Architecture ofGrace
A developmental SEL framework that identifies needs, connects them to lessons, and supports growth through curriculum, conversation, and literature.
This is a project about relationships — the one you build with yourself, and the ones you share with each other.
The check-in (K through adult), the conversation starters, the companion novels, the four pillars — every piece leads to the same place: knowing ourselves, and growing closer to one another.
Built on identity, self-compassion, forgiveness, and grace — the ground every healthy relationship stands on.
Free to read & download
Every chapter preview and sample lesson, in one place — no code, no purchase, no sign-up. Open or download any of them.
Four ways in, one framework
The same eighteen items and the same care, worded for whoever is answering. Each path is already built into this file — choose the door that fits.
The founder, and the why beneath the work
My name is Jimmy Ramsden. I didn’t come to this work from a boardroom — I came to it from the classroom, where I still teach today as a special educator.
For more than a decade I’ve worked as an Illinois-certified special educator across elementary and junior-high classrooms — in self-contained, resource, and social-behavioral settings — and I hold a Learning Behavior Specialist endorsement for students from preschool through age twenty-two. Along the way I built and ran an elementary Social-Behavioral Learning resource program, where I coach students in the very skills this curriculum is built around: naming what they feel, steadying themselves, and trying again. The Architecture of Grace isn’t a departure from that classroom work — it’s two decades of it, gathered into something I can hand to other teachers.
My journey started at Humboldt State University with a degree in political science, followed by a master’s in special education. But the real catalyst came in 2006, when a serious car crash left me with a traumatic brain injury and a neurological disability. Rebuilding my life changed how I understand struggle, patience, and grace. It’s the reason this work isn’t abstract to me.
The Architecture of Grace grew out of a conviction that individuals deserve more than to be measured — they deserve to be understood. Built under the School of Life Foundation, everything here rests on four core pillars:
As a teacher and a father, these are the values I want for my students, my own children — and for anyone willing to do this work.
This work is in its early stages. The check-in is a pilot — a score is a flag for a conversation, never a diagnosis — and the curriculum is a framework I’m actively proving. I’d rather be honest about that than oversell it.
If you’d like to try it or share your thoughts, please reach out. whytheschooloflife@gmail.com
— Jimmy Ramsden
Who’s checking in?
Same three areas, the same care — just worded for who’s answering. Choose one to begin.
How are you doing, really?
Take a few quiet minutes, just for you. It’s private, there are no wrong answers, and it helps the people who care about you know how to help.
A private 4–10 minute reflection · no wrong answers · nothing leaves this device unless you choose.
Before you begin. There are no right or wrong answers — just pick what feels most true for you lately, and go with your first instinct.
If a question brings up something you’d like to talk about, you can reach out to a teacher, counselor, parent, or guardian any time.
Some of these questions were shaped with the help of children — so the words would sound a little more like yours, and a little less like ours.
About you
Choose how you want to take it
- 18 items, single-tap response
- Score 0–54, flags who may need support
- Comparable across seasons of life
- Granular frequency (Never → Constantly)
- Intensity rating on 6 highest-signal items
- Three optional written reflections
- Score 0–90 with rich Home View report
How are you doing, really?
A few quiet minutes, just for you. This is a check-in, not a test — and not a diagnosis. There are no wrong answers. It’s a way to notice how you’ve been, and a flag for a conversation if something needs one.
If you’re carrying something heavy right now, you don’t have to carry it alone. In the U.S. you can call or text 988 (the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline), any time, day or night. Reaching out is a strong thing to do.
Before you begin. Just pick what feels most true for you lately, and go with your first instinct.
Your responses aren’t anonymous — they go to the person or team who shared this with you, so someone can follow up with care. If something here brings up a lot, please reach out to someone you trust.
About you
Choose how you want to take it
Thank you.
Your answers have been saved. A trusted adult will review them to make sure you have the support you need.
Name something true about yourself.
Before you go, tap one or two positive words that describe you today.
—
Carry that word with you today.
How you’re doing
Here’s everything you just shared — and where each piece lives in the books.
Your family’s check-ins
Add each child once, then check in together a few times a year. Everything stays on this device — see growth over time and print conversation starters.
