When will tiered interventions be added to the Second Step® Elementary and Second Step® Middle School digital programs?
They will be added on August 22, 2025.
Why are you adding tiered interventions?
We want to make it easier to make a difference. Our goal is simple: help educators, leaders, and districts support the development of human skills in real classrooms without adding stress, extra tools, or steep learning curves. Every update this year, including our tiered interventions and Assessment Toolkit, is designed to remove barriers so educators can focus on what matters most. We continually improve our digital programs and want to ensure that you can meet a wider range of student needs with our K–8 programs, eliminating the need for additional external intervention tools.
Will it cost anything to enable tiered interventions on a Second Step® K–8 license?
No, it’s an included resource that will add value to the Second Step Elementary and Second Step Middle School digital programs at no additional charge. Educators with an active K–8 license will have the option to access it upon release.
What tiered interventions are you adding?
- Tier 2 lessons
- Tier 3 resources
- Assessment Toolkit
How do Second Step® Tier 2 lessons relate to our existing Second Step® Elementary and Second Step® Middle School digital programs?
The Tier 1 curriculum is designed as a universal foundation, ensuring that all students receive consistent instruction in core human skills, such as collaboration, problem-solving, growth mindset, and resilience. The Tier 2 lessons are designed as targeted interventions to support an identified skill gap or need. These are often delivered in small groups of students who require more assistance than what’s provided to all students through the Tier 1 curriculum. Tier 2 interventions are meant to be built upon a strong Tier 1 foundation, as universal instruction provides essential skill development, common language, and a shared framework for reinforcing these key concepts in more targeted settings.
While our new Tier 2 lessons are specifically designed for intervention, we recognize that some educators successfully adapt Tier 1 lessons to meet the individualized needs of students requiring additional support. However, for optimal effectiveness, we recommend using the Tier 1 curriculum in conjunction with Tier 2 interventions, rather than as a standalone intervention, to ensure students receive both broad exposure and targeted skill reinforcement.
This integrated approach aligns with multi-tiered intervention models and best practices in human skills development, ensuring that students not only receive the support they need but also benefit from a cohesive, schoolwide framework.
What key concepts will the Tier 2 lessons address?
They’ll cover the following key skill areas:
- Emotions, Thoughts & Feelings (such as managing strong emotions, stress, anxiety)
- Relationships & Prosocial Skills (such as problem-solving, social conflict resolution, empathy and kindness, perspective-taking, active listening)
- Executive Functioning (such as on-task behaviors, inhibitory control, cognitive flexibility)
These skill areas are also the names of the three focus sections within Second Step Tiered Interventions, with interventions for behavior included within those three sections.
What grade bands will they cover?
Each focus area will have developmentally appropriate, age-differentiated lessons for three grade bands: K–2, 3–5, 6–8.
How can I sample a Tier 2 lesson?
View a sample Tier 2 lesson from each grade band (K–2, 3–5, or 6–8).
How many lessons are there?
There are six lessons for each grade band in each of the three focus areas. So, there are 18 lessons per grade band and 54 lessons in total.
Do you provide training and support ?
Yes! Similar to Second Step Elementary and Second Step Middle School digital Tier 1 programs, the Tier 2 supports will include training, implementation support, and family resources to ensure a successful rollout.
What are the main components of the Assessment Toolkit?
The toolkit includes three complementary tools:
- Universal screener (Grades 3–8): A brief, research-backed student self-report survey
- Teacher-report human skills rubric (Grades K–8): A quick, teacher-friendly rating form that can be used to assist teachers with the Tier 2 referral process
- Intervention fidelity and student progress tracker (Grades K–8): An all-in-one downloadable Excel spreadsheet to monitor intervention fidelity and individual student’s progress throughout an intervention period
What benefits does the Second Step® Tiered Interventions Assessment Toolkit provide schools?
The Assessment Toolkit empowers you to make informed, data-driven decisions about student support. It helps identify students’ strengths and areas for growth (highlighting what students do well) and is grounded in research. It also enables you to track intervention fidelity and individual student progress throughout the intervention period.
