Multi-Tiered System of Supports, or MTSS, is a term used to describe an evidence-based model of schooling that uses data-based problem solving to integrate academic and behavioral instruction and intervention (Florida’s MTSS Project). This definition brings together the worlds of academic instruction and behavioral intervention. The MTSS movement is catching on because it is now understood that you cannot separate academic performance from social/emotional learning.
The third step in the Personal Responsibility Map, which is the core assessment in our Personal Responsibility—Achieving Academic and Career Goals program, is Values Congruence.
A value is a belief about what is good, just and beautiful. Values move us to action or to a way of behaving or acting. Values Congruence is the ability to have a healthy balance between values, beliefs and goals.
Why is it important to have values that match your goals? When your values are congruent or consistent with your goals, you are more likely to follow through and achieve your goals.
In the MTSS process, helping your students identify goals should be the first step in the intervention process (See MECA—Interest Indicator). The second step is to help connect goals to personal values. Remember, values is what are important to your students. They were created at a very early age and are a key motivator for success in their lives. Connecting goals to values creates motivation to learn and to achieve personal goals.
How Are Values Developed?
Values are ideas, things, or actions that are important to a certain group of people. Agreed-upon values represent ideals for an entire group or society. Ideals are things that are considered good enough or worth enough to be copied or imitated.
Your values were developed at a very early age. The process of developing values begins as soon are you are born. Your parents, caregivers, siblings, teachers and friends all influenced your values. Books, television, internet, social media, music, schools, churches, and workplaces are all things that may have had an effect on your values. As you experience these things, your values will be affected by them, either positively or negatively.
Whose Values?
One of the most important things about dealing with values is to understand the idea of ownership. By ownership, we mean that the value is owned by you. No one can force his or her values upon anyone else.
Values Are Affected by Your Beliefs
Your belief system is what you believe about yourself and others, and it is the direct result of what you say to yourself, self-talk and your thoughts about yourself. Self-talk produces a picture of yourself in your mind that only you can see. This, in turn, produces your belief system. Every experience, whether it is positive or negative, results in self-talk in your mind. Experiences stir in your feelings and your feelings affect what you say and think about yourself.
Teaching your students to pay attention to their self-talk is critical to their personal success in school and in life. Teach your students to eliminate negative self-talk and replace it with positive self-talk.
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