Six Step Applied Behavior Analyis Management (intervention) Plan
When people are ignored, or worse, feel marginalized, scared, or angry, it’s no surprise they feel betrayed and want to destroy something.
Caring is essential to make peace and accept help.
All humans can be helped and learn to lead lives of deep concern for others, for the natural world and its creatures, and for the preservation of a sustainable world.
The first step is an act of caring, which must be recognized as caring for care to truly occur and mastery oriented goals to be set and achieved.
Don’t take misbehavior personally. Keep in mind the limits of the person you’re dealing with. Then listen and develop a rapport necessary to together develop a cool headed goal oriented behavior focused intervention for a solution, and avoid an emotional personal reaction.
Overview
This article describes applied behavior analysis using a six step planning heuristic to help a person set and achieve mastery oriented goals to replace self limiting behaviors as described in Conversations to assist behavior change.
Overview
Six Steps
- Collect information.
- Context analysis - Analyze the information from all the different sources and make connections between them.
- Explain possible causes of the behavior and reasoning to justify them.
- Identify a goal for a new behavior, or behavior modifications, and a rationale for why the student might achieve it.
- Create an intervention procedure to achieve the goal.
- Evaluate and modify the intervention as necessary.
1. Collect information
Attain perceptions of the behavioral or instructional issue or question
Perceptions of the teacher. Makes observations, reflect, and record a rigorous description of the behavior. It is human nature to consider why behaviors occur in a given context, but our initial conclusions may not be accurate. For maximum student benefit it is essential the teachers perception of the issue or instructional question is valid so appropriate goals and interventions are selected. Questions to consider:
- What does the teacher do, what does the student do, and how does the teacher and student interact when the issue is active (before, during, after. see ABC chart in step 2)?
- Why does the teacher believe the behavior is a problem?
- Why does the teacher believe the issue is disruptive to the learning environment of the classroom?
- How does it make the teacher feel?(frustrated, anxious, fearful, helpless - see Driekur's theory in step 3)?
- Why does the teacher think the student is choosing the behaviors?
- What does the teacher say is the actual question or issue?
- What does the teacher believe about the needs of the student?
- Other teacher perceptions or reactions.
Perceptions of the student are also important to consider. A non-directive interview where the interviewer mirrors the students thoughts and comments through reflective comments (Rogers, 1971) can be a successful way to gain the students perceptions of what the teacher or others do, what the student does, and how the interactions with each other relate to the issue.
- What biopsychosocial affects might relate to the behavior?
- What does the student say he or she does when the issue is active (before, during, after)?
- Does the student believe the behavior is a problem?
- Why or why not?
- How does it make the student feel? Frustrated, anxious, fearful, helpless?
- Why does the student say they are choosing the behaviors?
- What are the student's goals with respect to the behaviors?
- What are the students expectations for being in school?
- What motivates the student?
- Other student perceptions or reactions.
Perceptions of other people.
- Other students
- Parents
- Former teachers
- Supervisors
- Observations by peer teachers
Perceptions of other contributing sources.
- Task influences
- Teacher expectations and other contributing factors
- Student data: age, medical and health status, achievement, social development, school placements, grade levels, family situation, friends, current classes,
- Group arrangements from lack of social interactions, pairings, triads, to whole class settings and outside of class settings
- Environmental contributions
- Communication
2. Context analysis - Analyze information from the sources and make connections between them.
- What do you believe causes the onset?
- How long does it last?
- What is its intensity?
- Is it increasing or decreasing?
- What interventions have there been and what have been the consequences?
Record a detailed observation of events as an anecdotal record, or an antecedent-behavior-consequence chart.
Example of an Antecedent-Behavior-Consequence (ABC) Chart
Antecedent What happens before a behavior |
Behavior |
Consequence Behavior after the Behavior |
---|---|---|
Teacher asks about assignment. "Where is your assignment?' | Student replies she does not have it. "I don't have it." | Teacher asks again for clarification. "Why don't you have it?" |
Teacher asks for clarification. "Why don't you have it?" | Student clarifies, 'I didn't know what to do." | Teacher asks why. "Why didn't you know what to do?" |
Teacher asks why. "Why didn't you know what to do?" | Student replies, "Because I didn't understand it in class and and I don't know any adults who understood it either." | Class laughs. |
Teacher tells student she will take a zero. | Student replies, "It isn't fair." | Teacher sends student to office. "You know your plan says if you don't come to class prepared, then you have to report to the office." |
Teacher sends student to office. "You know your plan says if you don't come to class prepared, then you have to report to the office." | Student states she'd rather go to the office. "I'd rather be there than here." | Student leaves. |
Analyze the context of the information collected.
Teacher related analysis:
- How do the teachers expectations and perceptions influence his or her choice of interactions?
- How does the student react to the different ways of communication?
- What are the results of the teachers philosophy of teaching and learning upon the student?
- How do the teachers expectations effect the student?
- How are cultural issues affecting the teacher and student interactions?
Student related analysis:
- What are the biopsychosocial influences on the student's behavior.
- What are the consequence with respect to the student's expectations and perceptions of being in school in relation to the school's, teachers, and care givers?
