of these pieces ofthe framework, but how they look
in your school might bedifferent.
Lori (07:17):
Yeah, sarah, I think so much hits home for me there.
I love the analogy, that's funand also very true.
But that's that's, to me, thestuff that is very frustrating
to teachers.
Like I think, when we hear froma lot of teachers, the things
that they're frustrated with arenot necessarily the classroom
teaching right, like themajority of teachers that come
(07:38):
to me and Melissa askingquestions and I'm sure come to
you all I see you nodding Likethey love working with students,
like teachers love teaching,and I will say the same too.
You know, when I was in theclassroom, the part that was
frustrating was typically notthe teaching part.
It was all the other stuffsurrounding it that were broken
systems that were very, verytricky to work with, because
(08:03):
you're working within a brokensystem and then it broken system
and then broken systems don'tnecessarily function to the
highest quality.
So I'm thinking now we've kindof set this foundation and
understanding here of systemsand of MTSS versus intervention.
So we thought we would jumpinto some questions from
(08:24):
listeners, questions that we'rehearing from teachers every day.
Does that sound good to youboth?
Yes, all right, sounds great.
So we hear teachers asking thisquestion.
We've learned about the scienceof reading, but I'm not seeing
results translate into studentgrowth.
What do you suggest?
Stephanie Stollar (08:42):
Yeah.
So the part that is central toMTSS that we don't always see
schools doing is elevating thebarriers.
So for classroom teachers tosurface what's in their way and
for the rest of the educators inthe school and district to
understand that their role is tohelp eliminate those barriers
(09:04):
for the teacher to be successfulin their classroom.
So for us we use a specificdatabase decision-making
framework in our book thecollaborative improvement cycle.
That is the meat and potatoesof MTSS.
And again, it's something wedon't always see happening.
Even when schools or districtssay they're doing MTSS, they're
(09:31):
not getting together in thesecollaborative teams to use their
assessments in a structureddecision-making process.
So our book is really orientedto support people to make that
shift and lots of tools, meetingagendas, templates for having
those conversations.
There are often meetings inschools but people are not
(09:52):
talking about this and we wantto really direct people to
surfacing the barriers.
What would teachers say is intheir way?
Why are they not getting betterresults?
What's in their way, and thensystematically as a
collaborative group, writingaction plans to eliminate those
(10:13):
barriers.
We don't want the science ofreading to be these one-off
actions Like all we have to dois get some professional
development and then we're done,we're good to go.
All we have to do is adopt somenew program and then
everything's going to bedifferent.
That's what people areexperiencing is not happening
(10:34):
and from our experience we couldhave told you that would be the
case.
So we want people to have theright expectations that it's not
these simple actions.
You can't expect to continue tooperate in the same way in your
school and expect a differentoutcome.
Sarah Brown (10:51):
I think everything Stephanie said I agree with the
other another thing that I seelike in terms of why schools
aren't getting outcomes and andteachers, reading specialists
they're frustrated by that right, Like they've done the things.
They've invested a lot of timeand money in this work.
I see two things happeningregularly.
(11:12):
One is that teachers, we haven'tnecessarily connected the
learning that teachers have donethrough about science of
reading to their curricularmaterials, and so if you are an
expert, if you are listening topodcasts like this fantastic one
, right then you might bethinking about that and doing
that naturally on your own, butit takes work to do, and so how
(11:37):
are we as a system asStephanie's saying right
supporting teachers to be ableto do that?
The second thing that I see isthat we're still approaching
supporting students student bystudent, and so in schools where
we have large numbers ofstudents who need additional
support, who are at-risk readers, we're still trying to provide
all of them additionalintervention, when, in reality,
(12:01):
in order to get really largegains as a system, we also need
to look at what we're doing astier one, in terms of what I
would call tier one interventionintervention at that first
class, wide level in order toaccelerate overall learning.
So those are two commonbarriers that I see and I agree
with everything.
Stephanie said that I would usedata and conversations with
teachers to identify what arethe specific barriers in our
(12:23):
school and how do we do that.
Those are two common ones, Isee.
Melissa (12:26):
Yeah, that's great, and I'm also.
I'm thinking now, you know,another question we get a lot is
about, you know, I'm trying allthese things, I'm doing, we're
doing all these interventions,but the data isn't showing it
and or, like we try to, and likethe data even went down, like
there was a little dip in our inour data.
And I'm wondering.
(12:49):
Oftentimes, I feel like what wehear is people like, okay,
what's next?
Right, like we're going tothrow those things out and we
got to try a new thing.
But I'm wondering, like, whatshould people be doing
differently in terms of, likelooking at their data, if
they're not seeing the successthat they hoped for by
implementing these things thatthey thought were going to work?
