Accelerating Appropriate Behaviors of Children in a Head Start Program

Abstract

A research and demonstration classroom was established through the cooperative efforts of the University of Washington's Experimental Education Unit and the Head Start Program of the Seattle Public Schools. The demonstration classroom enrolled children demonstrating severe social, emotional, and/or language deficits, as identified by Head Start teachers. The aggressive or acting out child was most often seen as the child needing help. Of the 25 children originally referred, 12 were enrolled for a term which ran up to 43 days. Principles of programing the arrangement of activities in language and social discrimination were followed in the classroom. Behavior modification procedures were utilized and introduced to the regular Head Start teachers. The demonstration class teaching staff worked with the Head Start teachers when the children returned to their home class and throughout a followup period.

The Use of Child‐centered Play Therapy and Filial Therapy With Head Start Families: A Brief Report

“…Although the literature contains several examples of the treatment of Head Start children with play therapy techniques (Alverson, 1979;Haring, Hayden, & Nolen, 1969;Yellin, 19871, there is only one example of the use of child-centered play therapy in Head Start programs (Andronico, 1969). To date there are no documented studies of the effects of filial therapy in Head Start programs.…”

SOME EFFECTS OF TOKEN REWARDS ON SCHOOL ACHIEVEMENT OF CHILDREN WITH DOWN'S SYNDROME1

“…A second matched group of six children received only verbal praise for correct responses to the same instructional materials and failed to improve in arithmetic but showed significant gains in language. Re-test scores one year later revealed that the Token Group maintained its gains in both subjects whereas the language performance of the No-Token Group showed a significant decline.Behavior modification research with children of normal intelligence (e.g., Haring, Hayden, and Nolen, 1969;Miller and Schneider, 1970;Chadwick and Day, 1971) has amply demonstrated the effectiveness of token economy systems in producing improvement when successful performance on academic subjects is selected as the "target behavior" for modification. There are few comparable studies with retarded children (e.g., Birnbrauer, Wolf, Kidder, and Tague, 1965).…”

“…Behavior modification research with children of normal intelligence (e.g., Haring, Hayden, and Nolen, 1969;Miller and Schneider, 1970;Chadwick and Day, 1971) has amply demonstrated the effectiveness of token economy systems in producing improvement when successful performance on academic subjects is selected as the "target behavior" for modification. There are few comparable studies with retarded children (e.g., Birnbrauer, Wolf, Kidder, and Tague, 1965).…”