Talking to Adults About FBA: Keeping it Simple for Busy Teachers Terrance M. Scott University of Louisville Bruce Stiller Eugene School Dist. 4J, OR

Tertiary Prevention: specialized & individualized strategies for students with continued failure Secondary Prevention: supplementary strategies for students who do not respond to primary Primary Prevention: school-wide or class-wide systems for all students and staff ~80% of Students ~15% ~5% Student Outcome and Prevention Model for Schools

Underlying Principles of 3-Tiered Prevention Models 4 Components What are the predictable failures? What can we do to prevent failure? How will we maintain consistency? How will we know if it’s working? 1234 Same at Every Level!!

FBA Team Leader FBA Teaming CICO Coordinator CICO Academic and Cultural Intervention RIDE Level 3Level 2Level 1 SECONDARY AND TERTIARY INTERVENTION in a System of PBS Level 4 Experts Wraparound

SW PBS Team (look for prediction and refer) Student Support Team (decision making for intervention) data CICO SST HC FBA Formal FBA data Classroom & Academic Success

Why Do People Behave? Modeling? Accident? Instinct? Condition?? Why Do People Continue Behaving? IT WORKS!

Function of Behavior

Functional Behavior Pathways Setting Independ. work time Problem Disruptive noises Antecedent No teacher attention Consequence Teacher attention Replacement Behavior Raise Hand ERIC Function Access teacher attention

5 QUESTIONS 1.WHAT IS THE PROBLEM? 2. WHAT IS HE/SHE GETTING OUT OF IT? 3. HOW CAN WE TEACH HIM/HER A BETTER WAY TO GET THE SAME THING? 4. WHAT ELSE CAN WE DO TO HELP THE STUDENT TO BE SUCCESSFUL? 5. HOW WILL WE KNOW IF IT WORKS?

ERASE problem behavior E xplain - What is the problem? R eason - What is he/she getting out of it or avoiding? A ppropriate - What do you want him/her to do instead? S upport - How can you help this happen more often? E valuate - How will you know if it works?

Functional Intervention Process FUNCTIONAL ASSESSMENT -collaborative -proactive -determine function of behavior Teach Functional Replacement Behaviors -teach key rules and skills -teach structure of environment -teach functional consequences CELEBRATE AND FADE ARTIFICIAL COMPONENTS -environments and conditions -reinforcers -negative consequences Facilitate Success -alter routines and physical arrangements, -instructional prompts in the natural environment -teach at the level of the student to ensure success Enhance Reinforcement for Desired Behavior -more immediate reinforcement -more obvious connections to natural reinforcement -artificial reinforcers Contingent Consequences for Undesired Behavior -extinction (differential reinforcement) -more obvious connections to natural reinforcement -artificial reinforcers START

We must affect the efficiency of target and replacement behaviors: irrelevant ineffective inefficient relevant effective efficient Goals for Target vs. Replacement Behaviors

Behavior Support Plan Jason S. Setting Event Strategies (make the problem behavior irrelevant) Build self esteem by giving the student a role in which he can excel. He is a good student. Pair him with a student who is not as academically able. Behavior Teaching Strategies (make the problem behavior inefficient) Teach student a replacement behavior that accomplishes the same thing the problem behavior accomplishes. 3 half hour sessions with school counselor on anger management, leading to the replacement behavior: “this is insulting. I want it to stop” Prompt this behavior when he becomes agitated. Teach classmates to say “Sorry” and stop. Reinforcement Strategies (make the replacement behavior more rewarding) Student earns the class 5 minutes free time on Friday for each day he gets through class without an anger outburst.

Behavior Support Plan Ronnie M. Antecedent Strategies (Prevention) 1. Use Green/Red Card to award points/praise every 5 minutes 2. Precorrect prior to each activity Behavior Teaching Strategies (make the problem behavior inefficient) 1. Teach R. to raise hand for attention 2. Teach (role play) in room time-out Reinforcement Strategies (make the replacement behavior more rewarding) 1. 80% of points earned and no blow-outs (trips to office) earns special time with adults and Jake (yellow lab). 3 time blocks per day 2. 80% of points earned and no blow-outs earns 20 minutes play time with Dad. Extinction Strategies (Minimize reward for Problem Behavior See extinction flow chart -- next slide

Where are the Clues? When does the problem behavior not happen? "It always happens everywhere" is neither correct, nor helpful. How do peers react to the problem behavior? What about adults? Parents? Remember that some problem behaviors are reinforced intermittently If you wanted to, could you create the problem behavior? What would you do?

Classic Pitfalls Identify one function per problem behavior. It is not a smorgasbord. Find the thing, that, if you took it away, the problem behavior would stop happening. Narrow the focus. Pick one or two problem behaviors (or classes of problem behaviors) and deal with those first. We cannot effectively deal with 25 problem behaviors at once.

Finding the Function On a scale of 1 to 6, how confident are we that we have identified the primary function of the problem behavior?