Curriculum 101: MTSS Basics

It’s lab day; the microscopes are out, and you’re eagerly awaiting your turn to look into the lens at the layers and particles of whatever specimen you’ve pinned to the glass.

As you were trained, you start with the lowest level of magnification. You want to get to the most granular level, so you move to the next-highest lens. Then the next-highest.

Once you’re looking down at your specimen at the highest magnification, you focus the lens until everything is clear.

In times like these, it’s not a good idea to switch immediately to the highest level of magnification because you could skip past the proper level of magnification for this specimen. Or worse, you could accidentally damage your equipment.

However, once you’ve assessed a safe distance between the slide and the lens, you can switch back and forth between the lenses to see the slide with unique levels of detail.

The Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) framework is a lot like this. It starts with the base tier of support (high-quality instructional, behavioral, and emotional support), which is designed to meet the needs of all students. Even students who are receiving more support will still receive the first tier.

Students who have more specific, intense needs receive the second tier of support. The third tier of support is for students who need a much closer look than students in the other two tiers.

While the educator supporting these students may need to start with diagnostics that place students at certain levels of support, with MTSS, they can flow from one level of support to the next depending on their level of confidence, their assessment data, and even their behavioral needs.

We’ll get into what all of this means, but first, let’s start with some definitions.

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What is MTSS?

MTSS is a framework. Essentially, it provides the basic foundations for educators to use best practices and their own systems to support students at their various levels of need.

Picture a house in the suburbs. Before paneling is built, before drywall is put on, a frame is built that can support the house and everything it entails. The house can vary widely in appearance once all of the floors, walls, and windows are put in, but the suburb has standardized the frame of the house. Each frame will look the same.

A framework requires that many things stay the same, while some of the details (the method and the means) can vary based on the teacher, the school, and the system of support they choose to implement.

One of those standardized pieces of the framework (meaning, it stays the same no matter which method is used) is the “support” part of the multi-tiered systems of support.

MTSS has three tiers of student support.

Tier 1 includes all students. The Center on Multi-Tiered Systems of Support defines this tier as “high-quality, school-wide academic, social, emotional, and behavioral programming and supports designed to meet the needs of all students.” Essentially, providing a high-quality education fulfills the requirements for Tier 1.

Tier 2 is for students who need additional support outside of the standard programming. These are “small group, standardized interventions” for students who are “at-risk.” 

Often, these “standardized” interventions are purchased as part of a program-wide initiative. Therefore, all students across a department receive the same Tier 2 programming.

Tier 3 is for intensive intervention that is customized to the individual student.

We’ll explore these tiers more in our MTSS deep dive, but for now, let’s discuss some frequently asked questions and concerns about starting out in MTSS.

What are the four pillars of MTSS?

The four pillars, or components, of MTSS are like its core tenets. These four things are essential to properly supporting students at their various levels.

Screening requires that educators use a process to identify students who need additional support. This process will depend on the school and the systems they have in place for data collection and analysis; however, the data must come from valid, reliable sources.

Progress monitoring is as straightforward as it sounds. Educators must use a system to regularly monitor the progress of students in each tier. This data should also be used to improve the system itself to drive better and better outcomes for students.

The Multi-level prevention system includes the three tiers of support we’ve just described. 

Data-based decision-making includes the use of screening, progress monitoring, and the three tiers of support to make decisions about student growth and system improvement.

If you’re a regular Eduphoria reader or webinar viewer, you know that we try to implement these four core tenets in many of our resources. Data-based decision-making is a must, not just for school leaders but also for teachers, support staff, coaches, and any educators who support students in their daily lives.

That being said, MTSS doesn’t have to be a confusing or overwhelming new system to implement. If you are building data-minded systems that already use these core tenets, then you’re well on your way to an MTSS-based system.

How is MTSS different from RTI?

Many of you will be familiar with Response to Intervention (RTI). RTI typically groups students into multiple support levels, providing them with more intense, individualized support at each level of need.

Sound familiar?

That’s because RTI is a form of MTSS. It is a multi-tiered system of support that is often used to identify, monitor, and support struggling students using data-based interventions.

Like most systems of support, RTI resources can be purchased, so the program is standardized across departments and grade levels.

The major difference between RTI and MTSS may also depend on local norms. With RTI, students aren’t considered for disability screening or passed onto a Speech Language Pathologist until RTI has failed to help them improve.

With MTSS overall, it’s strongly encouraged that these needs of every student, including learning differences and disabilities, are considered at every level of the three tiers of support. In fact, students may flow between each level of support every unit, every week, or every class period. 

Conversely, in RTI, students progress through each level depending on their progress. When they’ve been moved to the third level of support, the first and second tier were proven to be insufficient for them through progress monitoring techniques like assessments.

What is the purpose of an MTSS program?

One word you’ll see a lot in MTSS resources is “preventative.” Supporting students at their various levels means using data to prevent students from falling behind. It’s proactive, so we aren’t reacting to data trends too far after they will be helpful for the student. By working with students to predict their needs and accommodating them as they arise, educators can stay ahead of the curve on behavior, student growth, and performance.

In practice, prevention and proactivity means frequent and ongoing data collection. As a result, educators who support students look at the most relevant, up-to-date information on the student's needs so they can make the most informed decisions about that student’s growth.

With an MTSS program, teachers have a guide of sorts to help them establish a cadence of data collection, build a toolbelt of interventions, and implement best practices with a support network of administrators, teaching assistants, and curriculum specialists.

Want to learn more about MTSS?

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