Disruptive behavior is the referral problem in this case. Disruptive behavior relates to the condition where a child shows abnormal behavior that threatens or intimidates other individuals. Such behavior can be exhibited in various ways that violate the social norms. Disruptive behavior impacts the learning capability of a student because it inhibits the child from taking part in educational activities and isolates him or her from the peers. Besides, it minimizes the chances of participating in ordinary community activities. The aggressiveness and noncompliance character places the student and others in physical danger and comes with too much demand upon teachers and other members in an institution. I have been requested by a staff member representing a provider of education to develop a behavior intervention plan for a third-grade student at a local elementary school. The behavior intervention plan will be used to assist a student who is demonstrating disruptive behaviors in the classroom and within the school vicinity.
Functional Behavioral Assessment relates to the procedures that have been developed to ascertain or find out why a child acts in a particular way. The concept of FBA is that all behaviors happen within a certain context and serve a particular purpose. The approach is used on students who show behavioral or emotional problems that impact their education progress or coping along with other students. The purpose of the FBA is to provide an insight and understanding of the reasons behind the inappropriate behaviors to get the desired outcome or goal (O'Neill, Albin, Horner, & Sprague, 2015). For example, a child might be having a hard time to show his work on math issues, crumples up the paper, and gets angry. This behavior is not suitable because the child might be avoiding frustrating work. The FBA can be used to figure out the cause of the problem and find the best possible way out. Also, it can be used as a basis for developing an individual education plan. The assessment assists in identifying challenging behaviors to enable teachers or parents to concentrate on positive outcomes and build a positive association between the student, teachers, peers, and family. It is essential to conduct the assessment before it escalates into a disciplinary action since teachers can focus on positive desired outcomes.
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It is essential to conduct FBA before the development of a behavior intervention plan because FBA assists in identifying the causes of the behavior that needs to be intervened. FBA provides a review of particular practices and behavioral patterns that need to be addressed by the intervention plan. Also, FBA gives a broader perspective on the behavior of the student in question that can be utilized in the development of the plan to make sure that all critical areas are addressed. The collected data is crucial because it assists teachers to define the behavior that can be used in forming an individual based plan.
Antecedent stimuli and conditions are potentially crucial for the assessment of the disruptive behaviors. It entails the modifications of the environment to allow the changing of the conditions in the setting that prompt a student to participate in interfering behavior. Antecedents relate to the events or actions that take place before a behavior while conditions are the circumstances under which the behavior happens. There is an association between the behavior of an individual and the surrounding environment. Antecedent strategies enable those assessing to obtain information about environmental events that trigger disruptive behaviors and those associated with desirable behavior. There are several environmental activities that can lead to the development of the disruptive activities, for example, activity sequence in promoting learning, pace of instruction to facilitate student engagement, classroom seating arrangements, difficulty of the tasks and opportunities to respond to teachers cue or writing a response (Madill, Gest, & Rodkin, 2014). Antecedent stimuli and condition provide a basis of understanding and addressing the needs in a generally disruptive classroom. It allows the correcting of an environment that is contributing to the problem behavior and enables the matching of individual skills and strength.
Antecedents provide people with an opportunity to understand and modify behavior. It gives a foundation of understanding information on the behavior and situations that trigger specific behavior.
A discriminative stimulus is a spur in the presence of which a particular response will be reinforced. It can be applied consistently to achieve a specific reaction to increase the probability that the desired response will take place. Discriminative stimuli and motivating operations assist in triggering disruptive behaviors. The attention of a student can be scheduled to enable him or her gain and develop social skills, for example, facilitate peer tutoring for the student or arrange for teacher attention. The incorporation of the student interests can motivate and trigger the desired behavior, for instance, task modification help in decreasing the problem behavior and enhance productivity.
Consequence stimuli and conditions are events that take place after or succeed a response. Either negative or positive reinforcement can maintain disruptive behaviors. Negative reinforcement is used in reinforcing proper behavior and at the same time put escape-motivated behaviors on extinction, for example, a student can avoid poor academic performance by reading (O'Connor, 2015). Positive reinforcement is where a person gets something as a result of his or her behavior. It seeks to increase to increase the possibility of the desired behavior by removing a stimulus instantly after a behavior. Automatic reinforcements assist in creating a favorable outcome without the engagement of another individual.
The three indirect functional assessment procedures that will be used include interviews, record reviews and Checklists, and questionnaire. Interviews with key individuals will be utilized in determining the concerns and perspectives concerning the student and occurrence of disruptive behaviors. Teachers spend a lot of time with the students hence can share crucial details about the setting and other exhibited characteristics by the student. This tool will be used to acquire background information about the student and characteristic of the class. Record reviews entail the reviewing of the behavioral, psychological and academic reports of the students to disclose vital information concerning social skills, possible setting events and academic strength and issues. Checklist and questionnaire that are available in the FBA will be used to measure the quality of life of a student (O'Neill, Albin, Horner, & Sprague, 2015). It will highlight the life of a person and the needed attention. This will provide insight into the mandate of maintaining the problem behavior of the student.
The three direct, descriptive assessment procedures to be used during the process of FBA is direct observation of the student’s behavior, recording of the frequency of the issue and determination of the intensity of the problem. The direct observation entails the gathering of information about the issue, antecedent triggers and consequences and this assists in the identification of the problem and its existence. The recording of the frequency permits the determination of the routine of the problem and the duration to enhance effective implementation measures. The determination of the intensity of the problem can be determined by determining the number of referrals and incomplete assignment.
Ethical considerations are essential when addressing the issue of disruptive behaviors. The control of this condition may require the use of drugs like Ritalin that comes along with side effects like being addictive and can lead to anxiety and depression. Also, the drug can lead to the development of a negative feeling about children on the drug taking. The use of drugs is effective in boosting the learning experience of the affected child, peers, and teachers. The treating of the affected child by use of behavioral modification through operant techniques like Token Economies is another ethical concern. It is a mechanistic bribery system that entails the use of tokens when a child demonstrates good behavior. The approach is practical because it assists in improving the self-esteem of the child and enables him or her to cope with others.
In conclusion, there has been a growing concern of behavioral and academic problems where students demonstrate disruptive behaviors both in classroom and within school setting. The forms of disruptive behavior vary widely depending on the environment and causes. Functional Behavioral Assessment is a crucial tool used in the determining and ascertaining of the disruptive behaviors in students.
References
Madill, R. A., Gest, S. D., & Rodkin, P. C. (2014). Students' perceptions of relatedness in the classroom: The roles of emotionally supportive teacher-child interactions, children's aggressive-disruptive behaviors, and peer social preference. School Psychology Review, 43(1), 86.
O'Connor, M. A. (2015). A Comparison of the Effects of Choice and Differential Reinforcement on the Computation Fluency of Students with Escape-Maintained Academic Performance Problems (Doctoral dissertation, The University of Nebraska-Lincoln).
O'Neill, R. E., Albin, R. W., Storey, K., Horner, R. H., & Sprague, J. R. (2015). Functional assessment and program development. Nelson Education.
