Tools for Making Change

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Tools
Stories

Download these resources to help you share your MDI data, ask deeper questions, and get input from children, parents, staff, and community members.

These stories and videos can help explain the Middle Years Development Instrument and illustrate how its core concepts and public data can kickstart change in schools and communities.

Janelle Zebedee & Tricia Penny, Health Promoting Schools Coordinators in School District 23 (Central Okanagan), discuss their work to support schools and communities in building local well-being plans.

MDI Stories

Supporting schools and communities in building well-being plans
Peter Dubinsky, Director of Instruction for School District 41 (Burnaby), reminds us to look down from the population-level data of the MDI to see where we can make lasting local impact.

MDI Stories

Dig deeper, look closer
Marna MacMillan, Learning Services Coordinator for District 43 (Coquitlam), shares how she gets her district staff and schools excited about the MDI, and about the new language MDI data gives to educators to help them understand and discuss well-being in the middle years.

MDI Stories

The MDI reports give us a new language
For the 2017 survey, we've changed the way we ask about gender on the MDI.

Field Notes

How do you describe yourself? Changing the way we ask about gender
Discover how Jeff Stromgren and Marna Macmillan combine MDI data visualization and personal stories to engage their communities in their efforts to improve well-being in middle childhood.

Video

MDI as an Engagement Tool
MDI Champions Jeff Stromgren and Marna Macmillan explain why they chose to start collecting MDI data in their community of Coquitlam, BC.

Video

Why work with the MDI?
The power and importance of children's voices lies at the heart of the MDI. Members of HELP's Aboriginal Steering Committee discuss how critical it is for children's voices to guide our work.

Video

Learning by Listening
Roberta O'Brien, Coordinator for the Ridge Meadows Community Children’s Table, explores the development of the Active Kids Hour program, an after-school initiative involving collaboration between the municipality, school district and community stakeholders.

MDI Stories

MDI Community Story - Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows
Daljit Gill-Badesha, Middle Childhood and Healthy Communities Manager for the City of Surrey, shares her experience - and important insights - of incorporating MDI data into the development of a new middle years municipal program, the MyZone After School Drop-In initiative.

MDI Stories

MDI Community Story - City of Surrey
MDI Champions Jeff Stromgren and Marna Macmillan explain how MDI data can be the catalyst for rich conversations with your school, your staff, and your community.

Video

MDI is Central to the Conversation
Superintendent Greg Smyth shares how his district builds well-being into their school plans.

MDI Stories

Building School Plans:
A conversation with
Greg Smyth, SD70
Exploring ways to cultivate pro-social behaviour in middle-years children.

Field Notes

Encouraging Children to Care
One of our favourite videos to show to help people understand how meaningful interactions with adults can be throughout the school day.

Field Notes

Every Opportunity: the Value of Adult Relationships
How well-designed after-school programs can help children develop autonomy, a sense of belonging, and competence.

Field Notes

The ABCs of After-School

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