Teach by Design transforms complex research into straight-forward solutions. We give K-12 leaders and educators tools and strategies you need to make your classrooms more effective and equitable places where you spend more time teaching and less time negotiating student behavior. Every second Tuesday of the month we will come out with a new article designed to help you with a common problem.
Then, catch a new episode of Expert Instruction: The Teach by Design Podcast every third Tuesday of the month and listen in on our conversations with researchers, practitioners, and community members who do this work every day.
Implementing PBIS means continuously looking for ways to improve what you already do. Let’s kickstart that effort right now!
Action plan
Assessment
School-Wide
Survey
Implementation
Here are some of our reflections on a year’s worth of research findings, practical strategies, and a whole lot of GIFs.
Assessment
Data-based decision making
Evaluate
School-Wide
Action plan
An end-of-year evaluation is a data story you tell to students, families, and staff about the work you’ve accomplished and how they helped achieve these outcomes alongside your team. Here's how to tell your story this year.
Action plan
Assessment
Data-based decision making
Evaluate
Report
Answering just three questions will set you and your team on a data-driven path toward improving equitable outcomes in your schoolwide implementation.
Equity
Data-based decision making
Fidelity
Outcome
Implementing PBIS means committing to the long-game, but when you do it with fidelity, you'll see results.
Action plan
Assessment
Data-based decision making
Implementation
Incorporating student, family, community, and faculty feedback in your PBIS implementation ensures your systems and practices reflect and support everyone in your building.
Assessment
Climate
Equity
Implementation
Survey
Learn which classroom-level systems and practices you already have in place and use this resource roundup to make your awesome classroom even better.
Classroom
Action plan
Fidelity
We continue our series exploring the PBIS framework and its features. Today, we're talking about your schoolwide team, who should be on it and which procedures will help you do your most effective work ever.
Assessment
Action plan
Group
Systems
Evaluate
PBIS is a framework, but what does that mean? Here are the systems, practices, and data you need to implement to support your schoolwide efforts.
Assessment
Evaluate
Fidelity
Implementation
Here are some of our reflections on a year’s worth of research findings, practical strategies, and a whole lot of GIFs.
Implementation
Behavior
Data-based decision making
Equity
Evaluate
Too often, our PBIS implementation doesn't include school mental health data, systems, and practices. The Interconnected Systems Framework is one way to leverage your systems so students get the social, emotional, and behavioral support they need sooner.
Mental Health
Data-based decision making
Systems
Supporting student behavior continues to be a top concern in schools across the country. Before layering on additional support, we have to confirm the basics are firmly in place.
Assessment
Fidelity
Referral
School-Wide
Tier 1
Once you’ve named a schoolwide vulnerable decision point, then what? You implement solutions, of course. Here are a few to get you started.
Action plan
Behavior
Discipline
Equity
Implementation
When it comes to identifying the situations most vulnerable to inequitable decisions, it helps to define the problem with precision. Want to know how?
Equity
Data-based decision making
Action plan
If your PBIS implementation fell by the wayside last year, we’re here to tell you it’s not too late to make a comeback. Here are four components to tackle sooner rather than later to set up your reboot for a successful start.
Assessment
Fidelity
Implementation
School-Wide
When students play, they do more than blow off steam; they practice social, emotional, behavioral, and sometimes academic skills. So how can we incorporate more time to play during the day? Research has some ideas.
Social Skills
Research
Early Childhood
Keep your classroom calm by leveraging your existing school-wide systems and practices.
Behavior
Classroom
Your school has a mission statement. What about a purpose statement? This is your 4-step process to committing your school’s purpose to paper.
School-Wide
Individual
Climate
Motivation
Systems
Here are some of our reflections on a year’s worth of research findings, practical strategies, and a whole lot of GIFs.
Classroom
Climate
Implementation
Summary
Research
Mental health and social-emotional learning were trending topics at this year’s Association for Positive Behavior Supports Conference. These are 12 tips, tricks, and resources we learned from the experts that can support everyone’s mental health in your school.
