Behavior and Learning Environment
What to know
Behavior content clusters into three skills: defining, measuring, and changing behavior. An operational definition is observable, measurable, and free of inference ("hits peer with an open hand," not "is aggressive"). Measurement: frequency/event recording for discrete countable behaviors; duration for how long; latency for time to begin; interval recording (partial or whole) and time sampling for continuous or hard-to-count behavior. The ABC framework - antecedent, behavior, consequence - underpins the functional behavior assessment (FBA), which identifies function: attention, escape/avoidance, access to tangibles, or sensory/automatic. The behavior intervention plan (BIP) must then teach a functionally equivalent replacement behavior, adjust antecedents, and manipulate consequences.
Traps: punishment, including time-out, suppresses but does not teach. Reinforcement must be contingent, immediate, and scheduled (continuous to acquire, intermittent to maintain). Negative reinforcement removes a stimulus and increases behavior - it is not punishment. PBIS is a three-tier continuum (universal, targeted, intensive) and differs from an individual BIP. In discipline, a student with a disability may be removed for up to 10 cumulative school days before a change of placement; further removals trigger a manifestation determination, and a 45-day interim alternative placement applies to weapons, drugs, or serious bodily injury. Restraint and seclusion are permitted only for imminent risk, never as discipline, and must be documented.
Rule of thumb: define the behavior, find the function, then build a replacement - in that order. Example: a student who tears up worksheets to escape work gets a break card and a shortened task, not a lecture.