Research in Positive Behavior Interventions & Supports

1. Research in Positive Behavior Interventions & Supports Chris Borgmeier, PhD Portland State University cborgmei@pdx.edu www.sped596pbis.pbworks.com

2. Reading Review • Gast, 2010 - Ch. 5 • Crone & Horner, Ch. 1-2 • Babkie & Provost, 2004 • Sugai et al., 2000 • Implementation Fidelity • choose 1 - LIT REVIEW

3. Discussion • What is the existing process or routine at your site for FBA/BSP (or supporting individual students posing significant behavioral challenges)? • Who participates? • What is the meeting routine? • When/how are meetings held?

4. Beginning w/ Implementation in Mind

5. Who should attend FBA meetings? (in mainstream school settings) • Behavior Specialist (often School Psych or SpEd) • Principal • Teachers who work with student • Both Gen Ed & SpEd • Other staff who work closely with the student • Parent • Student (if old enough – team decision) An FBA meeting for an IEP student is an IEP meeting, so all required attendees must be present

6. FBA Team members

7. Embedding Function-Based Support into School Teams – Leah Benazzi, 2005 • Participants • School-based teams • Behavior specialists with knowledge of behavior theory • Participants developed behavior support plans (BSPs) based on description of students • Teams without a behavior specialist • Behavior specialist without the team • Teams and the behavior specialist together • All BSPs were evaluated for technical adequacy and contextual fit

8. Results • BSPs developed by behavior specialists alone, rated low on contextual fit • BSPs developed by teams alone, rated low on technical adequacy • Only BSPs developed by the team working with a behavior specialist rated high on both technical adequacy and contextual fit.

9. Day 1  Next 2 wks Day 14  Next 2 wks Day 28  Ongoing  Initial FBA meeting Team disburses and gathers functional assessment data FBA/BSP meeting - team reconvenes to review assessment information & develop behavior plan Team implements behavior plan & collects data Behavior Plan Review - Team reconvenes to look at data to Review effectiveness and implementation of behavior plan Continue to implement behavior plan or changes as needed Review Meeting - Reconvene as needed depending on success of behavior plan FBA Process -- Meetings

10. Supports that enable accurate & durable implementation of interventions • Ensure contextual fit • Organize adult responsibilities, tasks, etc. • Embed interventions in IEP • Establish effective, efficient, & relevant school-wide behavior support systems

11. Support Plan Design • Ensure Contextual Fit • Implementers involved in design of plan • Plan consistent with values of implementers • Plan consistent with skills of implementers • Plan consistent with resources of implementers • Plan consistent with administrative structure • Plan perceived as (a) likely to be effective and (b) in the best interest of the focus individual

12. Develop preliminary Intervention ideas…. THEN present & discuss w/ implementation team

13. Finalizing Interventions to Implement • Work w/ team to identify interventions • Change or eliminate interventions that implementers won’t implement • Monitor interventions suggested by implementers to ensure they are consistent with findings from FBA • Finalize interventions to implement & identify supports needed to implement

14. Implementation • Implementation Plan (Who will do what, when?) • Schedule prep activities (e.g. communication system development) • Schedule teaching times/curriculum • Schedule data system design/use • Schedule on-going times for assessment

15. Discussion • How does this model match what is happening at your site? • What are barriers to implementing this teaming model? • What are potential supports?

16. Implementation Plan: Fidelity of Implementation

19. Preparing Staff for Implementation • Who is implementing each part of the intervention? • How do staff implement it? (Requires specific instruction & modeling) • When should it be implemented? • What if it’s not working (Back-up/crisis plans)? • Why should this work? • When will we meet again to review the plan and implementation?

20. BSP Review Meeting • Make sure to review each step on implementation plan at Follow-up BSP meeting • Problem Solve around treatment fidelity • If we’re not implementing the plan with fidelity, we cannot evaluate if the plan is successful or not

23. Research: Actively Planning to Support Implementation Noell et al, 1997 Jones et al, 1997 Codding et al, 2005

24. Noell et al. (1997) • 3 Elementary School teachers in public schools • Ms. Wynn – 3rd grade – referred female student for mathematics • Ms. Milton – taught talented & gifted – referred 3rd grade male for mathematics • Ms. Gill – 3rd grade male – assistance w/ reading • all expressed concerns with inconsistent work and intermittent noncompliance w/ teacher instructions

25. Treatment Integrity - Measures • # of treatment steps teachers implemented • permanent product data collected to reduce reactivity to observation • intervention designed so completion of each treatment step would produce a permanent product

