In recent decades, research and practice have shown that investing in a positive school-wide social culture is a key component of effective education. Evidence demonstrates that educators and students succeed when students are present, engaged, socially secure, and academically successful. Developed by 2M Research in conjunction with an expert…

Whole-school or whole-class programs designed to promote positive behavior can enhance the likelihood that effective teaching and learning occur for all students. This practice guide is intended to help elementary education educators, as well as school and district administrators and parents, implement and support effective prevention-focused…

Parents (12 families) used self-instructional booklets to decrease their children's (ages 4 through 8) interrupting behaviors. A mean improvement of 31 percent was found with 11 of the 12 children showing improvement and 7 of these significant improvement. All parents rated the program positively. (Author/DB)

A social skills training program for deaf adolescents was developed which stresses (1) observable positive social behaviors and (2) social problem-solving thinking skills. Pilot evaluation of the eight-week program with 35 male adolescents revealed that the experimental group scored significantly higher than controls on a test of social skills and…

Comparison of the relative effectiveness of part versus whole teaching strategies for students (N=24) with moderate and severe mental retardation found positive (but not significant) effects favoring the part method. Students taught by the part method exhibited less excess behavior than did students taught by the whole method. (Author/DB)

The article describes the dramatic improvement in reading achievement, decrease in discipline problems, and improvement in student attitudes in a North Carolina elementary school over a two-year period when students were taught through their preferred learning styles. (DB)

Self-management strategy training was given to four learning-disabled adolescent males. The subjects mastered the steps in seven to nine sessions and went on to apply the strategy to target behaviors following which these behaviors were at or above criterion in both training and generalization settings. (Author/DB)

Analysis of videotapes of training procedures with 12 developmentally disabled adults in a horticultural day work program found an overall staff emphasis on selectively attending to workers' successful behavior with evidence of both efficiency and effectiveness of this approach. (Author/DB)

A review of nine studies on the efficacy of metacognitive interpersonal problem-solving training with students who have learning and behavior problems found demonstrated cognitive gains but less success in demonstrating that such gains were subsequently applied to actual behavior or generalized to other social behavior. (DB)

This study, with four preschool children who displayed difficulty maintaining independent on-task behavior, found they were able to learn a self-monitoring strategy (comprising self-talk, self-appraisal, and self-recording) and to maintain the targeted behavior improvements upon removal of the prompts. (DB)

This literature review examined the effectiveness of seven training programs for parents of junior high school students with learning disabilities. Parent training usually resulted in an increase in desired behaviors both at home and at school; difficulties encountered in parent training programs included lack of cooperation from parents and a…

This paper presents a synthesis of the research on positive behavioral support (PBS) for students with challenging behaviors. PBS is a long-term approach to reducing the inappropriate behavior, teaching a more appropriate behavior, and providing the contextual supports necessary for successful outcomes. It notes that the 1997 amendments to the…

Three mentally retarded students (ages 9-12) who exhibited challenging behaviors to escape from academic demands and to receive social attention were taught alternative assistance-seeking and attention-getting phrases. Data indicated that the intervention reduced challenging behavior. The results transferred across settings, and were maintained 18…

A review of 27 studies found that self-monitoring can be successfully used with special education students to decrease inappropriate classroom behavior and to increase attention to task, positive classroom behaviors, and some social skills. Self-monitoring also appears to increase the likelihood of generalizing learned behaviors to new settings.…

Two studies of three youths (ages 12-14) with severe mental retardation, who used aggression and self-injury to avoid difficult instructional situations, found that simple commands interspersed among more challenging instructional trials were effective at increasing the learners' responsiveness to instructions and decreasing levels of problem…