Best Practices and Behaviorism

The next section of the article, "Alternative Education Programs for At Risk Youth: Issues, Best Practices, and Recommendations" defines the population characteristics of students in alternative programs. What we can conclude here is that there are a variety of reasons why students need alternative programs. One of the growing segments of student populations to enter alternative schools are those students with special education needs. Here in St. Louis this would involve students with an Individualized Education Plan or IEP. At my school IEP students comprise nearly half of the school's population. I will comment on this issue in another post.

The article next list some best practices of research based alternative education strategies. Of course, the low student to teacher ratio is at the top of the list. I think anyone would agree that students with poor impulse control do better in smaller environments many times for the simple reason that there are fewer distractions. Following small class size is a class management system based on behavior management techniques like a level system. It is highly recommended that the school emphasize positive behavior management rather that punitive. Coupled with positive behavior management is "clear and direct" instruction of rules. Naturally, reinforcement fades over time.

Behavior management techniques which are grounded in behaviorism is the method of choice for most behavior management programs and especially for those involved in special education. I am not a proponent of many of the tenets of behaviorism. I believe behaviorism has valid points and even agree that it is useful in some situations. I, for one, would not like living in the type of world described in Walden Two by B.F. Skinner. I fully understand that we all in engage in behavior that has been learned from reinforcement but my ability to think in abstraction allows me to envision behavior that contradicts what I have been conditioned to do. I have again become sidetracked and will have to re-visit behaviorism in another post.

However, I cannot get away from behaviorism yet because the next best practice on the list is to perform a functional behavioral assessment. I am all too familiar with this technique and will comment further in my post about behaviorism. Rounding out the list for the best practices of alternative education programs is social skills instruction which includes problem solving and empathy training and high quality academic training which include direct instruction, difficulty with material controls, and small, interactive groups.

My philosophy for blogging is to keep it short and sweet or at least short, so I will conclude by stating that this list of best practices are components of the schools where I have worked. However, the level of implementation and the long term use of many of these components seem to vary from school to school and within each school from year to year.

Which of these practices are most important for alternative schools and what do these practices look like? The last part of this question is a favorite line for behaviorists, "what does the behavior look like?"