From TeacherVision. [dealing with disabilities, but applicable]: http://www.teachervision.fen.com/classroom-discipline/resource/2943.html

How to Manage Disruptive Behavior in Inclusive Classrooms

Question 1. Could this misbehavior be a result of inappropriate curriculum or teaching strategies?

[Inappropriate curriculum: yes. It’s too abstract, doesn’t tie to their lives, and is beyond their interest. I tried to tie it to their lives in ways I could: by showing them on a timeline when they live and when dinosaurs lived, and by asking them about animals in the present that they can relate to. Inappropriate teaching strategies: while I’ve tried many, a skilled teacher could handle this, despite the inappropriate curriculum]

Inappropriate curriculum and teaching strategies can contribute to student misbehavior–but not all misbehavior is attributable to these factors. Some misbehavior may arise as a function of the teacher’s inability to meet the diverse needs of all students. Consider these factors:

• Group size.
• Group composition.
• Limited planning time.
• Cultural and linguistic barriers.
• Lack of access to equipment, materials, and resources.

[Cultural and linguistic barriers strongly impede our communication. If their age or level of English were higher, the problems might not be so great — or if the text were at their level and addressed areas of their interest]

If the misbehavior evolves as a result of inappropriate curriculum or teaching strategies, redress the content and skill level components of your curriculum, its futuristic benefit for the student, and the formats you use in instructional delivery. When you identify the instructional needs of students within the context of the classroom, using a diagnostic prescriptive approach, and make curricular adaptations both in content and instructional delivery, you can greatly reduce the occurrence of student misbehavior.

Question 2. Could this misbehavior be a result of the student’s inability to understand the concepts being taught?

[Absolutely; see above.]

When there is a mismatch between teaching style and the learning styles of students, misbehavior inevitably results. Incidents of misbehavior may also result when students refuse to learn concepts because they are unable to see the relationship between the skills being taught and how these skills transcend to the context of the larger environment. In these situations, you should employ strategies and tactics that show students how component skills have meaning in the classroom and in the community. If you find that the cause of the inappropriate behavior is related to the student’s lack of prerequisite skills or abilities to acquire concepts, you can use a simple procedure known as task analysis. By using this procedure, you can pinpoint specific functional levels of students on targeted skills and provide sequential instructional programs that will move the student with disabilities toward mastery of a targeted goal at a pace appropriate for the student (Moyer & Dardig, 1978).

Question 7. How do I teach students to self-regulate or self-manage behavior?

You can teach students to self-regulate or self-manage their behavior by teaching them to use the skills of self-management:

• Self-instruction, self-recording, or self-monitoring.
• Self-reinforcement, self-evaluation, and self-punishment.
• Multiple-component treatment packages (Carter, 1993; Hughes, Ruhl, & Peterson, 1988; Rosenbaum & Drabman, 1979).

Many studies (e.g., McCarl, Svobodny, & Beare, 1991; Nelson, Smith, Young, & Dodd, 1991; Prater, Joy, Chilman, Temple, & Miller, 1991) focusing on self-management techniques have shown the effectiveness of self-management procedures in behavior change and academic productivity. These studies included students from many different populations, ranging from average achievers to students with mild, moderate, and severe disabilities. Teachers have found many advantages in using self-monitoring procedures: These procedures improve target behavior, stress the student’s role in behavior change, allow generalization to non-school environments, free teachers for other tasks, and teach students responsibility and self-determination (Frith & Armstrong, 1986). Furthermore, these procedures are relatively simple to implement; they quickly reach a point in which little supervision is required; and, they help students become more successful and independent in their classroom and in everyday life (Dunlap, Dunlap, Koegel, & Koegel, 1991). Of course, teaching students self-management skills should not be regarded as a substitute for a high-quality curriculum of instruction (Dunlap et al., 1991) that emphasizes academic and social learning skills. Here are some steps for teaching self-management skills:

• Defining the target behavior.
• Defining the desired behavior.
• Developing the data-collection system.
• Teaching the students how to use the self-management system.
• Implementing the system.
• Evaluating the effectiveness of the system (Carter, 1993).
• Additional steps may include identifying functional reinforcers and fading use of the self-monitoring procedure (Dunlap et al., 1991).

[I wish there were more detail on this. This is what I’d like to go for. I’ll draw up a contract to begin with, after I get them to identify what went wrong last time. But as far as enforcement, I don’t know what to do.]