Classroom
Research
School-Wide
Systems
Social Skills
When it comes to using data, nothing beats a solid process to guide the decisions you make. Here are five key factors to take your decision-making process to the next level.
Data-based decision making
Action plan
Measure
Report
Systems
So, you asked your students, families, and staff to take a survey about your school climate. What do you do with all the data you collected? You go through it all one step at a time.
Survey
School-Wide
Climate
Report
Whether you find yourself starting at the bottom or you’re ready to level up, here are some ideas to incorporate student perspectives in your school.
Classroom
Implementation
Data-based decision making
Climate
Social Relationships
While we practice self-care, it’s also important to examine the systems creating our stressful environments and find ways to change them. The WRAP process is just the thing to jumpstart those conversations.
Data-based decision making
Climate
Measure
Have you ever made a decision and wondered if there's something you might have missed? Here are four ways to expand your problem-solving perspective and explore new solutions to some of your most challenging decisions.
Data-based decision making
Tier 2
We could all use some go-to strategies for managing the stress in our lives right now. Here are 10 ideas for how to handle the stress responses in your classroom.
Behavior
School-Wide
Climate
As your students come back to the classroom, investing in relationships and fostering a sense of belonging should be at the top of your list of to-dos. Here are some ways to start radically welcoming students in your classroom.
Climate
Social Relationships
School-Wide
Behavior
To close out the year, we’re celebrating the wins you experienced in spite of the chaos.
Implementation
School-Wide
Outcome
Climate
It doesn't have to be a heavy lift. Here are 14 small things you can do to make improving everyone's mental health a priority in your school.
School-Wide
Social Skills
Individual
Behavior
Walk with us on a journey through the past year as we explore the four phases of crisis recovery and how PBIS practices supported us every step of the way.
School-Wide
Intensive
Implementation
What's your definition of respectful behavior? How would your students define it? Get on the same page by creating something called a behavior dictionary.
Climate
Behavior
Equity
Individual
Creating a supportive environment requires addressing policies, procedures, and a school’s physical space. Here are some tips to make your school's environment more welcoming and culturally relevant to students.
Climate
Equity
School-Wide
Social Relationships
Give students ownership over the way their school feels and center their voices in your school's PBIS implementation.
Equity
Implementation
School-Wide
Climate
Embedding culturally responsive practices in PBIS implementation requires creating a space where all students’ identities are affirmed and validated from the moment they walk in the building.
Equity
Climate
School-Wide
Social Relationships
Find out how one teacher uses classroom management to prevent problem behaviors from getting out of hand.
Discipline
Distance Learning
Behavior
Social Skills
Equity
If your team will meet virtually for any part of this school year, here are some ways to adapt your meeting processes based on your new, remote reality.
Social Skills
Distance Learning
Social Relationships
Group
Don’t look for brand new ways to manage student behavior during distance learning; look for small changes you can make to your strong classroom management strategies.
Data-based decision making
Distance Learning
Managing classroom behaviors when students are physically in front of you is challenging. How on earth are you supposed to respond to problem behaviors over the internet? First, breathe…
Behavior
Distance Learning
Implementation
While your students are at home, families might benefit from those strong school-level PBIS structures you know and love. This is my family's experience attempting to create normalcy in the middle of a pandemic.
Distance Learning
Action plan
Implementation
Motivation
Successfully implementing individual student supports can be challenging. Incorporating data in the process makes the path to success so much clearer.
Action plan
Individual
Targeted
Data-based decision making
Outcome
Addressing disproportionality is a complex process…however, the complexity of this work should not deter us from having courageous conversations about our systems.
Equity
Implementation
Systems
Data is a four letter word, but it doesn’t have to be one that causes your team anxiety. Embrace a data routine and start looking forward to using your data to improve decision making and outcomes for students!