- What are the results of communication between the student and others?
- What are the consequences of any life style changes for the student recently (moved, loss of family member, divorce, separation, other)?
- How do the student's strengths and weaknesses effect the student's behaviors and others who interact with him or her?
- How does the students development, maturity... levels effect the behaviors?
- How do cultural issues affect the students interactions with others?
- How does the students environment impact the behaviors?
Task related analysis:
- How do the selection and kinds of materials used effect the behavior?
- What is the effect of reinforcement provide? Tangible, social, general praise, specific praise, encouragement, oral, written, public, private, from the teacher and/or peers, student preference?
- Does the difficulty level of the tasks match the students ability and motivational level?
- How does the tasks match the interest of the student other effect on motivating the student?
- How does the task relate to the students developmental level?
- Is the student given choices and a variety of tasks to do? Are the tasks presented in a manner that provides information that the student can process to learn?
Environmental related analysis:
- What effect do different instructional settings have on the student?
- What effect do different groupings have on the student: individually, with a partner, small groups, and in a whole class setting?
- What effect does different materials have on the student?
- What might is happening when the student's behavior is positive? (environment, groupings, tasks, teacher, students, other)
- What might is happening when the student's behavior is negative? (environment, groupings, tasks, teacher, students, other)
- If there are people who assist in mediating acceptable behavior, then what might happens?
- Is the room noisy? Warm? Cold? Bright? Dark? Where is the classroom in relation to outdoor activity?
Analysis of communication. Types of communication to consider for possible effects include:
Requests for this | followed by a refusal may cause this behavior | to create statements to explain interactions for ... |
---|---|---|
Attention | Protests verbally | Events |
Social interaction | Says no or stop | Objects |
Play | Swears | Agreeing |
Affection | Acts out physically hits bites | Greeting |
Permission | Runs away | Humor |
Assistance | Pouts | Feelings |
Additional information or clarification | Freezes | Stress |
Objects | Remain silent | Confusion |
Non inclusion | Requests |
3. Explain possible causes of the behavior and reasoning to justify them
Use the information collected and explain possible causes of the behavior, which will be referenced to justify intervention goals and procedures to achieve any change.
Examples for relating theory and other ideas to derive causes and explanations
Ideas to explain the causes of the behavior can originate from one source or be a combination of ideas from different sources as explained by models and theories of behavior. see notes on motivation and self-efficacy. Quick summary:
- Alderman's Model of Motivation (1990).
- Dreikurs and Cassels (1972) four reasons students misbehave: 1) to gain attention, 2) to control, 3) because they have not yet learned an alternative, or 4) because of immaturity or lack of readiness.
- Driekur's theory helps to identify possible causes of a student's "problem" by the way the teacher feels after the behavior. Annoyance, the nature of the behavior is probably attention getting. Threatened, the issue is probably one of control. Feeling the need to teach may signify that a student has not yet learned an alternative behavior, and Helplessness suggests immaturity.
- William Glasser's Choice Theory can help identify causes that might be based on why students are making limiting choices. To gain: 1) love, 2) power, 3) freedom, 4) fun, and 5) survival.
- James G. Wilson theory from Moral Sense might relate cause to four moral senses Wilson believes all people have: 1) sympathy, 2) fairness, 3) self-control, and 4) duty.
Example
Mary gets excited when she knows an answer or is about to participate in an activity where she has a high level of interest. She speaks loudly, out of turn, and when students correct her or object she does not have the social skill or maturity to accept their suggestions and criticisms. She usually gets frustrated, crosses her arms, looks down and withdraws quietly. Other students do little to include her, because they are embarrassed by her actions and tend to avoid her. The student might be said to be immature or she has not learned self-control and social skills.
4. Identify a goal for a new behavior, or behavior modifications, and rationale for why the student might achieve it.
Use the connections of ideas along with possible causes, explanations, and reasoning to create a goal for mastery oriented behaviors the student could choose in place of the non conventional behaviors or for altering the non conventional behaviors to change along with the reasoning for the student to accept a change and implement it to create master-oriented behaviors with self-efficacy.
- Consider how student's strengths might be used for the students advantage?
- Consider how student's weaknesses can be improved?
Sample.
The teacher will talk and work with Mary to emphasis the value of being excited about participating in learning. The teacher will model and help her role play socially accepted ways to interact with her peers to share her enthusiasm without being abrasive or infringing on others desire to participate. The teacher will also discuss with the guidance counselor to possibly include stress reduction techniques, self-awareness, relaxation techniques, goal setting, development of self-efficacy, and increased self-control. The teacher will also work with other students on how to encourage and support each others learning. When Mary learns that she can be enthusiastically involved in learning and share her enthusiasm with her peers and they with her, she and they will be motivated to continue to explore new ways to learn and achieve together to increase everyones self-efficacy.
5. Describe how to implement an intervention to learn conventional behaviors and achieve successful results.
The behavior changes in the goal for change require a plan. The plan should be created with the student as much as possible and have several elements. These include:
- How to encourage the student to accept a need for change
- Setting of realistic goals or outcomes for change,
- Specific multidimensional instructional plans which considers and describe how the intervention can draw support to
- Address any known biopsychosocial issues.
