Six Step Behavior Management Plan

1. Collect information.
2. Analyze the information with regards to the behavioral or instructional issue.
3. Write a hypothesis for the cause of the behavior and the reasoning to justify it.
4. Write a hypothesis for how the behavior could change and reasons to believe it would.
5. Describe an intervention to implement conventional behaviors based on the hypothesis to change.
6. Evaluate and modify the intervention as necessary.

1. Collect information

A. Attain perceptions of the behavioral or instructional issue or question

Perceptions of the teacher. The teacher makes observations, generates theories, and develops a hypothesis to develop a rigorous description of the behavior. An accurate description of the issue will help facilitate a more positive behavior. It is human nature to consider why behaviors occur in a given context. For maximum student benefit it is essential that the teacher’s perception of the issue or instructional question is valid. A strategy for a teacher to obtain perceptions of the issue is to reflect on the following.

• Why is the behavior a problem?
• How is the issue disruptive to the learning environment of the classroom?
• How does it make the teacher feel? Frustrated, anxious, fearful, helpless?
• Why do you think the student is choosing the behaviors?
• What is the actual question or issue?

Perceptions of the student. After you have recorded your perceptions, you may obtain perceptions of the student. A non-directive interview may be the most successful way to gain the student’s perceptions of the behavior. Through this interview, the teacher mirrors the student’s thoughts and comments through reflective comments (Rogers, 1971).

B. Review all possible information about the issue from other sources. Ask any of the following about their interactions with the student and the students interactions with them.

• Parents
• Former teachers
• Supervisors
• Observations by peer teachers

C. Additional information about the student

Student data: age, medical and health status, achievement, social development, school placements, grade levels, family situation, friends, current classes,

D. Describe the current interaction pattern.

Your perception of your reactions. What do you do, what does the student do, and how do you and the student react when the issue is active?

Student’s perceptions of your reaction. How does the student describe what you do, what the student does, and how you and he or she react when the issue is active?

2. Analyze information with regards to the behavioral or instructional issue

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 in anecdotal records or an antecedent-behavior-consequence chart could be made for more specific narrow behaviors.

Antecedent-Behavior-Consequence Chart

Analyze the context. Collect information from the teacher and the student.

Teacher variables: How does the teacher’s expectations and perceptions influence his or her choice of interactions? How does the teacher communicate? Is the communication sufficient for this student? How does the teacher’s philosophy of teaching and learning fit with the student? How does the teacher’s expectations fit for this student? Are there cultural issues that affect the teacher and student interactions?

Student variables: What are the expectations and perceptions of the student for being in school? Are they consistent with the school and the teacher’s? How does the student communicate? Are they sufficient to meet the student’s needs? Have there been any life style changes for this student recently (moved, loss of family member, divorce, separation, other)? What are the student’s strengths and weaknesses? How can the strengths be used for the student’s advantage? How can the weaknesses be limited? What is the student’s development level? Are there cultural issues that affect the student’s interactions with peers and or teachers? How does the student’s maturity and developmental level impact learning?

Task variables: What kinds of materials does the task require? What kinds of reinforcement does the task provide? Tangible, social, general praise, specific praise, encouragement, oral, written, public, private, from the teacher and/or peers? What does the student prefer to use? What kinds of tasks motivate the student? Does the difficulty level of the tasks match the student’s ability and motivational level? Do the tasks match the interest of the student? Is the task at the student’s 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 variables: What kinds of instructional settings are used? How does the student work individually, with a partner, small groups, and in a whole class setting? What kind of opportunities does the student have to interact with people and materials? How does the student interact with people and materials? Who is present when the behavior is positive? Who is present when the behavior is negative? Are there people who assist in mediating acceptable behavior? If so how? Are there materials that influence positive and or negative behaviors? Are their any environmental pollutants? Is the room noisy? Warm? Cold? Bright? Dark? Where is the classroom in relation to outdoor activity?

D. Analyze communication. Some possible types of communication to consider are in the following chart.

3. Write a hypothesis for the cause of the behavior and reasoning to justify it.

Use the information collected and write a hypothesis for the cause of the behavior and an explanation to justify what is believed to cause the student to behave the way that has been describe. You might use ideas from a variety of sources or combine ideas from the different models and theories of behavior. Alderman's Model of Motivation (1990). Dreikur’s and Cassel’s (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 is that one can assess a student's "problem" by the way you are made to feel. If your reaction is annoyance, the nature of the behavior is probably attention getting. If you feel 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 a feeling of helplessness suggests immaturity. William Glasser in Choice Theory identified what he believes are five variables that control choices people make: 1) love, 2) power, 3) freedom, 4) fun, and 5) survival. James G. Wilson in Moral Sense identified what he believes are four senses which all people have: 1) sympathy, 2) fairness, 3) self-control, and 4) duty.

After you have written a hypothesis for the cause of the behavior and reasoning to justify it share it with other teachers and the student for their opinion on its plausibility.

Sample 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. The student has not learned self-control and social skills.

4. Write a hypothesis for how the behavior could change and reasons to believe it would.

Use the hypothesis and reasoning to create a second hypothesis to suggest what mastery oriented behaviors the student could choose in place of the non conventional behaviors and the reasoning for the student to acceptance a change.

Sample. The teacher will talk and work with Mary to emphasis the value of being excited about participating in learning. The teacher will work to help her learn self-control and socially accepted ways to interact with her peers to share her enthusiasm without being abrasive or infringing on their desire to participate. The teacher will also work with other students on how to encourage and support each other’s 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.

5. Describe an intervention to implement conventional behaviors based on the hypothesis to change.

The behavior changes promoted in the hypothesis 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, help for the student to set realistic goals for change, an instructional plan to learn skills needed to change, a schedule on when and how to implement different parts of the plan, and suggestions on how to monitor progress or provide assistance. The continuum of interventions chart (next page) can be used to select a variety of interventions to create a comprehensive holistic plan which can be documented in a linearly written narrative using the six step format, or using a chart form at the end of the text.

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 doesn’t mean that it isn’t appropriate to collect data with the purpose to show a decrease in unconventional behaviors. What probably will be more successful is to track both the occurrence of mastery oriented behaviors that are being taught to the student as well as the occurrence of the unconventional behavior. However, if collecting two sets of data is too much, chose to collect 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 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 remaining 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.

Robert Sweetland's Notes ©