Sarah Brown (13:01):
So the first thing I would say is stay the course.
If you're using something thatis evidence-based, then let your
data, and then theconversations around those data,
help you identify specificallywhat are the barriers to those
things being successful rightnow and how can we address those
barriers.
When you started by talkingabout intervention, I'll just
(13:22):
give a brief example from ourbook about how we would suggest
doing that.
So, instead of startingintervention conversations,
looking at student by studentand saying, ok, this student
didn't make enough progress,what do we need to change?
Ok, this student didn't makeenough progress.
What do we need to change?
Look at the intervention as awhole and say, ok, if there were
seven students getting thisintervention and five of them
(13:42):
didn't make enough progress, weactually need to talk about the
intervention itself, not aboutthese students.
Right, and figure out what thebarrier is.
Maybe the interventionist wasbeing pulled regularly to sub
and we just weren't gettingthrough an intervention.
Or maybe we can only meet acouple times a week for 15
minutes a day because we have somany students we're trying to
serve and we're really onlygetting through about a lesson a
(14:04):
week.
Right, I wouldn't expect reallygreat growth from that.
And so, thinking about andtaking a step back and looking
at what are our data and why arewe seeing success?
Most of the time there'ssomething related to
implementation or becauseschools are hard, complex places
, or dosage, like being able toget enough of that really good
(14:27):
stuff.
We're teaching that.
We see there are other thingstoo, but those are two really
common ones.
Lori (14:33):
And it's the reality of it , right, Sarah?
That's the real stuff.
Like you can put the stuff onpaper and the goals, but then in
reality it's like, oh, there'ssomebody out sick and we need to
pull this person for that, andthen we're not getting the
dosage that we thought we were.
And on paper it looks like this, but then reality says this and
there's a big gap.
So I'm so glad that you pointedthat out, because I feel like
(14:54):
that's the reality of everyteacher's life, right?
Stephanie Stollar (14:57):
And it's no one's fault.
No, I was just going to addthat in the book we try to help
people understand that thereality isn't going anywhere.
Your reality isn't going tochange.
You have to work within yourreality.
Oh, so good, so good.
Sometimes people throw up theirhands like we can't even do
(15:19):
MTSS in our school because ofour reality, and we want people
to understand.
This is the process ofcontinually revisiting your data
, revisiting your implementationand making adjustments and
improvements over time to get adifferent result.
So I think just being veryupfront about that is important.
Lori (15:43):
I think of it so much in terms of like the analogy of
like a health and fitness right.
If you're looking to add someexercise to your schedule and
you only have, you know you've30 minutes a day but you're not
doing any at this point.
You don't start with those full30 minutes, you start with five
or 10 and you build up fromthere and you get momentum and
(16:04):
you work within your reality andthen perhaps once you've got 30
going, you're like for a longwhile you're like, oh hey, I
actually could do a little bitmore, because my systems now
have shifted and now I, you know, or maybe 30 is good and maybe
I want to tackle something else.
So that's such a good point, towork within your reality and I
think that that's actually thething that is a big barrier,
(16:26):
that is the miss right.
Stephanie Stollar (16:28):
So if you're trying to adopt those healthy
behaviors, you would have someway of measuring Did you make
any progress?
You might have a coach.
You might have to adjust yourschedule.
You might buy some newequipment that helps you right
Like to accomplish that.
You might have some incentivesbuilt in to that or some
(16:49):
consequences built into that.
All of those supports will helpyou make that behavioral change
and everybody can relate tothat with some kind of you know
analogy, like some healthybehavior.
Same is true for changing theway we teach reading and our
reading outcomes in schools.
Lori (17:08):
Yeah, and such a good point, Like you know, say
there's a day where there's amiss, that doesn't mean that
then every day forward we'rejust like well, whatever it's
like, make a plan for failure,right, Because there will be
that failure there.
And how do we?
Sarah Brown (17:21):
create the culture where it's okay to say I planned
on 30 minutes a day for thisbut it's really not happening.
And I have this group and I'mreally trying to get them some
extra practice in readingconnected texts and I'm and I'm
just not getting to it, or, oryou know, it doesn't seem like
they're ready for these books orwhatever it is Like.
(17:43):
We need to create a culturewhere we feel confident to say
I'm winning right, like here aremy wins, but also that we feel
confident saying like here arethe things that are that are
hard for me right now and I needI need help.
Lori (17:55):
Okay.
So for me right now and I needhelp, okay.
