Positive Behavior Support

Overview Managing learners’ behavior to reinforce positive behavior and change inappropriate behaviors is critical to helping them attain their learning objectives. According to (Kern & Clemens, 2007), reinforcing positive behaviors among learners with academic and behavioral problems positively influences their motivation and can in fact prevent problems. Positive behavior support is an approach that aims to provide rigorous and individualized interventions to individual learners who exhibit challenging behaviors. In a school’s settings negative habits such as disruptive classroom behavior, bullying and violence are rampant and have the potential to significantly disrupt learning both at the individual student level and at the institutional
Such behavioral problems may range from mild troubles such as disruptive talking during class lessons to serious behavioral problems such as fighting or bullying other pupils in a class or school. More often than not, such antisocial behavior leads to academic underdevelopment in the short term and poor development of positive social skills in the long run (Luiselli et al., 2005). At the individual student level, such disruptions are undesired and needs to be addressed in order to refocus a student towards academic and social goals. At the institutional level, behavioral problems not only affect the academic performance of the students exhibiting the problems but also of multiple other students who learn within the environment. Without doubt, therefore, behavioral problems are a serious cause for concern for both educators and parents whose kids exhibit behavioral problems, especially in schools. The magnitude of behavioral problems and their implication to learning can be deduced from most public schools where education efforts are adversely affected by conditions which are counter-productive to learning (Warren et al., 2006). Virtually all educators concede that education would be much easier if the education environment was rid of discipline
There is adequate evidence from research showing a marked reduction in behavioral problems among learners where PBS models of behavior modification were implemented. Some of the direct behavior changes that can be observed within the classroom include increased academic engagement (can be seen through passive behaviors such as silent reading and more attention when listening to class instructions and active behaviors such as increased confidence in class and asking questions) reduction in office referrals and suspensions following adverse behaviors, and increased academic performance in general (Kern & Clemens,