From Principles to Practice: Tools for More Equitable MTSS Decisions

“Intervention is not a hold harmless proposition.”

Good systems are built on sound principles.

Great systems have processes and tools that make those principles easier to implement consistently.

From Principles to Implementation

In my last blog, I shared six design principles for creating more equitable MTSS systems for multilingual learners.

We need to consider growth rather than relying only on static benchmarks. We need strong, linguistically appropriate Tier I instruction. We need to use assessments for their intended purposes, provide appropriate tiered supports, engage in collaborative problem solving, and continuously examine whether the patterns we see represent student needs or systems needs.

Those principles give us a foundation.

But leaders still have to build the processes that allow people to put them into practice. That is one of the challenges of systems leadership. We can't depend on every educator remembering every piece of research or independently making the same judgment. We have to design processes, protocols, tools, and agreements that help people consistently make better decisions.

The goal is to make the right work easier to do.

In our work with multilingual learners and MTSS, two tools have become particularly useful: the Reading/Language Matrix and MTSS Team Agreements.

Together, they help turn principles into repeatable practice.

Six Principles for Equitable MTSS

Before looking at the tools, let's quickly revisit the six principles from the previous blog.

1. Response to Intervention: Decisions should focus on student growth toward proficiency, not simply whether students meet static benchmarks.

2. Critical Importance of Tier I: Students need access to effective, linguistically appropriate core instruction before we assume additional intervention is the solution.

3. Appropriate Use of Assessment: Screeners, diagnostic assessments, and progress monitors serve different purposes and should be used accordingly.

4. Short-Term Tiered Supports: Students should have access to increasingly intensive support based on need and progress, while continuing to receive core instruction and required English language development services.

5. Collaborative Team Problem Solving: Qualified educators should bring multiple sources of data, student history, and expertise—including second language acquisition—to decisions about student needs.

6. Continuous Improvement: Teams should monitor both student progress and the effectiveness of the system itself, continually asking whether the data reveal a student issue or a systems issue.

Those are important principles.

But what processes help a team actually do all six?

The Reading/Language Matrix: Putting Context Back Into the Data

One of the tools we've used to support this work is the Reading/Language Matrix. The concept is fairly simple. Instead of looking at a student's reading performance in isolation, we examine it alongside the student's oral English language proficiency.

That relationship matters.

A reading score tells us how a student performed on a particular assessment. It doesn't necessarily tell us why the student performed that way.

For multilingual learners, that distinction is critical because every assessment administered in English is also influenced, to some degree, by English proficiency.

The Reading/Language Matrix gives teams a structure for putting those pieces of information together.

It doesn't make the decision for the team.

It helps the team make a better decision.

And importantly, it supports all six principles of equitable MTSS.

The Reading/Language Matrix

Start by plotting each student's overall reading score in conjunction with their oral language proficiency. You'll see in the matrix below that that the y-axis represents reading proficiency and the y-axis represents oral language proficiency. Green boxes are expected targets for second language students. As their English language proficiency increases, so should their overall reading proficiency. When that is not the case, students will end up in yellow or red boxes. These indicated the potential for more reading support.

1. More Accurate Screening Decisions

Think back to the activity from the last blog where I asked you to describe your favorite vacation without using any word containing the letter N.

If I evaluated your writing without knowing about that constraint, I might reach some pretty inaccurate conclusions about your ability.

Context changes the meaning of the data. The same principle applies to screening multilingual learners.

A universal screener is designed to flag potential risk. It tells us:

“We should look more closely at this student.”

It does not tell us:

“This student needs intervention.”

The Reading/Language Matrix helps provide some of that necessary context by considering reading performance alongside language proficiency.

Instead of automatically moving from a low screener score to intervention, the team has a process for investigating what that score might actually mean.

2. Better Expectations for Growth

Response to Intervention has an important word in the middle: Response.

We should be examining how students respond to instruction over time.

For multilingual learners, that means our expectations for growth need to consider where students are starting both academically and linguistically.

A student may remain below a static grade-level benchmark while simultaneously making significant progress in reading and English language development.

If we only look at the benchmark, we may miss the growth.

The Reading/Language Matrix helps shift the conversation from:

“Is this student at benchmark?”

to:

“Given where this student started, are they making the growth we would expect?”

That's a very different conversation.

And it leads to very different decisions.

3. Better Tier I Conversations

The matrix also helps us move beyond individual students.