So, along those lines, I thinkthis is kind of a difficult
question I'm going to ask youbut we get this question and I'm
sure you do too how do leaders,how do you recommend leaders
respond when people in thesystem are not doing what they
said they would do or what theyagreed to do?
(18:16):
You know, I know there's thosemeetings that happen and it's
like we're going to invigorateeveryone to do this, and then,
you know, people are like, oh mygosh, yet again there's this
other thing that's happening andI really want to do this.
So I guess, how can we besupportive of teachers and
support staff who, like, mightbe the only ones who see a path
(18:39):
forward?
Right, there's maybe there,there's a teacher listening
who's like I am one of the onlyones doing what I said I would
do, and then there are teachersaround me who perhaps aren't.
And I think this is trickybecause we say no or yes to
things for a variety of reasons.
So I just want to say that,like, not there's no shame in
this question, just it's anhonest question.
(19:00):
So how do we respond as leadersand how can we support teachers
to who are out here listeningLike I'm one of those yes people
and I'm I'm on board, butthere's other people around me
who perhaps aren't.
Sarah Brown (19:13):
As a leader, the first thing to think about is is
this the same way we would withstudents?
Is it a student issue or asystem issue?
The same thing I'll ask aboutimplementation of change.
Is it one or two teachers whoare struggling to implement or
is it most?
Teachers need right and when wethink about doing new things
(19:38):
like I'm just going to go backto, like motivation theory,
right, expectancy, value andcost.
So do our teachers expect thatthey will be successful if they
implement and make these changes?
And there's lots of reasons wecan expect that it might not be
successful.
Maybe I'm not confident withthe skills or the materials that
I have, or the time that I haveto teach it in, or the student
needs in my class.
(19:59):
Maybe I don't expect it becauseI haven't ever actually seen it
be successful.
I've never actually seenstudents who started the year at
risk grow enough not to be atrisk right.
So that's the expectancy.
Value is how valuable is thisto me to do so?
Like is it worth my effort?
And then cost is what am Igiving up?
And I think thinking about allof those things as a leader is
(20:21):
important to consider.
Okay, if we've identified thatthis is a system level issue in
our building, then I need toidentify what are the reasons
that teachers aren't able totalk to teachers and listen to
them and then build the supportsand give them what they need in
order to be able to supportstudents.
Stephanie Stollar (20:41):
Yeah, I agree with that.
I think the leaders have to setthe vision and they have to
stay the course.
They have to have a way to geteverybody on board with the
urgency for change, and justabout every school in our
country has that urgency becauseso many students are struggling
(21:04):
readers or at-risk readers.
So, setting the expectation,setting a vision for change,
creating a plan that people havehad input in so that they're
going to buy into it it's notsomething that's put upon them
from the outside or from the top.
So giving teachers and alleducators a voice into what is
(21:26):
the plan, but then reallysticking to it and the
administrator not changingcourse when people are
disgruntled or unhappy orpushing back or not doing what
everybody agreed to do, butrecognize, as Sarah said, that
that just is.
It means the conditions aroundthose folks are not such that
they are supported to do thething, for whatever reason.
(21:48):
So, as Sarah said, ask them whythey're not doing it.
Ask them what they need to doit, what they need to do it.
Don't let them just cycle andcomplaining and, you know,
spinning their wheels, butremind them that this is what we
all agreed that we were goingto do.
But how can I support you to doit, because it seems to be a
(22:11):
struggle for you for whateverreason.
So those are the kinds ofconversations I've found to be
most helpful, because change ishard and, as we've already said,
changing people's behaviorabout teaching reading is not
any easier than any otherbehavior change.
So we shouldn't expect thatjust because we have a new
(22:33):
district policy, everybody'sgoing to jump on board gleefully
doing all the new things andknow what they should stop doing
so that they can start doingthe new things.
Like we just have to get ourexpectations lined up and
realistic.
Melissa (22:49):
I really love that idea of just you know, asking
teachers and listening to thewhy, Because, like Lori said
earlier, I mean, teachers wantto do a good job.
No, no one shows up at theirjob every day and says like I'm
just don't want to do it right,If they're not doing a thing,
it's because there's definitelyprobably a reason behind the why
they're not doing it.
So to hear it instead of, Imean, I feel like what happens
(23:11):
usually is people just say likethey like, say it louder, like
you have to do this thing andlike that's not going to work,
Just telling me more and morethat I have to do this isn't
helping.
The whatever it is that'sgetting in the way of me
actually being able to do it.
Whether it's time or people orresources, something's probably
getting in the way.
Stephanie Stollar (23:30):
That's the purpose of those collaborative
teams and, using thecollaborative improvement cycle,
that is the venue for people tospeak up and for the ask of why
are you not doing the thingthat we plan?