- Develop intrinsic motivation, self-worth, and self-efficacy.
- Initiate, achieve, and sustain home support for change.
- Develop self-efficacy.
- Provide curriculum, instruction, and task support for the change.
- Communicate necessary information to facilitate the change.
- Become self-regulated.
- Provide an environment to support and maintain the change.
- Generalized the behavior to other settings.
- Provide social relations that support change.
- A schedule on when and how to implement different parts of the plan,
- Suggestions on how to monitor progress or provide assistance.
- A comprehensive holistic plan, using these six steps, can be documented with an outline in a linearly written narrative, or in a chart. A framework for each follows.
6. Evaluate and modify the intervention as necessary.
To evaluate the success of the interventions expected outcomes must be identified.
Outcomes that include what you want the student to do are more important than what you do not want the student to do. That doesnt mean that it isnt appropriate to collect data with the purpose to show a decrease in unconventional behaviors. However, to better insure success it is important to identify the mastery oriented behaviors to be taught. Then to be more positive it would be necessary to collect data on the positive.
This tracking can be done with anecdotal records or quantitative records starting with baseline data and recording additional data periodically until a target rate is achieved.
To evaluate quantitative data, first, collect data for the baseline. Collect data for 3-5 days or until the data is steady. Some observations that could be recorded are the level of assistance needed to complete the tasks, the frequency and duration of a behavior, percentage of correct items, positive comments to others, positive contributions to discussions, percentage of assignments completed, the amount of time participating positively in a discussion, and playing without incident on the playground. The amount of time between baseline and the change in performance represented on a graph gives a clear picture of the success or lack of success of the interventions. The independent variable, or the manipulated variable, (generally duration of time) goes on the horizontal axis and the dependent variable, or responding variable, (generally behavior) goes on the vertical axis.
Worksheets in Chart Format
1. Collection of Information | |||
---|---|---|---|
Invented Student name: Birthday: Primary care giver(s): |
Behavioral or instructional issue: | Date: | Team members: |
Teacher perceptions |
Student perceptions | Other people's perceptions | Perceptions from other sources |
2. Context analysis - Analyze information from the sources and make connections between them. | |||
---|---|---|---|
Antecedent-Behavior analysis | Teacher related analysis Student related analysis: |
Task related analysis Environmental related analysis |
Biopsychosocial analysis Analysis of communication |
3. Explain possible causes of the behavior and reasoning to justify them |
---|
Possible causes of the behavior and rationale to support them. |
4. Identify a goal for a new behavior, or behavior modifications, and rationale for why the student might achieve it. |
---|
Goal and outcomes for new behavior or behavior modification Rational for success Reason to believe it will provide self-efficacy |
5. Describe how to implement an intervention to learn conventional behaviors and achieve successful results. Describe how the intervention can draw support to |
||
---|---|---|
Address any known biopsychosocial issues. |
||
Develop intrinsic motivation, self-worth, and self-efficacy.
|
Initiate, achieve, and sustain home support for change. | Develop self-efficacy. |
Provide curriculum, instruction, and task support for the change.
|
Communicate necessary information to facilitate the change. | Become self-regulated. |
Provide an environment to support and maintain the change. |
Generalized the behavior to other settings. | Provide social relations that support change. |
Intervention (sequence steps, methods, resources...) (Person(s) responsible) (Next evaluation date) |
6. Evaluation Information | |
---|---|
Outcomes for success
|
Evaluation plan Possible modifications |
Worksheets in Outline Format
Invented Student name:
Birthday:
Primary care giver(s):
Behavioral or instructional issue:
Date:
Team members:
1. Collect information
Teacher perceptions
Student perceptions
Other people's perceptions
Perceptions of other sources
2. Context analysis - Analyze information from the sources and make connections between them.
Antecedent-Behavior analysis (ABC for goal setting)
Teacher related analysis
Student related analysis
Task related analysis
Environmental related analysis
Analysis of communication
3. Explain possible causes of the behavior and reasoning to justify each cause
Possible causes of the behavior and rationale to support them.
4. Identify a goal for a new behavior, or behavior modifications, and rationale for why the student might achieve it.
Goal and outcomes for new behavior or behavior modification
Rational for success
Reason to believe it will provide self-efficacy
5. Describe how to implement an intervention to learn conventional behaviors and achieve successful results.
Describe how the intervention can draw support to
- Address any known biopsychosocial issues.
- Develop intrinsic motivation, self-worth, and self-efficacy.
- Initiate, achieve, and sustain home support for change.
- Develop self-efficacy.
- Provide curriculum, instruction, and task support for the change.
- Communicate necessary information to facilitate the change.
- Become self-regulated.
- Provide an environment to support and maintain the change.
- Generalized the behavior to other settings.
- Provide social relations that support change.
Intervention (sequence steps, methods, resources...) (Person(s) responsible) (Next evaluation date)
6. Evaluation information
Outcomes for success
Evaluation plan
Management - self development & individual, group, & classroom management