Research Supporting Preschool Life Skills
Donaldson & Austin, 2017
The Preschool Life Skills program is cited within this article as an effective preventative measure for problem behavior in children due to its success in decreasing problem behavior while simultaneously teaching new, socially-significant skills.
Fahmie & Luczynski, 2018
This review of the Preschool Life Skills program summarizes the research as well as provides future direction for PLS in the areas of maximizing skill acquisition, improving generality, evaluating feasibility and acceptability, and testing predictions.
Falligant & Pence, 2017
The purpose of the current study was to extend the PLS literature by assessing the level of instruction necessary to teach children with autism spectrum disorders and developmental disabilities to respond to their name, request attention and assistance, and tolerate delays and denials.
Gunning, Holloway, & Grealish, 2020
These experiment represents the first evaluation of a parent implementation of the PLS program.
Gunning, Holloway, & Healy, 2018
The Preschool Life Skills program was implemented in an Irish preschool with one classroom acting as a control group and a second acting as the intervention group. There were no significant differences between control and intervention groups at baseline. Following intervention, there was an increase in the skills and decrease in problem behavior in the intervention group. Generalization and maintenance of the skills were also observed.
Hanley et al., 2014
In this research study, the Preschool Life Skills program was implemented in two Head Start classrooms to assess their effects on skills acquisition and problem behavior. The program was implemented for around 7 months and resulted in the classrooms meeting the goal of providing 10 opportunities with 5 correct responses per child on an average of 83% of occasions. There was also a 57% reduction in overall problem behavior.
Hanley et al., 2007
This is the original research study on the Preschool Life Skills program. A classwide teaching model was used to demonstrate the preschool life skills and data was collected on student performance and problem behavior. Results showed over a 300% increase in preschool life skills and a 74% reduction in problem behavior.
Luczynski, Hanley, & Rodriguez, 2014
This study aimed to assess the generalization and maintenance of the preschool life skills for six children ages 3 to 5. After each child successfully performed the skills on at least 85% of trials across three different sessions, generalization and maintenance trials began. Moderate to high levels of generalization were observed, after some modifications were made to the generalization conditions. Most of the social skills were maintained after a 3 month period.
Rees et al., 2023
This study sought to evaluate individualized PLS curricula for two boys with substantial trauma histories and demonstrate how the PLS program could be delivered within a trauma-informed framework.
Robison, Mann, & Ingvarsson, 2019
The Preschool Life Skills program was evaluated for its effects on nine children with various developmental disabilities. There was an overall increase in the preschool life skills as well as a decrease in problem behavior for each of the children.