Check-In Results
Aggregate view across all administrations
How everyone’s doing
Domain averages
Class trends
Family & adult results
Growth across windows
Syncing & distribution
Affects only this device. Students who open a generated link sync regardless of this setting.
See results from other devices
Classroom Link Generator
Export & data management
Where your data lives
Responses are saved privately in this browser for this session only, on this computer. The exports above are class-level summaries — they never include student names, individual scores, or written responses.
Reset
Use only after confirming exports are saved.
One Living Ecosystem
A curriculum becomes an ecosystem when it can teach, measure what it taught, and use what it learns to teach better. Hover any piece to see what it does — tap it to go there.
The honest frame. The check-in is built from a coherent framework, which makes it internally sound — but it has not yet been through external reliability and validity testing. For a pilot, that is appropriate and disclosed. Until then, every score is a flag, not a diagnosis — and the curriculum, not the number, is the intervention.
What Is Architecture of Grace?
In plain terms — it’s a developmental, secular SEL framework that combines honest self-reflection, universal screening, family engagement, literature-based learning, and practical intervention supports into one connected system — for students and adults alike, from kindergarten through adulthood.
Architecture of Grace is a human development framework and intuitive digital check-in platform designed to help individuals understand themselves, strengthen relationships, and navigate life’s challenges with resilience, responsibility, and hope.
Built upon developmental psychology, social-emotional learning, reflective practice, and character formation, the framework provides a structured pathway for lifelong growth through lessons, assessments, conversations, and real-world application.
By bridging the gap between deep personal development and daily practice, the platform empowers people to become the healthiest versions of themselves — ultimately reducing burnout, improving retention, and fostering a resilient culture across school districts and families.
How a check-in becomes support
Every piece hands off to the next — a check-in becomes a conversation, and a conversation becomes the right support.
That’s the path in a school. On their own, an adult takes the very same check-in privately — the personal report and conversation starters are theirs alone. This is for every age, not only the classroom.
Four ways in, one framework
The same eighteen items and the same care, worded for whoever is answering. Each path is already built into this file — choose the door that fits.
What this platform includes
Every piece below is built into this one file or its library — not a roadmap, but what ships today.
How Architecture of Grace is different
Not a knock on other tools — just where this one stands apart from most SEL programs.
If you lead a building or a district, here is the operational picture — screening, tiering, and follow-through in one tool you host yourself.
1. What this is
A universal social-emotional learning (SEL) self-report check-in built directly from the Architecture of Grace curriculum. It is brief, universally applicable, and designed to be taken at regular check-in points across the year — each season at school, or anytime at home — to track baseline, growth, and risk over time. It measures three domains — Emotional Regulation & Well-Being, Self-Compassion & Growth Mindset, and Social Competency & Repair — with six items each, eighteen total.
2. The two modes
Quick — the standard school check-in. A 4-point frequency scale (Never / Sometimes / Often / Almost Always), about four minutes. Use this for whole-school administration where you need to triage many students quickly and compare across schools and windows.
Thorough — the full instrument. A 6-point frequency scale (Never / Rarely / Sometimes / Often / Very Often / Constantly), plus intensity follow-ups on the highest-signal items, plus three short written reflections. About ten minutes. Use this for home, mentor, or counselor settings where you want to actually understand and act, not just triage.
3. How it is scored
Every item is scored so that a higher number always means a healthier response. Reverse-scored items (the risk indicators) are flipped automatically before scoring. In Thorough mode, intensity ratings reduce an item’s score when a difficulty is reported as high-impact. Both modes are normalized to a 0–100 composite so any two responses can be compared directly, regardless of mode.
Tier cut points (normalized composite, 0–100):
Needs support · 0–49 Consider follow-up within one week; in a school, a Tier 3 review.
Worth a check-in · 50–74 Targeted support; reassess at the next window.
Doing well · 75–100 Continue universal support.
The trusted-adult item (Item 18) is also tracked on its own. A response of Never or Rarely/Sometimes raises a flag regardless of the composite score, because connection to a trusted adult is protective on its own.
4. Access code
Access to the results dashboard is protected by a private code, chosen by whoever published this file. To change it, open this HTML file in any text editor, find the line near the top of the script section that begins const ACCESS_CODE =, and replace the value in quotation marks with your own. Save. That is the only change needed.
