How can educators modify a student’s behavior?

Educators can consider simple changes to the classroom environment, such as:

• Changing the student’s seating location (e.g., closer to the teacher, away from distractions)
• Adjusting sensory stimulation (e.g., providing headphones, alternative seating options)
• Offering visual supports (e.g., schedules, picture cards, timers)

Environmental modifications can address different behaviors with different functions. For instance, reducing sensory stimulation can effectively prevent the need for a student to run from the classroom to escape a noisy environment. Alternatively, providing a visual schedule that clearly identifies when free time will occur could prevent the need for a student to act out to access a preferred activity.

Once a student can effectively demonstrate a replacement behavior, educators can use prompts to remind them to engage in it. Prompts often take the form of proactive reminders before the student is expected to demonstrate the replacement behavior, and they can be delivered through verbal statements, gestures, or visual supports. For example, before independent work, a teacher might prompt a student by pointing to a card or privately tell them, “Remember, you can show me your break card if you need a break.” As the student begins engaging in the replacement behavior more consistently, the educator can gradually fade prompts over time.

When a student engages in a target behavior to escape academic work, the team must try to identify why. For instance, do they find the work too challenging, too easy, overwhelming, or uninteresting? To address the underlying need, educators might consider adapting academic tasks by:

• Breaking larger assignments into smaller tasks
• Presenting only a few items (e.g., math problems, short-answer questions, pages of reading) at a time
• Providing extended time to complete a task
• Allowing alternate response modes (e.g., respond orally instead of in writing)
• Providing assistive technology (e.g., e-books, speech-to-text software, calculator)
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• Reading instructions and information aloud when the instructional goal is not reading related
• Offering enrichment or extension activities
• Integrating the student’s interests into the content

Choice making is the process through which an educator provides structured options to facilitate a student’s ability to follow an instructional or behavioral request. Choice making is especially effective for students who engage in interfering behaviors to escape non-preferred or challenging tasks. Offering students choices gives them more control over their own learning and fosters independence. To avoid overloading the student, educators should limit the number of options (e.g., two or three). Educators may offer students choice in terms of:

• Materials (e.g., write in a journal or type on a computer)
• Environments (e.g., sit on the carpet or at a desk)
• Order of tasks (e.g., read a chapter and then do a worksheet, or vice versa)
• Activities (e.g., work on either math or writing during independent work time)

For more information on choice making, explore the IRIS Fundamental Skill Sheet:

• Choice Making

Educators can support students’ self-regulation skills by creating a designated space in the classroom where individual students can go to take a short break or calm down. These areas are often referred to as calming spaces, cool-down areas, or peace corners. Students are taught to access and use the calming space as an appropriate alternative to interfering behaviors that serve the function of escape. For a calming space to be effective, though, the student must view the available items and activities as reinforcing. In this area, a student might:

• Spend a few quiet minutes with a comfort item or preferred activity
• Engage in sensory activities (e.g., listen to music, use a weighted blanket) or physical exercises (e.g., stretches, wall push-ups)
• Practice coping strategies (e.g., deep breathing, positive self-talk, mindfulness activities)
• Express themselves through writing or drawing

Using a calming space to take a short break should be a student’s voluntary decision. Although educators might suggest that a student consider taking a break, doing so should never be a disciplinary consequence. In this interview, Michael Bruebach discusses why it is important to establish expectations about the appropriate use of the cool-down corner (time: 1:48).

Noncontingent reinforcement is a strategy that involves delivering reinforcement on a regular schedule regardless of the student’s behavior. Because it is not dependent (i.e., contingent) on the student displaying any particular behavior, it is not designated as a reward to be earned. Rather than suggesting that “if you do X, then you get Y,” noncontingent reinforcement communicates that “you can count on Y being available at these scheduled times, no matter what.” As such, it allows the student to have their needs met without having to resort to the interfering behavior.

Although this strategy is often used to address behaviors for which attention is the function, it can also be used to address behaviors for which escape or access to items or activities is the function. Educators can use noncontingent reinforcement in a variety of ways, such as:

• Establishing designated times during the school day for the student to access attention by interacting with chosen teachers or other school staff (e.g., morning check-in, lunch meeting)
• Using a timer to remind themselves to provide the student with attention (e.g., give praise, stand near) on a regular schedule (e.g., every 10 minutes)
• Increasing opportunities for peer interaction throughout the school day
• Scheduling regular breaks from academic work
• Setting certain times when students can access reinforcing items or activities (e.g., computer, physical activity)

In this interview, Michael Bruebach explains how he implements noncontingent reinforcement in the classroom (time: 1:34).