And for the additional supportsto be put around those teachers
.
Melissa (23:48):
And I'm so curious about.
I know most of our listenersare teachers and I'm wondering
you know this sounds likeleaders have a huge role in
making this work, but if you'rea teacher in a place where you
want this to be going well,right, you want the systems to
be going well, but they're not.
Do you have any advice forteachers about how they can, you
(24:09):
know, maybe step up or talk totheir leaders or do do something
within a place where it's notworking well?
Stephanie Stollar (24:16):
Yeah, we wrote the first section of the
book, the first three chapters,for school leaders who maybe
haven't had the sameopportunities to learn about the
science of reading or learnabout MTSS.
So that's a resource thatteachers can point their school
leaders to.
In my experience, what's workedwell for teachers to sort of
(24:40):
light, a spark for change intheir system is two things Find
a buddy so that it's not justyou, because when you feel like
you're the lone ranger who'strying to make this change, it's
very lonely and it feels verydiscouraging.
So find somebody else who'slike, minded, who's interested
in in facilitating this change,and then find out what your
(25:05):
school leader is interested in.
So again, asking leaders tochange is not any easier than
asking teachers to change.
So you have to understand itfrom their perspective.
One of the things that happenswhen teachers learn about the
science of reading is they geton fire, like.
I've seen this over and overand over again.
They have learned a bunch theyknow more in some cases than
(25:28):
their building administratorsand district administrators
about the science of reading andthey get so excited about it
and then they sort of bulldozeover people.
They want them to know all thethings at once and they want to
implement all the things at thesame time and that doesn't work
because that's threatening tothe school leaders in many cases
(25:50):
, because it points out, maybe,the gaps in their knowledge and
it's putting a lot of change infront of them that they might
not be comfortable to lead.
So, recognizing what is it thatthe school leader is already
setting for themselves as a goal?
So all building principals have, like reading, achievement
(26:11):
goals.
Every district administratorhas some kind of literacy
improvement goal.
District administrator has somekind of literacy improvement
goal.
Many states are putting thesekinds of accountability
frameworks on schools anddistricts.
So if you can find a way toconnect the change that you'd
like to see in your school tothe existing goals that your
(26:35):
school leaders are alreadytrying to accomplish, then you
will not be this annoying,overbearing, threatening force
in the school.
You will be seen as the personwho is trying to help that
leader meet their existing goals.
So maybe that soundsmanipulative.
I don't look at it that way.
(26:56):
I think it's just human naturethat every educator is busy and
potentially overwhelmed.
You don't want to contribute tothat with your enthusiasm about
the science of reading.
You want to become the personwho is a trusted, knowledgeable
partner who can sort of comealongside those leaders.
Lori (27:19):
That's so smart.
I hear you saying too that likeMTSS is very efficient and will
be helpful at all levels, right, so if I'm a teacher, I'm
looking to help.
I'm going to just zoom in onwhat my administrator, what my
district leader they're alreadyfocusing on so smart.
So when I think aboutefficiency, I also think about
(27:39):
classroom teachers listening anddoing this work, and they might
be feeling overwhelmed.
So how can teachers do thiswork so it's like the most
efficient and not overwhelmingto them?
So maybe, like, let's elevatethat triangle of efficiency here
.
Sarah Brown (27:58):
Yeah, a couple ideas.
So one is I would, I would leanon, lean on a collaborative
network, right.
So it might be like, likeStephanie said, right, your
buddy who's kind of working likeyou're doing this with, but
also your grade level team,assuming you have right that or
kind of cross grade level teamif you're at a single section
school and and really be usingso we provide agendas and data
(28:19):
protocols in the book.
I think that takes a lot of thekind of prep work out of those
conversations, right, if I'musing universal screening data
three times a year and I'mrunning every day to plan and do
things I don't necessarily beknowing you know, which report
am I supposed to pull up?
What questions do I want to askas I look at these screening
(28:42):
data, right, what that lookslike, and so we've tried to help
teams by providing some of thatto make it a little bit more
doable.
And then for the day-to-day, Iwould be like using that
collaborative network that Ihave.
I find in most schools that Igo to around the country that
teams are really used to talkingabout standards and what
(29:03):
they're going to teach, but lessused to having conversations
about how they teach and thenlike day to day what that's
going to look like and that canbe a huge support to teachers to
make their planning moreefficient, to make their
outcomes more effective, whenthey're able to have those types
of conversations within theirgrade level team or their PLC.
Stephanie Stollar (29:26):
One of the great efficiencies in the MTSS
model is the fact that we zoomout and don't just look at
individual students.