Remember one of the central questions from our systems-thinking work:

Are we seeing a student issue or a systems issue?

Suppose one multilingual learner is struggling despite receiving strong, linguistically appropriate Tier I instruction. We should investigate that student's individual needs.

But suppose a large percentage of multilingual learners are demonstrating the same pattern.

That's different.

Systems thinkers look for patterns.

Rather than immediately referring large numbers of students for Tier II intervention, we should ask what the pattern tells us about Tier I instruction, English language development, curriculum, scheduling, professional learning, or other parts of the system.

You can't Tier II your way out of a Tier I problem.

4. Better Matching of Supports

The Reading/Language Matrix also helps teams think more carefully about what kind of support a student needs.

Two students can have very similar reading scores and require very different instructional responses.

One may primarily need additional reading support.

Another may primarily need additional language development.

A third may need both.

That's why simply identifying a student as "below benchmark" isn't enough.

Remember our commitment from the previous blog:

Do no harm.

If we misunderstand the need, we can provide the wrong support. Worse, we may remove a student from instruction they actually need in order to provide an intervention they don't.

The goal isn't simply to provide more support.

It's to provide the right support.

5. Better Collaborative Problem Solving

One of my favorite uses of the Reading/Language Matrix happens when we put it on the table during an MTSS meeting.

Now the classroom teacher, EL teacher, interventionist, administrator, and other specialists aren't simply bringing separate pieces of data and separate perspectives.

They have a common framework for examining how those pieces fit together.

This connects directly to systems thinking.

Systems thinkers look for relationships.

The matrix helps make the relationship between reading performance and language development visible.

That doesn't eliminate the need for professional judgment.

It improves the conditions under which that professional judgment occurs.

6. Better Continuous Improvement

Finally, don't just use the Reading/Language Matrix one student at a time.

Zoom out.

• What happens when we look across classrooms?

• Grade levels?

• Schools?

• Are students moving over time?

• Where are they getting stuck?

• Which instructional supports appear to be producing growth?

Those patterns provide information about more than individual students. They provide information about the system.

That's when the Reading/Language Matrix moves from being a student-level decision-making tool to becoming a continuous improvement tool.

Tools Need Processes Around Them

Of course, putting a good tool in front of a team doesn't automatically create a good decision.

Teams also need shared processes for how they will use the information.

That's why another important part of our work has been developing MTSS Team Agreements.

These agreements capture some of the core principles we want teams to return to whenever they make decisions about multilingual learners.

For example, our teams agree that:

• Do no harm. We consider the potential cost of intervention as well as its potential benefit.

• Growth matters. Language acquisition and closing academic gaps take time.

• Response to Intervention means examining response. Decisions should consider growth over time, not simply single-point data.

• Screeners don't diagnose. They identify potential risk that requires additional investigation.

• Language proficiency matters. Academic performance must be interpreted in the context of language development.

• Interventions must be linguistically appropriate.

• Additional intervention should not replace English language development services.

These agreements do something important.

They turn principles into decision rules.

A team doesn't have to start from scratch every time a student comes to the table. The team has already established some shared beliefs about how evidence will be interpreted and how decisions will be made.

The Reading/Language Matrix helps organize the evidence.

The Team Agreements help organize the decision-making process.

Together, they make consistent implementation more likely.

A Quick Test for Your MTSS Process

At your next MTSS meeting, consider these three questions:

1. What tool helps our team interpret academic performance in the context of language development?

2. What process ensures that a low screener score leads to investigation rather than automatic intervention?

3. What shared agreements guide our team when educators interpret the same student data differently?

If the answers depend primarily on who happens to be sitting at the table, you may have great people.

But you don't yet have a great system.

A More Complex Application: Dual Language

These decisions become even more complex in dual language schools.

Now teams aren't simply considering the relationship between reading and language development in English. They need to examine a student's development across two languages.

A student may demonstrate different reading strengths in English and Spanish.

Language proficiency may differ significantly between languages.

The team may need to determine not only whether additional support is necessary, but what that support should address and in which language it should occur.

That complexity makes good processes even more important.

We've developed an MTSS process specifically for dual language schools that helps teams work through these questions systematically, including examining reading and language data across both languages and determining the most appropriate language for additional reading support.

If you work in a dual language school and would like a copy of the MTSS process we've developed for making intervention decisions across two languages, email me at chadransom@compassedvantage.com, and I'll send it to you.