“PBS: Starring your behaviorally challenged child, not Big Bird and friends”

Does your child exhibit behavior that inhibits his or her ability to succeed in school or other social situations? Have no fear. PBS is here! Nope, not your favorite childhood television network. In this case, PBS stands for Positive Behavior Support, or the process of analyzing behavior and using effective tools to alter it. There is a lot of information on the web regarding the steps for implementing PBS, but we would like to make the process more accessible for parents. The following are the steps to PBS broken down for real-life situations. 

1. Behavior Team: Since consistency is key for behavior modification, it is going to take the work of all those involved in your child’s development for PBS to be true and effective. Open communication and collaboration amongst parents, teachers, service providers, and any other caregivers is ESSENTIAL! 
2. Individualized Planning: What works for one child may not necessarily work for another. Teachers and parents, know your children! The behavior plan developed for the student should be a product of the behavior team’s collaborative work based on their knowledge of the child. 
3. Functional Behavior Assessment (FBA): We know it sounds scary, but it’s really quite simple. Although performed more formally on a school level, parents can conduct an FBA at home. This involves determining the ABCs of your child’s behavior, as described in our last entry. Let’s put this in real-life context by considering young Sarah from our previous post:

You pick up your six year-old, Sarah, from school. She’s excited to get to her room and play with her toys, but you tell her that she needs to do her homework. Sarah throws herself on the floor and starts kicking and screaming. The noise is pulsating and you have a headache. Therefore, in order to get her to stop crying, you give her one of her favorite toys and tell her she can play. 

A. First, you have to take note of what happens before Sarah’s behavior occurs (antecedent). 

You tell her she needs to do her homework. 

      

B. Secondly, you must indicate the behavior that occurs (behavior).

Sarah throws herself on the floor and starts kicking and screaming.

C. Finally, determine what the consequences of the behavior were (consequence).

You give her one of her favorite toys and tell her she can play.

Now think about this, if you someone gave you exactly what you wanted every time you threw a tantrum, wouldn’t you scream and cry all of the time? We thought so. 

So, as part of the behavior plan that you are going to implement, you may want to start thinking about some more effective consequences for your child’s behavior, as discussed in our previous post. It is imperative, however, that your child has just as important role as you do in creating these consequences. By developing the consequences together, you build a partnership with your son/daughter/student and allow him or her to take ownership of these behavioral results. 

4. Hypothesis: After several instances of determining the before, during, and after of your child’s behavior. You have to analyze your findings. Don’t worry, it’s not as technical as it sounds. Your simply taking all of the information you have gathered about the ABCs of your child’s behavior and using it to make an educated guess as to what is causing the behavior. In referring to Sarah’s case, perhaps she is intimidated by the amount of homework she has or is concerned that she is not going to have time to play. The cause of the behavior can be determined not only by the results of the FBA, but also in talking to both Sarah and the other adults involved in her life.

5. Behavioral Support Plan: Once you have hypothesized about the cause of the child’s behavior, it is a lot easier to develop a plan to help him or her. This plan should be created by the behavior team and should include strategies for preventing the behavior, new methods of responding to the behavior, ways of teaching skills to replace the inappropriate behavior, and goals for the child. We’ll have more specific posts about the components of the support plan in future posts. 

6. Monitoring Outcomes: You’re implementing the plan, providing consequences, and teaching new social skills. That’s enough, right? Wrong. Perhaps, one of the most essential parts of PBS is monitoring your child’s progress. This simply means tracking your child’s success –or lack thereof– in acquiring more appropriate social skills and meeting his or her goals. If it becomes apparent that the child is not progressing as needed, the behavior team must reconvene to alter the behavioral support plan. 

Now that you are aware of the specific steps that PBS involves, you may want to read about specific strategies and visual supports that you can use as part of your child’s behavior plan in our next post. Stay tuned!