So I would encourage teachersto adopt that perspective and,
rather than looking at theirscreening data to identify the
individuals who are struggling,to look for the patterns.
So what percentage of studentsin your class are struggling to
(29:51):
read text for meaning?
What percentage are strugglingwith basic decoding or phonemic
awareness?
So look for those trends andpatterns and then approach the
magnitude of that problem eitherwith a class-wide strategy or
with grouping students who havethe same concern.
(30:12):
You know, in many of the old RTIapplications, teachers would
look at screening data and thenmake a referral for intervention
for every individual studentRight, and that is surely
overwhelming.
It's overwhelming to theteacher, it's overwhelming to
the intervention system.
(30:33):
So the alternative to that thatwe really elevate in MTSS is
does anybody else score in thissame way?
And again, look in yourclassroom.
But also, if you have a partnerfirst grade teacher or a grade
level team, ask during thatmeeting hey, you know, I've got
two kids who are reallystruggling to read text
(30:54):
accurately and fluently.
Does anybody else have kids whoare struggling with that?
Right?
And so then take that ontogether, rather than each
individual teacher thinking thatthey have to support individual
students.
Look for the opportunities tobuild in those class-wide
routines and approaches toinstruction when you see
(31:17):
patterns and multiple studentswho have the same need.
Melissa (31:21):
Yeah, and this comes back to what I talked about,
mtss and intervention often get,you know, put in the same
bucket, whereas and I thinkoftentimes we don't think of
what do you do for tier one inthis right and you guys
mentioned that this interventionand differentiation can happen
in tier one right you don't haveto wait until tier two and tier
three and have it all happenthere Because, like you said,
(31:43):
that's just too many students todo all that work.
It's too overwhelming and notefficient in any way.
Stephanie Stollar (31:51):
The best approach is to consider tier one
instruction first.
It's the place where studentsspend most of their reading
instructional minutes andactually its job in MTSS is to
reduce the number of studentswho need intervention.
That is like the stated role oftier one reading instruction,
so we don't have enoughconversations about that.
Sarah Brown (32:16):
And I've seen schools in one year's time get
incredible growth 30% of studentlike, increase in percent of
students who meet targetbenchmarks in one year by
implementing class-wideintervention.
It's an evidence-based strategy.
That's amazing.
Melissa (32:34):
Easily, but yeah, yeah, closing gaps between student
groups and so much easier thangetting more interventionists
and more people to supportoutside.
I mean, you're doing it rightthere in your actual instruction
not only easier, but itactually works better.
Yeah, it's like a double bonus,yeah, so you?
(32:57):
So you all talked about I mean,we're talking about efficiency
here, but I know another thingthat you all brought up was this
idea of prevention.
So how, how would a school, ifthey're focusing on prevention
instead of you, know whathappens?
I taught this and it didn'twork.
Now, what do I do?
How does that look different ifthey're going in with this like
lens of prevention instead ofwhat's?
(33:18):
What's a word I'm looking forhere?
Not prevention, butintervention, intervention,
reaction.
Lori (33:23):
Yeah, um how did proactive versus a reactive?
There you go.
Melissa (33:27):
I think you're getting it exactly so how does this
proactive prevention um lenslook different for schools?
Sarah Brown (33:35):
yeah.
So a lot of it is in thequestions that we ask.
I mean, that's some of the mostimportant things that we do are
the road that we go down.
The path that we go down isgoing to be different depending
on the questions we ask.
When I talked about I give thatanalogy right of an accident.
If I'm asking questions abouthow that accident happened that
time, that's what I'm going toreact to.
(33:55):
If I ask questions about theintersection as a whole, it's
going to take us down adifferent road.
So I think that's a big piece ofit is asking some questions
about how, if it's kindergartenin the fall, I want to compare,
I want to get those screeningdata right away, right, and then
I want to compare how thiskindergarten class's patterns
(34:18):
look compared to our previousyears, because that's going to
tell me how intensive our tierone instruction needs to be in
order to help students besuccessful and make the most
growth in kindergarten aspossible.
And so a lot of it is theperspective that we take and the
questions that we ask.
I mean, universal screening isa preventative practice in and
(34:39):
of itself.
I don't see schools makedramatic improvements in reading
outcomes without havinguniversal screening in place, so
not only having it.
A place to start would be, ifyou have universal screening
data, seeing how you're using itright.
Like a number of schools that Iwork with have had these data
for years and they haven'treally had the resources, the
(35:01):
protocols, the conversations toreally take action with those
data in a proactive manner.
Stephanie Stollar (35:07):
So asking the question after universal
screening, how many students areat risk, how many students
scored low on screening?