Steps of the Catch Them Being Good Technique

[From TeacherVision: http://www.teachervision.fen.com/teaching-methods/classroom-management/9154.html?page=2&detoured=1]

1. Identify instances of disruptive behaviors.
2. Identify instances of nondisruptive and appropriate classroom behaviors.
3. Implement the beeper system (explained below) at the start of each class period. When the beeper sounds, praise a number of students (including the children who are the focus of your concern) if they are not engaged in disruptive behavior.
4. When a child is disruptive, ignore the disruptive behavior (unless the nature of the behavior cannot be ignored).
5. At the same time you are ignoring a child’s disruptive behavior, direct your attention to others who are being appropriate and praise children who are adjacent to the target child for their appropriate behavior.
6. If a child is engaged in severely disruptive behavior, remove him or her to a time-out area for a short period of time. The first step in implementing this technique is to identify the types of behavior that are disruptive. These are the behaviors you will ignore. Also, at this time, identify those disruptive behaviors that cannot be ignored (e.g., aggression, loud and violent tantrums, etc.). Try to keep this list short. Concurrently, identify those nondisruptive behaviors that you will attend to and praise when they occur. Identify the individual child or children who will be the focus of this technique.

You may need some help to deliver praise for appropriate behavior in a systematic manner. An auditory cue or signal to look around every so often and deliver praise and attention for nondisruptive behavior will allow you to incorporate this technique more readily into your instructional plans. The beeper system involves the presentation of audible beeps at random intervals within a class period. Each beep cues you to scan the class and praise appropriate classroom behavior.

This technique provides a certain number of opportunities for children in the class to earn praise. The beeper system works best when a tape recorder is used to present beeps at random intervals for designated periods of time (e.g., 15 minutes, 20 minutes, 30 minutes, 45 minutes, etc.). The tape is an efficient way of cueing you, for you do not have to rely on memory alone to cue praise. The beeper system must be audible so it can be heard anywhere in the room from your desk, with or without earplugs.

When the beep sounds, you scan the class and praise the children of concern if they are not engaged in disruptive behavior at that time. You can praise other children for nondisruptive classroom behavior at the same time. You may also want to implement a point system whereby points are given to students who are not engaged in disruptive behavior. They can trade these points in later for free time.

When an individual child is being disruptive, withhold your attention from that child. Instead, praise the appropriate behavior of children who are adjacent to the child. For example, “I like the way Johnny and Susan are doing their work. Ashley, you are sitting so nicely.” Notice that your attention is diverted to behavior that is appropriate and not to the specific incident of disruptive behavior. However, if the child is severely disruptive, remove him or her to a time out away from the general area for a short period of time so that the disruption does not continue to disturb other students.

One comment that sometimes comes up needs to be addressed. The suggestion to some teachers to “catch them being good” is often met with “I don’t have the time. I have too many children to make this workable. I don’t have time to praise children in my class on a frequent basis. If I do this, I won’t have enough time to devote to my instructional duties.” There are several ways to respond to this objection.

First, it is true that using the strategy of praising children when they are not disruptive may initially take a lot of time from the teacher and he or she may feel overwhelmed. Consistently praising appropriate behavior is a new skill for some teachers, and it may feel as though it takes an inordinate amount of time away from other activities. However, the more you practice praising children frequently, the more natural it will feel, and it will become an inherent part of your teaching repertoire.

Second, after this initial “learning period” there may actually be no more time invested in dealing with disruptive situations than was invested previously. Very often, using this positive strategy merely requires a shift in teacher attention: There will be drastically decreased amounts of attention paid to disruptive behavior balanced by increased amounts of attention paid to nondisruptive behavior. Also, as a child’s behavior improves, the need for praise becomes less frequent, thus allowing more time for other teaching duties.

Finally, praise for appropriate behavior makes school more fun for the children and motivates them to learn. Consider using healthy doses of praise as a good investment in a child’s future in school.

Teachers must realize that disruptive behaviors do not go away by magic. There is an appropriate saying you can use with teachers who do not want to entertain any new techniques to overcome disruptive behavior: “If you keep doing what you’re doing, you’ll keep getting what you’re getting!”

ERIC #: ED065195
Title: Self-Regulation in the Modification of Disruptive Classroom Behavior.
Authors: Bolstad, Orin D.; Johnson, Stephen M
Publication: Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis (in press) 1972

Abstract: This study compared self-regulation and external regulation procedures in the treatment of children’s disruptive classroom behavior. Following the collection of baseline data, three of the four most disruptive children in each of 10 first and second grade classrooms were reinforced by the experimenter for achieving low rates of disruptive behavior. The fourth child served as a control subject throughout the experiment. Two of the three experimental subjects were then taught to self-observe their own disruptive behavior. In the final reinforcement period, these subjects were given control over dispensing reinforcers to themselves, based on their self-collected behavioral data while subjects in the other experimental group continued with the externally managed reinforcement. In extinction, reinforcement was discontinued for all subjects, but one of the self-regulation subjects in each classroom continued to overtly self-observe. Results indicated that both reinforcement programs produced a considerable reduction in disruptive behavior. The self-regulation procedures were slightly more effective in reducing disruptiveness than was the external regulation procedure and this advantage persisted into extinction. These results suggest that self-regulation procedures provide a practical, inexpensive, and powerful alternative in dealing with disruptive behavior in children.