Data-based decision making
Behavior
School-Wide
Outcome
To break a habit of reacting to every problem behavior, we need to turn our intuitive, knee-jerk responses into deliberate, practiced actions.
Discipline
Behavior
Outcome
Implementation
Climate
When it comes to our referral process, knowing what subjective behaviors like defiance and disrespect feel like isn’t enough. We need to define them precisely and we better do it fast.
Behavior
Data-based decision making
Equity
Measure
If you think your referral process is written in stone, think again. You can adjust it to fit your style without sacrificing fidelity.
Behavior
Data Integrity
Discipline
Implementation
Your school's systems work together to make sure you’re collecting the right information in the right way at the right time. When it comes to improving student outcomes, everything starts with your discipline systems.
Data Integrity
Outcome
Data-based decision making
Looking for a little inspiration to carry you into the upcoming school year? Here are 12 books to check out...preferably poolside.
Research
Behavior
Climate
Equity
If meetings are going to be part of your work, don't let them be a waste of time. Here are 28 hacks to make your next meeting the best one yet.
Social Skills
Social Relationships
Climate
Using data to make decisions is important. What role does your intuition play in the process?
Data-based decision making
Survey
Implementation
In all the ways educational research is juicy and full of promise, the way we talk about research findings can be overly complicated. If a journal article loses us at its abstract, those findings don’t stand a chance to see the light of day in a classroom.
Fidelity
Implementation
Data-based decision making
Numerous studies confirm that actively engaged families play a major role in improving academic and behavior outcomes for their students. It's time to stop simply involving families and start really engaging them.
Climate
School-Wide
Social Relationships
Assessment
Team-based decision making is how your school operates. How can you turn those teams into effective decision makers while avoiding the parts about group work that make you want to scream?
Climate
Social Relationships
Social Skills
Sometimes telling someone what to do works. Most of the time, mandates from above do little to inspire actual change. Getting support from staff members is critical if you plan to sustain any program in your school over the long-haul.
Social Relationships
Implementation
Data-based decision making
The higher your fidelity score, the better your odds for improving student outcomes. How well you can match the intervention to your context matters almost as much.
Implementation
Fidelity
Survey
Nearly every school reports suspension data at the end of the year. If improving academic outcomes is on your list of goals for next year, don't just send your suspension data to the state; use it.
Discipline
Data-based decision making
Behavior
Knowing the function of a student's behavior is the difference between creating a support plan that works versus creating one that makes things worse.
Motivation
Behavior
Data-based decision making
While we cannot guarantee a violent incident will never occur at our school or in our community, there are measures we can take to reduce the probability.
Climate
Social Relationships
Here are 13 ideas to get you thinking about what you'll do when spring is here...as told by hilarious cat GIFs.
Action plan
Climate
Setting goals comes as a standard practice for school teams. Once you've mastered the SMART goal, what else is there?
Motivation
Action plan
When students are rewarded and they don’t know why, the reward doesn’t work. What can we do to offer rewards that encourage students to start doing the things we want them to do?
Behavior
Motivation
Discipline
Looking for specific ODR patterns helps you offer support to the students who benefit from it the most. The best time to identify these students relies upon a little method we like to call The October Catch.
Behavior
Data-based decision making
Research tells us how to set up schools to sustain PBIS implementation...and what to do if you think they may be dabbling in abandoning everything.
Implementation
Data-based decision making
Check-In Check-Out is a great way to help students manage their behavior when they need just a little more practice. Learn about common pitfalls and simple strategies to make your CICO program run smoothly.
Behavior
Implementation
Individual
Targeted
Action planning doesn't have to be an after thought. With a little strategy, you can transform your conversations from all talk to real action items.
Action plan
Implementation
Team Initiated Problem Solving (TIPS) co-author Anne Todd gives 5 things you can do right now to get more out of your team meetings.
Group
Social Relationships
Data-based decision making
School-Wide
Data Integrity