ECSE 602 Instructional Programming for Infants and Young Children with Disabilities

1. ECSE 602Instructional Programming for Infants and Young Children with Disabilities This week’s session Instructional Strategies and instructional environment Task Analysis Dr. Y. Xu

2. Instructional Strategies • Teaching strategies exist along a continuum, going from child-initiated learning to teacher-directed learning (Sadler, 2003) • Level A: Make environmental adaptations to maximize the child’s engagement in all areas of the classroom. • Level B: Improve the social environment to increase the child’s engagement in exploring, verbalizing, and problem-solving. • Level C: Apply naturalistic strategies to embed specially designed instruction on specific objectives during free play. • Level D: Include effective instruction related to the child’s objectives in typical teacher-directed activities. • Level E: Create separate individual or small-group instructional time specifically for the direct instruction of the child with special needs Dr. Y. Xu

3. Instructional Strategies • Naturalistic intervention strategies • Forgetfulness • Novelty • Visible but unreachable • Violations of expectations • Piece by piece • Assistance • Sabotage • Interruption or delay Dr. Y. Xu

4. Instructional Strategies • Behavioral problems and miscommunications • Imagine you are in a classroom at a university and listen to the professor saying: Dr. Y. Xu

5. Instructional Strategies • Behavioral problems and miscommunications • Now imagine what someone with learning disabilities or severe retardation might hear if he/she did not understand most of the words even the instruction is given in his/her own language: Dr. Y. Xu

6. Instructional Strategies • Behavioral problems and miscommunications • Imagine the confusion a student might feel if he/she repeatedly heard only parts of instructions during the school day. For example: • Students with learning disabilities maybe confused by the “back and forth” between social and instructional discourse and between oral and written language. • Students may have difficulty attending to or remembering a long series of instructions. • Students with ADD may fail to listen when spoken to or may be distracted by noise in the environment. Dr. Y. Xu

7. Instructional Strategies • Several events could occur when instructions are not followed: • The teacher may give instruction again, but may be ineffective if the same words are repeated. • The teacher could show frustration if he/she infers that the action, or lack of action by the student, is noncompliance. • The student might be reprimanded or punished for not following the instructions and therefore, also feel frustrated and perhaps angry. Dr. Y. Xu

8. Instructional Strategies • Possible causes for miscommunications: • The student doesn’t pay attention to instruction because of disruptions. • The student doesn’t understand the meanings of certain words. • The student requires certain period of time before the message is processed by the brain, e.g., • The delay in processing spoken words is a common problem in students with language and attention deficits. • The student receives a message that was directed toward another student. Dr. Y. Xu

9. Instructional Strategies • An example of miscommunication • Jan, who has severe mental retardation, sat at the cafeteria table with her lunch spread out in front of her. The teachers noticed that Jan was not eating; and within a short time, she began crying. The teachers knew that she had her favorite lunch foods. They checked for any signs of illness or discomfort, but found nothing. The teachers did not notice, however, what was happening across the table from Jan. A paraprofessional was working with another student who ate very rapidly. After every bite, the student was told, “Put your hand down.” After every directive, both the child receiving training and Jan put their hands down. Unfortunately Jan was not a quick eater, so she did not have time to put a bite in her mouth before she heard the instruction again (Saunders, 2001). Dr. Y. Xu

10. Instructional Strategies • Another example of miscommunication • Tony ran toward the cafeteria line. The teacher called him back and said, “Tony, you must go slowly, or you are not going to be allowed in the line.” Tony started again at a fast pace toward the lunch line. The teacher again called him back, and Tony began to shout and threaten the teacher. The teacher was not aware that Tony did not know the meaning of the word, ‘slowly,” but Tony did understand most of the other words spoken to him. Thus, what Tony heard was, “You must go, or you are not going to be allowed in the line.”(Saunders, 2001) Dr. Y. Xu

11. Instructional Strategies • Strategies for getting the message across to students with language and/or attention deficits 1.Before giving the message, say the student’s name and wait for the student to look at you. 2. Speak slowly, clearly, and loud enough to be heard. 3. Keep instructions short. 4. Emphasize important words. 5. Keep the ideas in messages simple. 6. Use visual reminders with the instructions when giving a multistep instruction. Dr. Y. Xu

12. Instructional Strategies 7. When giving an if-then instruction, give the instruction in “then-if” order with emphasis on what is required by the student . E.g., ‘We will play outside after you clean up your toys.” 8.If a student doesn’t respond, wait at least 10 seconds, get his/her attention, give the message again using fewer words, and with emphasis on the important words. 9.If the student responds incorrectly, get his/her attention, and repeat the message using different words. 10. If the student consistently responds incorrectly, teach the student by using modeling and feedback to follow the instruction. (Saunders, 2001) Dr. Y. Xu