How many students scored low onscreening?
That's the key for me tofocusing on prevention.
So making sure that that's thefirst question, not which
students are at risk, but howmany students are at risk or
(35:28):
struggling readers.
Other actions that lean towardsprevention would be things like
putting resources intokindergarten and first grade,
putting resources into pre-K.
Not putting all of yourresources into the testing
grades, third grade and aboveright.
Another action would be notwaiting until students are
(35:53):
behind.
So this can be enacted inthings like not making students
go through tier one, tier two,tier three to get intensive
support so noticing in the datawhen students might need very
intensive support from the verybeginning, even from the
beginning of kindergarten, fromthe beginning of kindergarten,
(36:15):
and not making kids, you know,fail before they get intensive
support.
Not waiting to take action.
Sometimes kindergarten teachersare reluctant.
Well, this is their firstschool experience.
I shouldn't, you know, doanything, maybe I shouldn't even
screen until the middle ofkindergarten, and I disagree
(36:38):
with that.
I think that kind of thinkingis from that old approach of
something outside of theclassroom in an intervention
framework is going to happen asa result of the screening, and
so we're asking folks to shifttheir thinking there and use the
screening data even at thebeginning of kindergarten to
(36:58):
take action through classroomreading instruction first and
foremost, and to not wait andsee.
That's what got us in troublein the past, because we know
that reading is not just goingto magically emerge from
students.
We have to take an active rolein guaranteeing that literacy
(37:18):
for all of our students.
So acting early, acting inkindergarten and early in every
single grade.
Melissa (37:25):
And Stephanie, you're not saying that.
You know we should be pushingour kindergartners to be able to
read early fall, but what I'mhearing you say is we're
screening them for things likeletter names, letter sounds, you
sounds, phonemic awareness,things like that that are really
going to help them when they'relearning to read.
Stephanie Stollar (37:45):
Yes, we're screening on those things
because they are predictive ofreading comprehension, right,
like they are the age or gradeappropriate indicators of the
student being on track or not ontrack, and we should pay
attention to that.
It's the reason to spend all ofthat time doing universal
screening so that we don't justsay, oh sorry, you're not
(38:06):
predicted to be okay, I'm sorryfor your luck, you know.
But that we actually act onthat information with age and
grade appropriate instruction,not pushing the curriculum, you
know, ever downward, earlier andearlier, but supporting them
with lots of language and thenlots of print as well.
Sarah Brown (38:28):
So, for example, if we saw in kindergarten in the
fall that we had a large numberof students who didn't have the
phonemic awareness skills thatthey should have at the
beginning of kindergarten, right, they were identified as at
risk.
I'm not looking to label thosestudents.
I'm not saying all of thesestudents need to be pulled out
from the classroom for readinginstruction, right, and let's
(38:48):
make some referrals for specialeducation evaluations Absolutely
not.
We're asking about the systemright now of kindergarten
instruction.
And so what I'm going to say isoh, this year I'm not going to
do the same intensity ofphonemic awareness practice that
we did last year.
I'm actually going to add insome more.
So when we're walking in thehallways, when we're standing at
the, you know like, maybe I didit once or twice a week before
(39:10):
and we were standing waiting forthe bat, Now we're going to do
it every single time, right.
And so it's telling me, as ateacher and the grade level
really, what do our studentsneed this year in order to grow
enough to be on track at the endof this year?
But nobody's looking to make,nobody wants to make
kindergartners or kindergartenteachers cry Like that's not the
(39:32):
goal, that's not, that's neverthe goal.
Lori (39:35):
And so much of what you're both talking about is going to
come out later this month too.
We have a kindergarteninterventionist, I guess SLP,
who talks a lot about this ideaof proactive kindergarten work,
and I'm so glad that you broughtthat up.
And then we also talked with Iguess we'll talk with, if you're
(39:58):
listening Michelle Hasp, andshe talks a lot about making
sense of reading, assessmentsand like this idea of universal
screener.
So if you're listening rightnow and you want to hear more
about what Stephanie and Sarahare saying about universal
screeners, be sure you tune infor the rest of the month and
also grab their book that willlink in the show notes.
Melissa (40:17):
All right, before we wrap up, I know we know we
talked a lot about some, somemisunderstandings between like
what is what is actually MTSS?
And I know that you allprobably hear way more than we
do about some misunderstandingsof MTSS and what it is and what
it's not.
So I'm going to just open thefloor for you all to talk about.
(40:38):
What are some things that youhear come up that you're like we
want to just dispel that rumor.
Now, that's not what MTSS is.
So what are they?
Stephanie Stollar (40:48):
Well, I'll start with one.