26. Phases of Implementation Support • Consultation Only • explained individual child assessment results to teacher -w/ rationale, how to implement intervention, provided data collection forms & explained an assistant would collect all materials related to intervention each day • no further contact w/ consultant • Daily Performance Feedback • consultant met with teacher each morning before school for 3 to 5 minutes • presented student performance data & teacher intervention implementation data to the teacher on a graph • consultant id’d specific treatment steps missed & discussed importance of steps. discussed how to improve implementation & praised treatment steps completed accurately • Maintenance • told consultant would not be returning for morning feedback meetings, but data collection would continue & teacher asked to continue using intervention

28. Results & Discussion • All 3 teachers initially exhibited high levels of treatment integrity over first 2-4 days w/ decelerating trend to follow • Introduction of performance feedback = increased treatment integrity • Moderate to high levels of treatment integrity were only maintained when performance feedback was provided to teachers regarding intervention implementation and student outcomes

29. Jones, Wickstrom,& Friman (1997). • School-based behavioral consultation is “a good talk spoiled” • Typical interaction: • consultant and teacher discussing a student’s inappropriate behavior, which can be very rewarding • Often, however, the student problem behavior is attributed to the “inappropriate” behavior of the teacher, and the consultant recommends a “new” response instead. • Often this new response requires greater effort than ignoring the consultant’s suggestions.

30. Students & Teachers • Joan (12) white female in Lang. Arts class • Ms D 9 yrs. teaching • Behaviors: excessive off task behavior related to touching objects, pulling her own hair, & biting nails • Bob (11)African American male in Reading class • Ms W (1 yr. teaching) • Behaviors: problem following instructions, aggression and throwing objects • Joe (11) white male in summer reading class • Ms. Bean ( 20 yrs. teaching) • Behaviors: spent great deal of time arguing w/ peers, getting out of his seat, playing w/ objects & making irrelevant comments • all 3 student reside in specialized Treatment Program at Boys Town for youth w/ severe behavioral difficulties

31. Intervention • Provide more frequent positive attention to students for expected behavior • Provide praise, approval statements & a mark on child’s daily note card • Provide positive feedback to student at least once every two minutes for on-task behavior & ignore students “passive” off-task behavior

34. Mean Levels of Treatment Integrity(% of 2 min. intervals w/ pos. consequence issued by teacher, contingent on student on-task behavior)

35. Results/ Discussion • Simply asking a teacher to implement consequences may result in inadequate level of integrity • Even w/ daily performance feedback – overall mean of treatement integrity did not exceed 83% for any of the teachers • Study makes salient the difficult nature of assisting teachers in the delivery of treatments w/ a high level of integrity

36. Implementing Behavior Support Plans Performance FeedbackCodding, et al. (2005) • Private school for students w/ brain injury 10-19 years old • Data collected on 5 teacher-student dyads • Percentage of antecedent & consequences components of the intervention implemented as written • All teachers received formal training in implementing behavior support plan

37. Phases of Implementation Support • Baseline – Observer completed integrity data sheet w/o knowledge of observation • Intervention – performance feedback was implemented after stable or decreasing performance in baseline was demonstrated • on same day as each observation, experimenter spent an average of 12 minutes w/ target teacher outside of classroom • Feedback included – praise for components followed as written & constructive feedback for components not followed consistently (reviewed components & explained how component should have been implemented)

40. Findings • Results of performance feedback were maintained for up to 15 weeks • Treatment integrity was assessed using direct observation • Performance feedback was provided every other week rather than daily or weekly and on the same day that the observation occurred • Performance feedback resulted in greater percentages of both antecedent & consequence components correctly implementing for 4 of 5 teachers

41. Codding et al. (2005) • “We suspect that periodic collection of treatment integrity data and subsequent performance feedback are necessary for high rates of intervention integrity to persist.”

42. Beyond Talking -- Feedback • Make sure to train staff how to implement • Modeling/Role Playing the intervention is best method of instruction • People won’t implement it if they don’t understand how to do it, or if it’s not working because they doing the intervention incorrectly • Frequent follow-up & check-in • Linking w/ permanent product to turn in can be helpful • Example – point sheet w/ regular interval ratings (way of tracking teacher feedback to student) • Example – daily Intervention checklist for teacher to self check implementation of plan • Email check-ins/reminders paired with periodic visits/observations are good

43. Discussion • Based on the presentation & readings: • What strategies would you recommend to support implementation? • What are implications for the research project design and procedures?