How does the Assessment Toolkit align with the K–8 curricula?
The toolkit’s areas assessed map directly to the Second Step Tier 2 small-group lesson topics for Grades K–8, ensuring seamless curriculum alignment. It assesses student strengths that align with three critical domains targeted in Tier 2 interventions, which ladder up to the broader themes of the Tier 1 curriculum:
- Emotions, Thoughts & Feelings: Understanding and regulating emotions, thoughts, feelings, and related behaviors
- Relationships & Prosocial Skills: Relationship skills, interacting positively with others
- Executive Functioning: Focusing, self-control, planning, and problem-solving
When should I use the Assessment Toolkit?
It’s designed to be flexible, so use it to best fit your school’s needs. It can be used as a:
- Pre- and post-assessment: Administer the universal screener and/or rubric at the beginning and end of a Tier 2 intervention cycle to measure student growth over time. This provides a clear before-and-after snapshot of how students are improving in developing human skills.
- Tier 2 identification: Optionally, use the student screener as a universal screening tool (for example, fall screening) to proactively identify which students may need additional Tier 2 support. The screener is brief and easy to roll out, so you can efficiently flag students who might otherwise be overlooked. It can also be re-administered to check whether students receiving Tier 2 interventions are benefiting.
- Progress monitoring tool: Educators are recommended to use the progress monitoring tool throughout an intervention period to monitor intervention fidelity (for example, student attendance and implementation fidelity) as well as individual student’s progress toward their skill goals. The tool will be embedded in Second Step K–8 digital programs as an Excel spreadsheet that educators can download and keep updated. Educators can update the spreadsheet every time they teach a Tier 2 lesson.
Will the Assessment Toolkit create a compliance burden?
No, using this toolkit does not automatically trigger any formal compliance requirements or mandated processes. You remain in control of how to act on the results. If you choose to treat it as an official screener, it has the rigor to serve that purpose. But if not, it simply functions as an informative tool for your team. In short, you get valuable data without added red tape or unintended obligations. The intervention fidelity and student progress tracker is a downloadable Excel spreadsheet and can be easily integrated into the school’s current information management system.
How easy is it to use the toolkit?
The Assessment Toolkit is designed for ease of use.
- Short and to the point: The student-report universal screener consists of only 20 simple items, and the teacher-report human skills rubric covers three essential skill categories with straightforward rating scales.
- Quick to administer: Data collection fits seamlessly into the school day without overburdening staff or students.
- Easy to interpret: The toolkit provides clear scoring guides and visuals to help interpret results at a glance.
- Clear instructions: The toolkit includes clear and thorough instructions and guidance for use and enables a smooth onboarding process for educators.
Do I have to use the Second Step® Tiered Interventions Assessment Toolkit, or can I continue to use my own assessment tool?
Use of the Assessment Toolkit is completely optional and is not required. It’s designed for schools and districts that don’t already have an assessment in place to identify students who may need additional support. You have the flexibility to choose which assessment tool you’d like to use. We also offer tips about integrating your own assessments or data. The goal is to help you form a complete picture of student needs using all available information.
What research supports Second Step® Tiered interventions?
Our approach is grounded in research demonstrating the effectiveness of both human skills programs and tiered support frameworks in improving student outcomes. Specifically, we follow best practices from established intervention frameworks, such as:
- Multi-Tiered System of Supports (MTSS)
- Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning (CASEL) Framework
- Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports (PBIS)
- Response to Intervention (RTI)
These frameworks emphasize data-driven decision-making, tiered intervention strategies, and research-based instructional practices, all of which inform our design of Tier 2 supports.
We have conducted thorough literature reviews to identify evidence-based and developmentally appropriate intervention practices that focus on key skill areas for the diverse needs of students.
Additionally, we’re working closely with educators, school leaders, and counselors to ensure that our strategies are practical for real-world classroom implementation. Through ongoing research, educator testing, and iterative feedback cycles, we’re building tiered supports that not only promote student success but also seamlessly integrate into existing schoolwide intervention efforts.