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Special education students can often be difficult to work with.  What type of behavior modification systems have you found to be successful when working with these students?

The best explanation I have seen  for correcting behavior is Posuitive behavior support. It is worth your while to get one good book on the subject (or obtain from a library). I have a book from Brookes called "Parenting with Positive Behavior Support" by Hieneman-childs-sergay, and it is excellent, although geared to parents. I am sure that Brookes has books on PBS for teachers, but I wouldn't know which is best. The basic idea is:
1) evaluate behavior:
    a)contributing factors (sleepiness, sugar foods, noisey classroom, etc)
    b) What is the child gaining from the behavior
2) Make a plan , trying to:
    a) eliminate or decrease contributing factors
    b)trying to prevent the child from "gaining" (even negative attention)
      from the bad behavior.
    c) arranging that the child gains his "benefits" that he used to get from bad
        behavior through good behavior

3) Implement and then evaluate.


If this does not work, either the plan was lacking in proper evaluation at first, was not done consistantly, or the plan needs revamping. It is a lot of work, but extreemely effective.

I have found Positive Behavior Support (PBS) to be extreemely effective in working with my daughter (who is a smart, sassy, strong-willed teen with Down syndrome). PBS takes a bit of time to learn, and takes careful planning to implement, but is extreemely effective.  I learned it through the book "Parenting with Posive Behavior Support" published by BROOKES, but this book IS geared to the home. Since Brookes is princibly an educational publisher, I am sure that they have good books on PBS for teachers, although I would not know which is best.  I will outline the basic idea here, but this is NOT a good subtitution for really studying it properly.
1) Evaluate the behavior
  a) when/ where/ with whom does it occur
  b) possible contributing factors (lack of sleep, didn't eat breakfast, too
      much suger, too noisey a classroom, etc.)
  c) what happens as a result of the behavior
  d) what is the child "gaining" (even if negative attention) from the behavior

2)develope an intervention plan, trying to:
    a) decrease or remove contributing circumstances
    b) arrange that he does not get the "benefits" from the bad behavior
    c)arrange for him to gain these benefits from good behavior
    d)a way to measure results

3) implement and evaluate, revise if needed