A child guidance skill-building guide for teachers and school staff

1. A Psycho-Educational Perspective

2.  Rewarding students for good behavior is a popular classroom discipline
procedure.Teachers of habitually disruptive students like using rewards
because, in a well-structured reward system, they have the potential of
winning students’ compliance fast.Advocates of using rewards to
discipline students with habitually disruptive behaviors claim that
rewards promote compliance and stop misbehavior. Opponents of
rewards state that rewarding students, an externally oriented procedure
(the teacher regularly administers the rewards, not the student), are a
way of controlling and manipulating children’s behavior that does little to
change permanently the disruptive behavior. In other words, the short-
term effect of stopping misbehavior does not translate into a long-term
effect of helping children grow and develop better-adjusted ways of
behaving.Alfie Kohn, the author of Punished by Rewards states that
rewards can be seen as punishment in the sense that rewards both
manipulate behavior and are a form of doing things to students rather
than with students. Both advocates and opponents of rewards present
strong supportive arguments and I would like to bring the child guidance
perspective to this controversy.

3.  Assuming that the teacher has a well-structured and consistent reward system,
rewarding students with habitually, and in some cases severe, disruptive
behaviors can be a fast and effective way of winning compliance. My fourteen
years of experience teaching emotionally disturbed/behaviorally disordered
students strongly supports the conclusion that rewards are both fast and
effective. Nevertheless, I also understand that, if used alone and with no clear
long-term goals in place (both for the student and for the teacher), rewards are
short-lived. External rewards may temporarily inhibit disruptive behaviors but
they do not teach appropriate behavior and will not help children outgrow the
disruptive behavior.Teachers need to be aware that rewards appeal exclusively to
students’ extrinsic motivation (“I do _____ so that I can get _____”) having little or
no effect in strengthening children’s intrinsic motivation (i.e. self-pride, self-
confidence, self-efficacy, and a sense of accomplishment among others).
Consequently, even when the teacher uses rewards consistently, a discipline
system that only takes into consideration giving rewards while ignoring children’s
perceptions, attitudes, and feelings may have a strong short-term effect in
winning compliance, but no long-term effect in helping habitually disruptive
students learn new and more productive ways of behaving.

4.  Simply put, therapeutic teachers see rewards as
one way of supporting and strengthening the
more comprehensive child guidance program,
but they never use rewards as the only and/or
most important component in the behavioral
management program. Primarily, teaching self-
management of behavior is the long-term
therapeutic goal; rewarding behavior
extrinsically while the student develops internal
self-control and is able to self-manage behavior
is just a supportive tool in our more
comprehensive child guidance toolbox.

5.  This brings us to the second point that I would like to make. At all stages of the
reward program, students should be part of the decision-making process.
Children have a say in what is motivating to them, and they have a choice in the
kinds of rewards included. Even when we are externally manipulating the
behavior, we give choices to children and make children part of the decision-
making process, encouraging and inviting the child in formulating solutions.
Learning to make better-adjusted behavioral choices is another long-term goal
that we teach children since the beginning.Children learn to make good
behavioral choices by having the opportunity to choose, not by following our
directions or receiving rewards. For this reason, we explain to the child that once
he or she is better equipped to self-manage behavior, we will fade the extrinsic
reward system, moving the student gradually from an externally supported
system into an almost exclusively internally motivated support system.The
child’s self-management skills and self-awareness tell us when he is ready to
make that transition. In addition, just knowing that they now require less external
manipulation than at the earlier stages of intervention is extremely rewarding
and motivating to students.Teachers can measure success when we find
ourselves using considerable fewer rewards at the final stages of our intervention
program than the amount of extrinsically motivated rewards required at the
initial stages of our intervention.

6.  If you are thinking of implementing a reward
system to manage a habitually disruptive
student, or already have one, the following
guidelines will be helpful in increasing your
system’s efficiency.With minimal variations,
you can adjust these guidelines so that you
can use them with a disruptive class.

7.  Get to know the child as an individual. Find out what the
child is interested about and what motivates him or her;
also, find out what the child dislikes. Directly ask the child
what is reinforcing to him or her.You and the child should
discuss the reinforcement.
 After discussing what is rewarding to the child, set goals
with him, and help the child translate the goal into an
action plan that clearly lists the sub-steps that he will need
to follow to reach the goal. Link the reward system with
the action plan, aiming at reinforcing the action plan.
 To set goals and develop an action plan, engage the
student in a discussion about “the ways he wants to be
(goal),” and how he can make that happen (action plan).

8.  Do not assume that the student knows how to
listen, how to cooperate with other students, or
how to solve social problems.Teachers need to
teach those behaviors explicitly. Explain to the
student, model, and then review the behavior
that you expect from the child. Give the student
examples of alternative behaviors that the child
can use to replace the habitually disruptive
behaviors.The extra time you spend earlier in
the year teaching socially appropriate behaviors
to habitually disruptive students will save you
time and frustration in the future.

9.  Explicitly state what the student needs to do
to earn the reward. For example, just saying,
“Be nice to each other” or “Pay attention to
the lesson” is not enough.You need to state
what the child is going to do in behavioral
terms, for example, “15 minutes seated and
doing your class work will earn you a token.”
The link between the child’s behavior and the
reinforcement must be apparent to the child.

10.  Vary the reinforcement, so that the child does not get used to it, and
does not feel bored by the same reward.With the student, you can
develop a reinforcement menu (10-15 rewards), and to make it more
appealing, include a mystery reward.When the child meets her behavior
expectation, she selects one reward from the reinforcement menu.
 For bigger rewards, you can use a token system, so that each day, the
child earns tokens, points, or checks that she exchanges at the end of the
week or month.
 Emphasize social and privilege reinforcement (e.g. breakfast with the
teacher or extra computer time) over material reinforcement (toy and
prizes). Reinforcement that involves spending time with adults and doing
tasks together are generally more rewarding to children than toys.
Remember, when you spend time with the child, resist the temptation to
discipline the child during that time. In other words, keep reinforcement
time and discipline time clearly separated.

11.  Always keep in mind that, particularly for students
with recurrent behavior problems, for behavior to be
good does not need to be perfect. Reward effort and
improvement; that is, notice and appreciate that the
child is trying hard and is doing a little better each
time.
 Teach the student self-rewards and self-reinforcement;
for example, the child compliments herself for raising
her hand, for waiting her turn, for using a learning
strategy, or for thinking of a better approach to solve
a situation. Gradually transition the student from an
externally manipulated reward system to self-reward
and self-reinforcement.

12.  Brandt, R. (1995). Punished by rewards? A
conversation with Alfie Kohn. Educational
Leadership, 53(1), 13-16.

13.  The guiding principle in child guidance is that
all therapeutic interventions are essentially
verbal interventions, most specifically,
carefully crafted ways of talking to gradually
shift a distraught or troubled child from a
state of agitation and helplessness into a
more resourceful state of resolution

14.  FACEBOOK PAGES AND
GROUPS
 PSYCHOEDUCATION FOR
TEACHERS (Page)
 https://www.facebook.com/p
sychoeducationalteacher
 FREE OR CHEAPTEACHING
RESOURCES (Page)
 https://www.facebook.com/fr
eeresourcesforteachers/
 WETEACHTHEWORLD
(Group)
 https://facebook.com/groups
/222247571474300
 BOOKS IN CHILD GUIDANCE
 THE PSYCHOEDUCATIONAL
TEACHER
 https://www.amazon.com/aut
hor/thepsychoeducationaltea
cher/