Ng Bee Ying, Group B

Case 1

Area of intervention:
Using soft toy (Bob Bear) to improve on Annie’s behavioral and social difficulties (example, biting)

Intervention:
The soft toy (Bob Bear) can be used as a teaching or learning tool to model, role play and reinforce children’s appropriate behaviours in class.

According to Keith, Mathews, Meese and Michael (2009), there are 6 steps for this intervention:

Firstly, teachers need to identify the student and specify the behavior that needs to be intervened. In this case study, Annie is the targeted child and the behavior that needs to be improved on would be her behavioral and social difficulties.

Secondly, teachers have to obtain baseline data. In order to do so, she has to observe Annie’s frequency of behavioral or social difficulties, and then set a goal for an acceptable level of behavior. The teacher would need to note down the frequencies of Annie’s behavior before and after setting the goal.

The third step would be getting an animal soft toy (for example a bear) which is durable and has a friendly appearance, last but not least, giving the bear an easily remembered name (Bob Bear). Next, teachers have to inform the parents that the bear would be brought into the classroom and state the purpose and benefits of the bear being introduced to their child.

The fourth step is to introduce Bob Bear to the class as a new student and getting the children to teach Bob Bear the classroom rules through role modeling. Teacher needs to pretend that Bob Bear exhibits both appropriate and inappropriate behavior for 4 main purposes:
1) Re-teach classroom rules
2) Reinforce appropriate behaviors
3) Enforce consequences
4) Assisting children to understand and complete activities

Fifth, the teacher has to continue counting the frequency of Annie’s behavioral and social difficulties, after introducing Bob Bear, until appropriate behavior increases or inappropriate behavior decreases to the goal level set during the second step of intervention. Plot the graph for both baseline and interventions then evaluate the graph to determine how effective the interventions have been.

Lastly, the teacher has to constantly record and reflect on the interactions between Annie and Bob Bear, but also on incidental learning and relating the learning to appropriate behavioral and social skills.

Effectiveness:
The intervention mentioned is an action research study which has been implemented in a preschool setting and proved to be effective in the table shown whereby there is a decrease in inappropriate behaviors in the child when Bob Bear was present. However, it is noticed that the graph did not show the child constantly decreasing his or her inappropriate behavior. But I still believe that the graph is accurate and the intervention is effective because children cannot be displaying appropriate behaviors everyday and there is indeed an observable declining of frequency in unacceptable behaviors exhibited by child.

Personal Evaluation on how the child benefits from the intervention:
I feel that it is a very good way to reinforce children’s positive and appropriate behavior in class as soft toys are non-threatening to children and perceived as something they are comfortable with.

The teacher pretends that the bear is displaying inappropriate behavior and getting Annie to show Bob Bear the appropriate behavior or the teacher enforcing the consequences when Bob Bear breaks a classroom rule is an effective strategy. It will allow Annie to internalize her thoughts and behaviors that if she bites her classmate, she will have to bear the consequences and hence reducing the chances of her repeating the inappropriate behavior.

Suggestions:
I feel that the intervention can be used for both children, with or without special needs. The improvement that I would make is that I think that it might be better if Annie could bring her own soft toy into the class as it is something that she is more familiar and comfortable with. I would also discuss the process and results with Annie, as well as doing an evaluation together so that she would know how much she has improved. I can take the chance during evaluation to acknowledge that I have noticed her improvement and encouraging her to keep up her good behaviors.

Reference:

Keith, S., Mathews, R., Meese, R. L., & Michael M. (2009). Bob bear: A strategy for improving behaviors of preschoolers identified as at risk or developmentally delayed. Teaching Exceptional Children, 41(5), 54-59. Retrieved from http://web.ebscohost.com.libwww3.np.edu.sg/ehost/pdf?vid=1&hid=103&sid=348044ee-d48d-47ab-88c6-9a942a7883eb%40sessionmgr111