How can Ms. Rollison determine what behaviors she should address and when she should address them?
Page 5: Phase 3–Agitation
The Agitation Phase is often rather long. In general, behavior is unfocused. Some students demonstrate agitation by increasing behaviors such as darting their eyes or tapping their hands, moving in and out of groups, and starting and stopping activities. In contrast, other students decrease movement by disengaging from groups, staring off into space, or lowering their involvement in instructional activities. Both are evidence that they have disconnected from the learning experience.
It is imperative that teachers identify and interrupt the acting-out cycle during, or preferably before, the Agitation Phase. If the cycle is not stopped, student behavior will likely increase to more severe forms of behavior such as verbal and physical aggression.
Listen now as Kathleen Lane explains more about how a teacher can interrupt the acting-out cycle during the Agitation Phase (time: 1:50).
Transcript: Kathleen Lane, PhD
Once you see these symptoms of agitation, there’s a couple of different strategies…and it’s important that you use these early on in this phase, because if they’re used later in the phase it could set the child off, to set them into the next stage of the acting-out cycle. But one approach is just to simply say, “It seems like you’re struggling right now and having a hard time staying on task,” or, “How can help you?”, “Would you like to go take your assignment and work in the back of the classroom?” or, “I’ve got this other area over here. Why don’t you move over here? Would you like to work with a partner on this?” So it’s before the behaviors become out of control. Because you don’t want to reinforce out-of-control behavior, but when you’re seeing that they’re struggling, they may not even be realizing yet that they’re having a hard time. Or sometimes you don’t ask them, you just simply say, “At this point we’re going to go ahead and grab a partner to finish up the last half of the activity and check your work, so I’d like you…” and then you’d number all of the children off, “One, two, one, two.” You kind of pair the kids up. But you need to shift something that’s happening in your instruction, and it doesn’t necessarily always have to be a change for the whole class. But, typically, if you have a child that’s disengaging like that, that’s not going to be the only child. And, as a teacher, hopefully you’re strong enough in your instruction and your talent to realize that, Maybe it’s time for me to shift something that I’m doing rather than it being a “within child” problem; it could be an instructional problem. So you would shift in that method. It’s much like wearing a necklace, like if you have a pearl necklace. Each little link is attached to the next, and all you have to do to stop the behavior problem from running the whole chain of your necklace, if you will, is cut it at one point. And it’s much easier to do that either at the Trigger Stage or the Agitation Phase. Because at that point, the discrepancy between where the behavior is and where the behavior you want it to be is so narrow that it’s much easier to get the kids back on track at that point.
Activity
Recognizing Agitation
Let’s take one more look at the video of Mark, but without the sound, so that you can focus on his and his fellow students’ behaviors (time: 0:43).
Description: Recognizing Agitation
As the teacher explains the assignment, Mark begins to shift in his chair. As the teacher mentions the yellow paper that the students will be writing their assignments on, Mark picks it up, looks briefly at it, then puts it down with a look of disgust. He smirks and shakes his head as she continues to explain the assignment. Throughout the teacher’s instructions, Mark seems either bored or frustrated.
Questions
- What are some indicators that Mark has entered the Agitation Phase?
- Are any of the other students in the room displaying signs of agitation?
- Is there anything the teacher could have done to intervene at this phase of the cycle?
Recognizing Agitation
What are some indicators that Mark has entered the Agitation phase?
Mark’s slouched body posture, facial expressions, and head shaking while the teacher is giving directions all indicate that he is not engaged in the lesson.
Are any of the other students in the room displaying signs of agitation?
Although not as disconnected, the girl in the right corner looks distracted. She rests her head on her hand, looks around the room, taps her pencil. Although she may be experiencing the same frustration or boredom as Mark, her behavior never escalates.
Is there anything the teacher could have done to intervene at the Trigger phase of this cycle?
Remember, “The very best discipline plan is a good lesson plan.” A more engaging lesson could prevent agitation, as could the use of both contingent and noncontingent attention (discussed earlier in this module). Because Mark is not the only student disengaged, a shift in the lesson would be appropriate.
Although a good comprehensive behavior management plan can prevent many problems in the classroom, it is not enough. A good lesson plan prevents misbehaviors that are responses to boredom or frustration. Finally, knowing how to intervene at the early phases of the cycle can de-escalate problem behaviors.
Any attempt to intervene during Agitation should be made at the beginning of this phase. Otherwise, these strategies might actually cause the behaviors to escalate toward the next phase—Acceleration.
