IB Schools: Stop the SEL Chaos. Here is the Blueprint You've Been Waiting For.
By Emily J. Thomas
Are you a leader or a member of the learning support team at an IB Continuum school? Then you know the ever-moving target that is creating a sustainable continuum for Social-Emotional Learning (SEL).
Having spent much of my career involved in the project of building an advisory curriculum in an IB secondary school, I know firsthand how challenging it is and how much can fall on the shoulders of the counselors and other members of the learning community. Often, counselors are the least empowered to lead this work, due to the fact that schools seldom make it a point to upskill learning support teachers and counselors in the specific language and approach of IB programmes.
Thus, counselors are left with the unenviable task of articulating a stand-alone curriculum for IB students (whom they often do not teach) that incorporates the terminology and ideas offered by the IB without really knowing much about the IB themselves.
I recently presented a workshop at the ISCA Virtual Conference in October 2025 titled “Weaving the ISCA Standards and the IB Curricular Framework to Help Students Flourish”. The session focused on this exact challenge and offered practical strategies for making the alignment meaningful rather than theoretical. (The 30-minute recording is available to all attendees through the ISCA Virtual Conference platform).
The Problem: The Endless Cycle of “What is our SEL Curriculum?”
Trying to build a meaningful and articulated SEL system across PYP, MYP, and CP/DP can feel like herding cats. We love the Approaches to Learning (ATL) skills, but, when it comes right down to it: getting everyone on the same page, with the same language, about what those skills look like in practice is often a massive headache. And in the end, students, teachers, and counselors often find the lessons stilted and uninspired.
The Solution: A Single Standards Framework
You need one collaborative framework that centers the student experience and brings your counseling, support, and classroom teams into perfect synchronization.
Cue the International School Counselor Association (ISCA) Student Standards. This framework is the perfect partner for international and IB schools, providing a clear, shared vocabulary for everyone. This framework can sit alongside the IB Programme
Standards and Practices creating a whole school approach to implementing a high-quality learning environment for students both academically and socio-emotionally.
And, the great thing is – these resources are accessible to everyone:
- The ISCA Student Standards are free for people to use and download. You can access them here.
- You can also view the Learning Progression here.
Step One: If you open a free account on the ISCA Publications website, you can access the Standards and the Academic Domain of the Learning Progression directly.
👉 Create your free account here.
Quick Wins: Leadership & Support Teams
For Leaders: Move beyond general goals. By integrating the ISCA Social-Emotional Domain directly into your curriculum map, you connect the broad ATL skill categories to concrete, globally respected student outcomes. This provides a quality assurance stamp that validates your commitment to global best practices and ensures ATL skill growth is intentionally consistent from PYP to DP.
For Counseling & Support: Your essential guide. The ISCA Standards seamlessly integrate your specialized guidance work with the school’s core ATL goals. It offers solid, measurable benchmarks for Tier 2/3 interventions, ensuring small groups and individual plans directly reinforce the broader IB curriculum.
Counselors & Learning Support: Your 7-Step Playbook to SEL-IB Alignment Mastery
Counselors and SEL learning leaders, I’m talking to you. Ready to move from responding to leading? Here’s how you become the essential link between student support and curriculum in your IB continuum:
- Build Bridges, Not Silos: Ask for a dedicated IB workshop and utilize your PD budget to gain fluency in IB terminology. A shared language is key to collaboration.
- Map the Alignment: Take the ISCA Social-Emotional Standards and map them directly onto the existing ATL skill clusters (Communication, Social, Self-Management, Research, Thinking). Highlight the powerful overlaps.
- Collaborate in Context: Spend time in classrooms. Observe how ATL skills and unit concepts are applied in real-time.
- Co-Create a Resource: Partner with your Programme Coordinators to develop a one-page resource for teachers that pairs the ATL skill with its matching, specific ISCA behavior benchmark.
- Inform with Data: Triangulate ISCA benchmark data with your existing wellness data (like the Panorama survey or similar tool your school uses) to help leaders build a comprehensive picture of non-academic skill development. Show exactly how support services contribute to school-wide goals.
- Elevate Your Curriculum: Use the specific, aspirational language of the ISCA domains to refine your Tier 1 guidance curriculum so it proactively builds the ATL skills essential for teacher success. Ensure teachers are explicitly teaching these skills.
- Advocate for Continuity: Present the ISCA/IB Programme Standards and Practices alignment to parent groups and the board. Illustrate the comprehensive scope of your support services.
About the Author
Emily J. Thomas is an educational consultant, literacy strategist with Erin Kent Consulting, and serves as an IBEN MYP Workshop Leader and DP Examiner. She advises schools on curriculum, assessment, and IB implementation through her consultancy, Playground Pedagogy. Her work focuses on helping schools build high-quality learning supported by clear, sustainable systems. She also presented at the International School Counselor Association Virtual Conference. emily@playgroundpedagogy.com.
Learn more about Emily at her website. Read more from Emily on her Substack called “Elsewhere, Examined”.