P.A.T.C.H.--Positive Approach To Changing Humans (1970)

[Music] [Music] in some classrooms the students enjoy a relaxed and regulated experience they learn have fun and enjoy the class because the really disruptive behavior of some students is carefully controlled by the teacher [Music] in other classrooms the situation is quite different undesirable Behavior can be changed [Music] [Music] a main part of the teachers role is to change behavior of students this may be academic Behavior or it may be social behavior teachers have a direct influence on the behavior of students whether they plan it or not for example unintentionally they teach students to be persistent in interrupting the teacher who is trying to work with another group of [Music] children if we can understand how the behavior of the teacher directly influences the behavior of the student then instead of this [Music] we can have [Music] this a whole class can change from this [Music] to [Music] [Music] this any age group can improve from this [Music] to this the most effective way to help teachers learn the principles of behavior modification is through inservice courses where they can try out the learning theory principles in their own classrooms between meetings leading the inservice is Dr Marsha McBeth school psychologist of the shoreline Public School Seattle Washington the ABC's stand for antecedent behavior and consequences antecedent means what goes on before a specific behavior occurs we know that all fourth grade children cannot do fourth grade arithmetic we may be able to prevent the kind of disruptive behavior that often accompanies frustration by giving a test to see what he can can do and providing materials at that level or take a simple situation such as who is to be the line leader in a second grade class a calendar with the names of each child in the room written on it for each school day eliminates the necessity of choosing teachers are pretty creative about thinking of antant [Music] although Richie and Mark have not yet learned to tell time they can match the hands to those on the real clock one effective way of changing behavior is through the use of operant conditioning any Behavior which is immediately acknowledged recognized or reinforced in any way is more apt to happen [Music] again any Behavior which is ignored or not responded to is less apt to happen again day byday all kinds of behavior both appropriate and inappropriate are being responded to or ignored for example what happens after an assignment has been made the teacher helps punishes notices all when the student is not working what does the teacher do when he is working he ignores him so according to our Theory the teacher is reinforcing nonworking Behavior you may wonder why you praise him for something he is supposed to do we are trying to change his behavior to teach him more appropriate behavior even if we think he is supposed to do something it may not be meaningful to him praise and other reinforcers are meaningful to most children later on comes the intrinsic reward of enjoying doing something but it doesn't start out that way [Music] but if he is praised every time what happens when you stop fortunately there is something called intermittent reinforcement this means that you start out reinforcing every time but then you begin skipping occasionally unfortunately this intermittent rein enforcement can also work against us now the teachers are ready to begin identifying situations they would like to change it may concern one child or a whole class John saheta school psychologist with the shoreline Public Schools explains to the inservice class how to pinpoint Behavior objective definitions of behavior are necessary the teachers selected a variety of behaviors they wanted to change there was Jerry who never finished [Music] assignments Matthew who was always out of his seat when he was supposed to be [Music] in and Miss emy's fourth graders who didn't stay in their seats long enough to start an assignment [Music] there was Pat a junior high school student rarely completed his [Music] work and Randy who talked out inappropriately bounced on his chair and displayed other such disruptive behavior here you won't know how far you've gone unless you know where you were you need to count and record how often the behavior you want to change occurs of course it depends on what you are counting if you are counting temper tantrums you could probably tally all of them if you're measuring how many minutes it takes a class to come in and settle down you could use a stopwatch for hitting Behavior you might want to use a wrist counter now we are ready to apply some of the principles we have been talking about what is rewarding to one child may not be to another giving a child free time to read a book in the library may be rewarding to one while reading might actually be punishing to another always pair an extrinsic reinforcer such as a gold star with social reinforcements such as praise although praise is a good reinforcer for some children it is not enough but when the two are paired often enough classical conditioning occurs and later just the praise is sufficient be sure reinforcement is given [Music] immediately when possible try to find a curriculum related [Music] reinforcer always provide a method of weaning away from dependence on extrinsic reinforcers let the student know that this method is to help him learn a better way to behave or learn by applying the principles teachers were able to affect changes here for example the anant was setting an egg timer for anywhere from 5 minutes to to an hour when it rang one point was earned for each child who was sitting in his seat total points were recorded on this track and when 500 points were earned the class had an extra recess Mr Johnson teaches social studies he is trying to determine what will be reinforcing to Pat Pat likes free time to work with science equipment he also would like to earn extra credit points to raise his social studies grade Pat records a point for every 5-minute block of acceptable behavior the points will later be turned in for his reinforcer we can observe a significant change in his performance [Music] this teacher has a unique plan for intermittent reinforcement of her whole class she has attached a Bucket close to the ceiling it is lowered from time to time when the children are working when it reaches a certain level she will read the note inside which will tell what the class has earned [Music] these children worked for four weeks to earn points toward a field trip each completed assignment in each subject earned a point for the [Music] class feeli trips can be highly motivating sometimes the school psychologists are called in to help set up a modification project Jerry is falling behind in his schoolwork because he does not do his class assignments one thing that is very reinforcing to Jerry is doing extra things with his parents so it is decided to involve the parents in this project the project is explained to Jerry with his teacher present [Music] Jerry begins earning his points [Music] Jerry earns his reward Mr s meta helps a teacher set up a project in a [Music] classroom children identify individual differences among themselves they also know what they can do to improve their behavior at the final ins service teachers are asked to share their [Music] ideas and finally comes the evaluation over 80% of the participants felt that they had gained a valuable tool and observations in the classrooms proved they were using it but the winners the real winners were the students [Music]