DRAKE QTC 8

b) Consider your CSEL intervention case study. Are there tools from a behaviorist view for either encouraging productive behaviors or discouraging undesirable behaviors that you could apply to the case? What are they? Conversely, how might self-efficacy and self-regulation contribute to the intervention plans you use in your case study?


High School Case Study


There are many tools that can be used from a Behaviorist standpoint regarding the seniors in the classroom, as well as the boys that continue to disrupt and even bully other students.  I have seniors in my first block class, and there is nothing more difficult than getting seniors to (A) come to first block, and (B) be motivated to participate and stay on task. I use a lot of positive reinforcers to motivate kids to act appropriately and stay on task, and these reinforcers would also apply to the High School Case Study. The seniors are ready to be out of high school and know that time is drawing nearer, so as teachers, we must grab their attention and make the class exciting and beneficial to them. This way, they see staying on task and attendance as rewarding. Teachers can even make being attentive during class a game. "Whoever answers the most questions correctly at the end of class will receive a prize of some sort tomorrow". Make activities, notes, the WHOLE CLASS if need be, a game. Another positive reinforcement would be having a quiz at the end of class to go over what was covered that day, however I believe the kids will respond better to a game-like approach. For the misconduct issues of disturbing class, interupting others, and having phones out constantly, I would use BOTH positive reinforcement and negative punishment (and I do use both). I would use negative punishment by taking away students' phones if they continued to have them out and it became a disruption in their learning environment. If students interrupted others or disrupted class with bullying, I would have them stay after class for two minutes. If that did not work, I would contact their parents as a positive punishment, or last resort send them to the office for reprimand. However, with phones and other disciplinary issues, I would have a positive reinforcement for acting appropriately.  If there were no inappropriate disturbances, acts of disrespect to one another or myself, and if no phones were taken up that week, I would allow students to have some reward at the end of the week. This could be donuts I bring in, a game they want to play, or just social time.  All of these would reinforce a Behaviorist approach in that students would strive to meet that reward and hopefully work to avoid the punishments.

Self-efficacy could come into play with a lot of seniors in the sense that they feel as though they have done as much as they can do to pass school, and they either are or they aren't, and that is that. Nothing they can do (or not do) is going to help them pass or make them fail. Therefore, they do not try or feel as though they do not have to and come in to a sort of invincibility mindset.  I would point out certain ideas to them that if they are not passing because of missing work or poor grades, they will have to take their final or even do summer school after graduation in order to technically graduate.  I would allow students to regulate themselves after explaining the new rules implementation to them. They have the choice to make the right decisions, and they have the choice to get rewarded or punished. The fact that they may miss out on something fun at the end of the week, or they may make their classmates miss out on something fun, may make them act appropriately and stay on task.