Behavior Change Project Student B Robinson Elementary Behavior Change: Completion of Assignments Behavior Prior to Implementation

Student B has an IEP for Developmental Delay. The student is in first grade and comes for support services four days a week. He needs help completing task, separation from classmates at times because of aggression, and can also be described as a loveable child who at times can be eager to learn. This student has a very complex home life and it has been affecting him at school everyday since the beginning of school. Student B is ADHD and had Fetal Alcohol Syndrome. He is not regularly medicated and it has been a challenge for his performance in many areas of the classroom. Student B sleeps in class, can be defiant, and has been reduced to half days because of behavior problems at school. Student B can be independent in his learning when using a computer, at times. Student B has days where he is able to follow directions and engage and then he can have days where he sleeps or is aggressive. The days that separate the good from the bad have no triggers to why Student B would behave one way or another. When it comes to his work, he needs goals, approval, and task broken down. Student B can have an attitude of knowing that he can accomplish everything that is required of him, but can quickly snap to not believing in his obvious abilities. It has been my task prior to this assignment to help Student B stay on task with in the resource room. Student B is able to complete task when he desires. Rewards have not always been effective. The student seems to need to be prompted constantly and have all the attention of anyone who will attend to him when he is working. Student B has not been known to stay on task independently, unless given a computer task, at times. From what I have observed Student B has never completed an assignment unless he has no distractions, one-on-one support, and constant prompting.

Behavior Change Project Student B Robinson Elementary Behavior Change: Completion of Assignments Brainstorming Process

From my observations in the General Education class and resource room for Special Education I have concluded that Student B uses his behavior of not completing task as an escape for negative reinforcement. I have seen that prior to getting off task Student B is engaged after many prompt to continue with the positive behavior. Student B is lead to being off task sometimes by choice and also by the distraction of his surrounding. In the classroom Student B sleeps most of the mornings and by the time he is back in the afternoon is usually aggressive. His ability to get work done independently is at a less than 30% chance. Student B in the resource room is not able to get away with not doing work because there are only three students. Even though it is a smaller class sixe, Student B stills needs about 90% of the teachers attention. When he does gain the attention he has to be prompted to complete the work still and then begins to complain about what he has to accomplish. I can tell that he seems overwhelmed. He likes order and needs explicit directions. He benefits from blocking out the others. I want to address the students constant need for attention from the teacher, his distracting behavior, and how to get his work done and learn from the work given to him. I want to address his hyper activity and how to have posture that is for writing and learning. He tends to move around in his seat a lot and move about when he does not want to listen or learn. I believe that Student B needs to be able to be in any setting and be able to focus, block out what is around him, and see his work in manageable pieces for him to get his work done and resist the urge to escape and not complete the task given to him.

Behavior Change Project Student B Robinson Elementary Behavior Change: Completion of Assignments Implementation Process

The Implementation Plan that I decided to try with Student B for completing task was one that I wanted to be able to apply in his General Education and in the Special education class. I believe that it would be most effective for Student B to use a blinder when working on task individually, that way he can block out the people around him. When the blinder was first used Student B wanted to knock it down constantly, but after explaining that this was to be used to help him focus, he left it alone. When he was surrounding his table space and work with the binder, it created instant focus for him. He was able to seemingly clear her mind without all of the distractions. This worked, but on the first day of solely only having the idea of using the blinder, Student B quickly went from working to snapping into saying that he could not do the work. I sat with him and then tried to see how I could quickly fix the situation before it escalated. He told me that it was just too much to do. I grabbed a piece of paper and began to cover his work that he had not done yet and helped him to see the work row by row. That worked really well because it met his need for order. It also worked well because he completed the task! He seemed to follow directions and be respectful to the help I was trying to bring him. Implementation was effective for completing the task, but not independently. He still needed teacher attention the entire time to get his work completed. The use of these resources coupled with explicit directions given to Student B ended with a great day with the first round of implementation. The following days of implementation had varied results and were effective, but a lot of the teachers attention and time was needed for the success of the student.

Behavior Change Project Student B Robinson Elementary Behavior Change: Completion of Assignments Effectiveness/Reflection

The effectiveness of Student Bs plan for changing his inability to complete work has been ineffective due to outside factors. His plan has been working at times when he has a typical morning, but he had a rough couple of weeks since the plan has been implemented. The plan has been unable to be implemented in the General Education classroom because it takes too much effort on the teachers part. The divider has been helping at times to help try to get the student on task, but he has also wanted negative attention and knocked it off the table to cause a scene. Breaking down the work into chunks is helpful for him and if it could happen without someone having to be there the whole time to complete his work, it would be better. The student is in the process of possibly changing his least resistive environment from the general education classroom. If I could do the project again, I would want to come up with a plan that is less dependant on the teacher for the success. This student is at a place where he cannot be without the constant aid of a teacher. I would suggest that the best situation for him academically would be to be in a small context for learning everything or to have a paraprofessional. I have learned from this experience that it takes trail and error and time to change behavior. I have learned so much about this specific student that this project was very valuable to me. I have learned that it is important to track data and observations before trying to make students change in a thousand ways. Plans of implementation were intentional and are so important for students to be able to receive the education that is around them and for them to excel in their abilities, disabled or not.