Level systems revisited: An important tool for educating students with emotional and behavioral disorders.

Abstract

Students with emotional and behavior disorders represent one of the most challenging groups for whom to provide effective educational services. For many years, level systems have been used by teachers to provide an overall structure within which to deliver educational services. In recent years, a number of researchers and practitioners have criticized level systems as outdated and overly restrictive. The authors believe that many of the concerns associated with the use of level systems can be overcome with careful planning and implementation and that level systems can still be an important and useful component in effective programs for students with E/BD. Guidelines for developing an effective level system along with suggestions for overcoming some of the problems typically encountered with implementing level systems in school settings are presented in this paper.

The ACHIEVE! program: A point and level system for reducing severe problem behavior

“…The improvement described in eight of the nine students is consistent with controlled studies using token economies with level systems (Cancio & Johnson, ) and individualized function‐based approaches to token systems (Hagopian et al, ). The students in our descriptive and correlational analyses were 15 to 19 years old with long‐standing severe problem behavior that in some cases led to their conviction for serious offenses against children and restricted their access to community‐based activities.…”

“…Second, there is no provision for the use of punishment procedures in the program. The program does not employ point loss or level demotions (Cancio & Johnson, ; Pazaratz, ), timeout (Filcheck, McNeil, Greco, & Bernard, ), or other forms of response cost (Martin & Pear, ). Our practice is premised on three factors: (a) Students with long histories of severe behavior disorders also have long histories of experience with punishment.…”

“…program was to motivate students to demonstrate consistent patterns of prosocial behavior over periods of several weeks that promotes a greater degree of dependence and graduation from the ACHIEVE! program via a hierarchy of increasingly challenging goals for prosocial and proacademic behaviors (Cancio & Johnson, ; Phillips, Phillips, Fixsen, & Wolf, ; Smith & Farrell, ). Each time a student attained level promotion, he had access to a greater range of new items and activities in his school shop with the money earned.…”

“…In combination with a token economy, Hagopian et al used a level system to reduce problem behavior. Level systems provide opportunities for staff to reinforce prosocial behavior by providing access to items and activities as the individual demonstrated higher levels of prosocial behavior over a sustained period (Cancio & Johnson, ). When linked to a token economy, a level system provided increased access to backup reinforcers and privileges as individuals met gradually increasing behavioral criteria over time.…”

Multi-component behavioural intervention reduces harmful sexual behaviour in a 17-year-old male with autism spectrum disorder: a case study

“…The primary purpose of the level system within the ACHIEVE! programme was to motivate Osian to work towards long-term goals (Cancio & Johnson, 2007;Hagopian et al, 2002;Mace, 2009;Pazaratz, 2003). As he was promoted to higher level status, he was able to earn more money per point and travel greater distances from the school to participate in his preferred activities.…”