Making the Plan: Teaching Strategies
There are many ways to teach students skills to replace challenging behaviors. The team identifies skills that will help the student get his/her needs met in more effective and appropriate ways. The ideas on this page are a sampling of teaching strategies the team can consider. For more information about each of these strategies below, click the name of the strategy.
Social narratives are stories that provide information to students to promote understanding.
Consequence maps can help students organize their thinking and understanding and engage in problem-solving discussions related to behavior.
Self-monitoring is a strategy that teaches students to self-assess their behavior and record the results. This has to be taught to students in order to be useful.
Visual supports can include visual schedules, choice boards, people locators, and as a way to communicate "no." When students are overwhelmed, visuals can simplify communication.
The 5-Point Scale is a teaching tool that visually represents social behaviors such as “touching,” emotions such as “anger,” and abstract ideas such as “silliness.” The 5-Point Scale visually breaks down the issue into clear, visual and tangible pieces including how it looks or feels, and identifies ways to respond or cope at each level.
Systematic instruction of skills is key to effectively teaching new behavior skills. Breaking skills down into component parts, selecting prompting systems, modeling and chaining instruction may all be part of systematically instructing students in these new skills.
Scripts are written sentences or paragraphs that students can use as supports to build social skills. They use role play to practice using the scripts.
Comic strip conversations use pictures and conversation bubbles to help explain a situation and the thoughts of others during a situation.