13. Arranging Instructional Environment • The overall orientation of the classroom environment • Ego-oriented classrooms • Students function in an overall competitive environment with each other • Success for individual students is defined with respect to the performance of other students • Students are graded on the “curve” Dr. Y. Xu

14. Arranging Instructional Environment • The overall orientation of the classroom environment • Task-oriented classrooms • Success is not defined as their “capacity” but rather is determined by a combination of factors that they can control, e g., interest, a sincere effort to learn • Students are evaluated with respect to their previous performance and not against the performance of others • All students have an equal chance at making an effort to learn Dr. Y. Xu

15. Ego-oriented “Tony, you’re the smartest student in the class!” “Richard, why can’t you be more like Ben?” Class, look at how smart Frank is, to have figured this out!” Task-oriented “Tom, this is your best work yet!” Jason must have worked very hard to have figured this out!” “Lisa, I know you can do much better on this assignment if you use the strategies we practiced and put more effort into it.” Arranging Instructional EnvironmentThe overall orientation of the classroom environment Dr. Y. Xu

16. Arranging Instructional Environment Opportunities to increase self-efficacy • Providing additional practice to reinforce prior knowledge • Initiating regular reviews • Overlearning • Using ongoing assessment strategies • Monitoring students’ comprehension by frequently asking questions • Carefully supervising guided practice activities Dr. Y. Xu

17. Arranging Instructional Environment Opportunities to increase self-efficacy • Pointing out appropriate social models • Offering assurances that students can do what the social models have done: e,g., “Hey, James couldn’t do this either last week. James worked hard and learned to do this, so I’m sure you can learn to do it, too!” • Providing positive support • Direct encouragement and support for effort: “I really believe you will be able to do this if you give it a try!” • Demonstration of genuine teacher interest at appropriate times Dr. Y. Xu

18. Task Analysis • Task analysis defined • Task analysis involves breaking a task (behavior, skill, milestone, concept, etc.) down into its component parts (simpler steps) in order to create a sequence of related targets for instruction. • Example: • Task analyze the following objective: • When told “Jimmy, please go to the office for me.” Jimmy will go to the door, open it and pass through 100% correctly on three successive occasions. ECSE 602 Dr. Xu

19. Task Analysis • While the list of skills in the task analysis always proceeds from beginning to the end of the task, the order in which skills are taught may not. • Forward Chaining • Backward Chaining • Partial Participation Task Analysis ECSE 602 Dr. Xu

20. Task Analysis • Forward Chaining: It is used in a situation where the reward is not a natural part of completing the task. • Assessment and teaching strategy • For assessment • Start at the beginning skill identified in the task analysis and document the child’s performance • For teaching • Start at the beginning and teach the required skills 2/19/09 ECSE 602 Dr. Xu Dr. Y. Xu

21. Task Analysis • Backward chaining: It is used in a situation where the reward is a natural part of completing the task. • Teaching strategy • Useful in tasks where there is a natural reinforcer for task completion • Useful with students who require immediate reinforcement • Useful with students who cannot complete the task beginning to end • Some skills, such as riding a bicycle, can’t really be taught using forward chaining ECSE 602 Dr. Xu

22. Task Analysis • Example of a task analysis for putting on shorts (constructed by observing a competent 2-year-old perform the task) (Noonan & McCormick, 2006, p. 132) 1. Grasp shorts at the waistband with hands on either side. 2. Look for label on inside of waistband; turn shorts so that label faces the back. 3. Squat and hold shorts close to floor. 4. Insert left foot into left leg of shorts. 5. Insert right foot into right leg of shorts. 6. Pull up shorts to hips, pulling up one side at a time until reaching the hips. 7. Grasp shorts at back of waistband and pull up over buttocks. 8. Grasp front of shorts and pull up to waist. ECSE 602 Dr. Xu

23. Task Analysis: More Examples (Noonan & McCormick, 2006, p. 133)Total Taskgrasp spoonscoop foodlift spoon to mouthopen mouthInsert Spoon in mouth • Forward chaining • Grasp spoon • Grasp spoon Scoop food • Grasp spoon Scoop food Lift spoon to mouth • Grasp soon Scoop food Lift spoon to mouth Open mouth • Grasp spoon Scoop food Lift spoon to mouth Open mouth Insert spoon in mouth • Backward chaining 1. Insert spoon in mouth 2. Open mouth Insert spoon in mouth 3. Lift spoon to mouth Open mouth Insert spoon in mouth 4. Scoop food Lift spoon to mouth Open mouth Insert spoon in mouth 5. Grasp spoon Scoop food Lift spoon to mouth Open mouth Insert spoon in mouth