Mtss is not a rigid set ofprocedures that must look the
same in every school, gradelevel or every district.
It is not a set of proceduresthat you put in a binder or a
flow chart and then push out toeverybody and expect consistency
(41:10):
in.
It is a framework and, bydesign, there are these
components Sarah mentionedearlier that might be called
different things, you know,based on different people
implementing MTSS, but thosecore components exist in the
school, but how they look, even,will vary grade by grade within
(41:34):
a school, because it's allabout making decisions based on
student data and students lookdifferent.
The resources are different inevery school.
What it takes to get change tohappen will look different in
every school.
So I would encourage people torecognize that this is, by
(41:57):
design, a flexible framework andthey need to contextualize
what's in the research to thereality of their school and the
needs of their students.
Sarah Brown (42:10):
I love that.
Stephanie, one of the thingsthat I hear often is confusion
about the pyramid, and itcircles around a lot of this
conversation that we've hadtoday.
But the MTSS pyramid we oftenthink of as containing the
students in our schools.
So we hear school leaders andeducators say all of our tier
(42:32):
three students or our yellowstudents, or we have an upside
down pyramid, right, and we knowexactly what that means.
We can see the picture in ourhead of what I know what that
means for that school.
It changes, though it's not atall.
It's not what an MTSS isintended to be, and if we shift
to a different perspective, itactually is more effective and
(42:52):
efficient.
The pyramid does not containstudents.
It contains our resources, andso when we think back to those
classes, melissa you mentionedearlier, it's an interesting way
to think about class-wideintervention to your one
intervention, as opposed togetting more interventionist
right.
If I think I have anupside-down pyramid, then I
think I need moreinterventionist right and more
(43:14):
time and a different schedule.
Maybe I need all of that If Itake the perspective of oh, we
have a lot of students who havea lot of needs.
Where do we have the mostresources in our system, tier
one.
So now we're going to look tosee how we can support with the
resources that we have.
That also includes then.
It helps in several differentways because it also keeps us
(43:36):
from thinking about oh, thestudent's getting tier three,
there's a tier three student sothey don't need tier one, some
of those other things that arekind of encompassed in that.
But that's a big thing that Isee that I think is helpful to
reframe.
Lori (43:50):
That's groundbreaking.
I know I'm sure a lot ofteachers out there are listening
like, oh my gosh, my school hasbeen putting students into
those categories.
And yeah, let's think about itin terms of resources.
I love this.
Sarah Brown (44:04):
You're not alone.
If your school is doing it,you're not alone.
But the podcast isn't all aboutthe pyramid and so I don't want
to go.
But we start to expect andaccept that some students are
going to be forever at risk inreading because they're tier
three students, as instead ofour tier two and our tier three
(44:26):
resources, we put a lot of timeinto and a lot of work into and
a lot of like love into for ourinterventionists and our folks
who support right Like in thoseresources, and so we need.
We do that because we need toaccelerate student progress, not
because they're a tier threestudent and they're always going
to be a risk.
Lori (44:47):
All right.
Well, I know one thing that isimportant to all of us.
This is a really toughconversation in terms of like
understanding for teachers.
Right, we have teachers outthere listening who might feel
like, okay, I'm in my classroom,I have a broken system around
me, I'm going to think aboutwhat I can control within my own
system.
Maybe there's a teacherlistening who's thinking, okay,
(45:10):
I'm in a system that's, you know, trying to trying to work.
It's maybe on toward workingtoward the right track here, you
know we're work.
It's maybe working toward theright track here, you know we're
all on board, we're going forit.
So there's a variety oflisteners out there.
But I think it might be helpfulfor everyone, regardless of
where you are in your MTSSjourney, to think about what's
working, and you two are thebest people to share because
(45:32):
you're out there doing this workwith schools and districts all
the time.
So I'm hopeful that you canshare some bright spots around
strong systems and what workswithin those systems, like
what's going well.
Stephanie Stollar (45:46):
Yeah, thank you for asking this because I
don't think we bring thosebright spots forward enough and
Sarah and I are reallyprivileged and honored to get to
be working and walkingalongside of schools that are
getting tremendous results.
So, just off the top of my head, some of the things that I see
working are individual teachersbeing brave enough to just start
(46:12):
something right, and sometimesthis happens in a kind of
revolutionary, rebellious way,like you all know, just close
your door and do somethingdifferent, and sometimes it's
more part of a school-wideeffort, right, but showing the
results.
So teachers who will dosomething different demonstrate
(46:35):
improvement, better outcomes fortheir students, and then they
will quietly share that, maybejust with other teachers at
their grade level, maybe with atrusted interventionist or
school psychologist within theschool, maybe with the principal
, and then people take notice,right, like what are you doing
over there?
