April/May 2017

Positive Reinforcement

Reinforcement increases the chance that a behavior will happen again in the future. Reinforcement can come in two forms: Positive (something is added) or Negative (something is taken away). When we talk about reinforcement, positive and negative do not mean good and bad. Both positive and negative reinforcement make the behavior that happened before the reinforcement happen again. Not everyone likes the same things, something that may seem good to you may not matter to someone else.

Examples:

Kelly makes her bed and her mom gives her a big hug and says “Great job!” Kelly likes this attention from her mom and makes her bed again to get more of this attention. (positive reinforcement)

Jeff screams at his teacher and the teacher goes away. In the future Jeff screams at his teacher when he wants her to go away. Jeff did not want his teacher to bother him so he screamed at the teacher and made her go away. Getting his teacher to leave was the reinforcer. (negative reinforcement)

Mike likes to look out the window. When Mike does his classwork, his teacher lets him look out the window for five minutes. In the future, Mike completes his classwork so that he can look out the window for five minutes. (positive reinforcement)

Operant of the Month

TACT

Student labels something they see, hear, smell, taste, or feel and gets non-specific reinforcement (such as praise or toy)

Ex. Student sees a picture of a cow, says “cow” and gets some kind of reinforcement. He/she does not actually get a cow.

Another word for a tact is label.

February 2017

February 2017

Cold Probe Data

By now you have received progress reports from your child’s teacher that indicate how many items or skills your child has “mastered.” This may leave you wondering how we decide when something is learned or “mastered.”

Skills targeted for teaching are “probed” or checked each day, relatively close to the start of your child’s school day, before those skills are worked on for the day. School staff present the targeted items and write down whether the student responded correctly or incorrectly. Students must respond correctly on the first try for the response to be scored as correct. When the student responds correctly on the set number of consecutive days (usually 3), the skill is considered mastered and a new target is chosen for teaching. Teaching occurs using the errorless teaching procedures described in our January newsletter.

When a student masters a skill, that skill is tracked on a skill tracking sheet, and the student’s graphs are updated to include the newly mastered skill. The total number of skills or items mastered are then reported to parents using progress reports or other means such as communication sheets and/or graphs.

Operant of the Month

IMITATION

Repeating or copying someone else’s motor movement. (Doing what you see someone else doing).

Ex. the student sees someone clap their hands, student claps hands, student is reinforced with general reinforcement (praise, treat, etc)

Individuals often look to the behavior of others in order to figure out how to do something or what they should be doing. Developing the ability to imitate others allows students to learn indirectly by copying a model. 



Important dates:
2/8/17: 2 hour data delay
2/16/17: Spartan Dress Down Day with $1 donation 
2/17/17: Act 80 Day: Teacher in-service day/No School for students
2/20/17: President's Day: No school for Teachers or Students