5. How to give it
At home or 1:1: Open this file in any browser. Each person enters a name or ID, their grade or age band, and the window. Choose Thorough mode. They answer privately. When everyone is done, come to this dashboard, open Home View, and select each person.
With a group or several people: Each person uses their own computer (or their own browser). Responses stay private on each device — nothing is shared between people automatically. If several people share one computer, each enters their own name, and the dashboard keeps their records labeled and separate.
Sharing the link: You can host this one file on a free static host (such as Netlify) to get a link anyone can open on a computer or iPad. Each person who opens it still keeps their own private data on their own device.
6. Reading the Home View
Home View shows every item, the actual answer color-coded from green (healthy) to deep orange (concerning), the intensity badge where one was recorded, and any written reflections in the person’s own words. At the bottom is a conversation guide: the items that scored lowest, rewritten as gentle questions you can ask, plus a pointer to the curriculum book that addresses that domain. Do not ask all of them at once. Open one door at a time.
A flag is never a dead end. The conversation guide points from each low-scoring item to the exact lesson in the curriculum that addresses it — flag → the right lesson. The number tells you where to begin; the curriculum is the intervention.
Those lessons aren’t a separate purchase. A district license includes the full K–12 program and the companion novels; families can buy individual pieces à la carte for home.
7. Privacy
By default, all responses are stored only in this browser, on this computer, and nothing is sent anywhere — unless a school turns on syncing to its own Google Sheet (see section 8). The reflections and the written word are saved with the response so a trusted adult can read them — appropriate for home and counselor use. If you ever use this with students in a school setting, treat the responses as part of the student record under FERPA and limit access accordingly.
If anything in a response or a follow-up conversation suggests abuse, neglect, or imminent self-harm, the check-in is not the final word — follow your mandatory reporting protocol.
8. Sharing results across a school (optional)
By default, a check-in stays on the device that took it. A school can choose to pool its results into its own Google Sheet, so a counselor sees the whole school in one place. With that turned on, a completed check-in is saved on the device and sent to the school’s own Google Sheet — never to us, and never through any server we run. The sheet builds a simple dashboard on its own (totals, average score, how many named no trusted adult). Setup takes about ten minutes and is covered in the “Connecting a School Sheet” guide; the data lives in the school’s Google, under the school’s control.
9. A closing note
This check-in is a flag, not a diagnosis. A low score in one window can be a high score in the next — that is the entire reason it is repeated across the year. The curriculum is the intervention; the check-in just tells you where to begin.
Construct-to-Resource Index
When a check-in flags a low domain or a specific item, find the matching construct below. Each one lists the exact lesson, anchor chart, and activity in every grade band — and now, under In the novels, the specific book and chapter where that same idea appears as story. (References are by chapter, which stay accurate across print and digital formats, rather than by page.) Both the Quick and Thorough check-ins measure the same items, so a result from either mode maps back to these same lessons, sections, and chapters.
Downloads
The free previews follow the program’s two anchor lessons — identity and the internal critic — as they grow across all twelve years. Everything beneath the previews is the full program, opening for download as each piece is posted.
The internal-critic lesson, K–12 — from Grumpy Gus in kindergarten to forgiving the younger self at graduation. Anchor charts, worksheets, scenario cards, and drawing activities, straight from the curriculum.
↗ Open · PDFThe identity lesson, K–12 — the K–2 Identity Web growing into the Mask & Mirror, the Curated Self, and the Threshold of adulthood. One question, every grade band.
↗ Open · PDFMeet Sammy and Room 12 in the opening chapter of The Year We Met Sammy — Book One of the companion novel series. The year begins on the same question the curriculum opens on: who am I?
Free to read & download
Every chapter preview and sample lesson, in one place — no code, no purchase, no sign-up. Open or download any of them.
Bring the whole K–12 ecosystem to your school or district under a site or district license — typically billed by purchase order and priced per building or per student. We’ll send a quote and help you set it up.
Request district pricing →Purchase individual books, packs, and home editions for the kitchen table. Free previews are always open below; paid items show a Buy button.
Ask about a family copy →Browse everything
Free previews download instantly. Everything else is part of the full program — license it for a school, or buy individual pieces for home. Open a category to explore.
Voices
Teachers, families, and students — share a few words about your experience. Posts appear on the wall below for everyone to read.
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