That's getting results?
I have kids just like yours andI didn't get results like that.
(46:58):
You know what are you doingover there?
That's been really powerful.
Like Sarah mentioned earlier, wesee school systems that are
getting tremendous improvementsacross one school year, even
doubling their percentage ofstudents who are on track.
And don't be afraid to startsmall in your own classroom or
(47:22):
do something like a pilot.
I've seen this be very, veryeffective.
If you are a school leader oryou're working with a school
leader who's willing to givethis a try, demonstrate at a
single grade level that you canimprove outcomes, or just within
your school, and then take thatsuccess to the rest of the
(47:43):
district so that you don't haveto try this like across the
board at every grade level inevery school in your district as
a starting place.
So I've observed that sort ofincremental change, sharing the
success stories, sharing thedata improvement, to be a really
effective strategy.
Sarah Brown (48:06):
I also really appreciate you asking this
question, so I'll just sharethis year one of the schools
that I was.
I was a special educationdirector in my last role in a
school district and I never getlike celebration emails and now
in my current work as aconsultant I get some
celebration emails and it'sreally exciting for me.
So one of those this year was aschool that I work with that
(48:28):
shared their data and they hadgone after having learned they
had.
Everybody was trained in thescience of reading several years
ago.
They've had a research-alignedgood program as part of their
Tier 1 for several years now andthey've been using screening
and progress monitoring forseveral years and they were
seeing pretty stagnant growth.
And this year they put in placetwo things.
(48:51):
So one, they did class-wideintervention, which we've talked
about, and two, they really didintentional data team meetings,
like supporting and havingconversations not just about the
data but what to do next,helping teachers move past kind
of looking at the data to takingaction on it.
And then, when they did havecelebrations, attributed those
(49:12):
celebrations and just said lookat what we achieved, but here's
what we did to do it right.
Like asking that next questionof oh, what did you do in your
classroom to get that, so thatwe don't just attribute it to
students?
It kind of finally clickedright for the student but like,
oh, we worked really hard, let'stalk about that so that we can
replicate it.
And in this school they managedto.
(49:33):
They had a four-sectionkindergarten.
They grew their percent ofstudents who were on track
between from the last severalyears it was stagnant to over
30% growth in one year and everysingle section reached over 80%
of students.
Every single section had atleast like 13% or 15% of student
growth because of one year ofchange.
(49:55):
And they talk about obviously,celebrating the student outcomes
is the best part, but they alsotalk about that having the
conversations as a team andbuilding that teamwork around
data use and taking action andreading also has changed their
culture around reading,improvement and data use to help
(50:18):
them support, support theirstudents, and so I think both of
those things are hugecelebrations that I've heard,
obviously from that school thatI described, but other schools
too that I also am veryfortunate to to get the
opportunity support.
But those are.
Those are things that I seethat I think are helpful for
students but also great for thesystem right and great for
(50:39):
teacher teachers happiness andwellness.
Melissa (50:42):
Yeah, I just have to say I mean you all, I know MTSS
can.
Even for me, sometimes it'slike okay, this is getting ready
for this podcast.
I was like this feels like adaunting topic, right, it does
feel like it's a little moreintense, right, it always feels
that way and this conversationreally made me realize like it
is hard, right, but the reasonit's hard is like because we're
(51:04):
asking people to make changesand I love the things you said
and they're probably all throughyour book of like, if we're
asking the right questions andwe're thinking about MTSS in
this big systems way and what'sworking and what's not working,
and being open to making thosechanges, doesn't have to be as
daunting and it can really leadto some great success.
(51:26):
So thank you all for sharingeverything today and helping me
feel like MTSS isn't as dauntingas it seems sometimes.
Stephanie Stollar (51:35):
Well, thank you for inviting us and for
asking such great questions.
It was a pleasure to talk withboth of you.
Sarah Brown (51:42):
Truly a pleasure, thank you.
Melissa (51:47):
To stay connected with us, sign up for our email list
at literacypodcastcom, join ourFacebook group and follow us on
Instagram and Twitter.
Lori (51:57):
If this episode resonated with you, take a moment to share
with a teacher friend or leaveus a five-star rating and review
on Apple Podcasts.
Melissa (52:07):
Just a quick reminder that the views and opinions
expressed by the hosts andguests of the Melissa and Lori
Love Literacy Podcast are notnecessarily the opinions of
Great Minds PBC or its employees.
Lori (52:19):
We appreciate you so much and we're so glad you're here to
learn with us.
Thank you.
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