Supporting High School Students’ Mental Health and Well-being with The Jed Foundation

    SEL and Behavior, Interventions and Learning Supports' Strategies, MTSS for Secondary

    Branching Minds is excited to partner with The Jed Foundation (JED) to bring essential resources to high school classrooms through the Branching Minds Support Library. Informed by direct research with high school students about what they need as they graduate, these new support cards offer concrete tips, tools, and resources on a comprehensive range of topics geared toward helping students manage the transition out of high school. Carefully curated and evidence-based, these resources provide teachers and students with accessible and actionable advice to aid in this critical — and often difficult — transition. 

    Progress Monitoring for MTSS at the Secondary Level

    MTSS Assessment Data, MTSS for Secondary

    As a professional development consultant for Branching Minds, I work with teachers and administrators from all over the country. I frequently get asked how progress monitoring should look at the middle school and high school levels.

    What Are MTSS Assessments in High School, and Why Are They Important?

    MTSS Practice, MTSS Data Literacy, MTSS Assessment Data, MTSS for Secondary

    One of the most challenging parts of my work as a High School Administrator was coaching my teachers and staff on the importance of making decisions based on assessment data. During my initial one-on-one meetings with my teachers and staff, I would ask them, “What assessment data are you using to drive your decision-making and instruction to meet the needs of your students? Most times, I would get a blank stare, or as my nephew says, I would hear crickets. Other times I would receive a response like this: “I did not need a test to tell me; I just know my students.”

    The Importance of Social-Emotional Learning in Secondary School

    SEL and Behavior, MTSS Practice, Interventions and Learning Supports' Strategies, MTSS for Secondary

    In education, I know what keeps me awake at night.

    I would imagine that each professional in their chosen career, when asked, could identify the thing that keeps them up at night. For the day trader, it might be an unexpected stock market crash. The comedian could lie awake in fear of an empty auditorium. Restless nights may come to the dentist who lays awake thinking of drilling the wrong tooth, or the professional athlete who misses the field goal to miss the playoffs.

    4 Ways Electives and Arts Classes Support MTSS

    MTSS Practice, MTSS for Secondary

    One of my favorite memories as an artistic and creative child was when the “art lady” came on Fridays to my 4th-grade class. She would introduce a project, and we got to pull out those crayons and paints we stored in our desks. We learned to do “stained glass” with tissue paper, draw pumpkins, and learn what to do when we made mistakes. 

    How MTSS Provides Foundational Support in High School

    MTSS for Secondary

    As a former MTSS coordinator, I always anxiously awaited universal screener results. I wanted to know every single student who needed support and interventions. Optimistically, I believed that once all students on my high school campus had been identified as needing additional support, we, as a school community, would quickly begin creating interventions and support plans to ensure all of our students were successful. 

    5 Practical Reading Comprehension Strategies for Secondary Students

    Interventions and Learning Supports' Strategies, MTSS for Secondary
    According to the Nations Report Card, in 2019, only 34% of 8th-grade
    students read at grade level.
    Unfortunately, gaps in reading skills have continued to grow since that time, not just as a whole but also between racial and economic subgroups. Because reading is essential for success in every content area throughout secondary school, helping students with reading deficits is every middle and high school teacher’s job, not just the interventionist or language arts teacher. 

    How To Empower Secondary Teachers Through MTSS

    MTSS Practice, MTSS for Secondary

    I am the first to admit that I didn’t even know how to get my students more intense help for many years. As a new 7th Grade ELA teacher, I just thought I was failing as a teacher. As I gained experience and training, specifically in English as a Second language, I learned how to make my instruction more accessible and to identify those students that needed help beyond core instruction. In many ways, I remained at a loss for how to provide the intervention they needed.

    Implementing MTSS at the Secondary Level: Answering 4 Common Questions

    MTSS Practice, MTSS for Secondary

    We all enjoy the collegial swapping of stories from our early days of teaching and chatting about the teaching memories we have collected over the years. This dialogue of shared experiences is extremely valuable as it can provide some laughs, illustrate how far we have come, and remind us that we are not alone, especially as we continue to learn new skills or take on new initiatives.

    Giving Students Agency With a Seat at the MTSS Table

    MTSS Practice, MTSS for Secondary, MTSS for Elementary

    Every year I head to my doctor's appointment for my annual check-up. This year, I thought about all the screeners that the doctor used to determine my overall health, as well as the conversation we had in her office as we sat at the table reviewing my results.