Teach Effectively!

The “Good Behavior Game” (GBG) is one of the interventions endorsed by the Coalition for Evidence-based Policy about which I wrote a couple of days ago. I’m very glad that it’s included there. The GBG has an extensive history, part of which I document at the end of this post. It goes back to Mont Wolf and his colleagues in the 1960s, who employed single-subject research methods to evaluate it. Mr. Wolf, who died a couple of years ago, worked on many different interventions while at Kansas University, including the Teaching Family Model. There’s a marvelous remembrance of Mr. Wolf written by Todd Risley, available for those who want to download the PDF (the abstract is linked in the first item that follows).

The large-scale, longitudinal studies by Shep Kellams and his colleagues took the GBG to new territory. Dr. Kellams and his group found that getting teachers to use the GBG had clear and long-term benefits for their children. Dr. Kellams, who recently retired from Johns Hopkins University, is not affiliated with the Center for Integrating Educaiton and Prevention Research. It promises to publish manuals for the use of the GBG and a mastery learning method for pomoting reading competence.

It’s work by folks such as Mr. Wolf and Dr. Kellams that provide the foundations of evidence-based interventions. We owe them.

Here are notes about the GBG from the Web site of the Journal of Applied Behavior Analaysis (JABA). Each of the items in this list is linked to an abstract for the article described in the snippets. JABA has a deal with the PUBMED’s National Library of Medicine by which one can obtained PDFs of any of these articles; just go here and take the publication information from any of these articles with you.

1. Montrose M. Wolf (1935-2004).
   Todd Risley (2005). Montrose M. Wolf (1935-2004). Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,. 38, 279-287. Montrose Madison Wolf, who discovered the reinforcing power of adult attention for children and based on that discovery invented and named the nonviolent parenting procedure time-out; who discovered that absent speech and social development could be artificially created with operant conditioning techniques; who first engineered a token
2. The effects of a good behavior game on the disruptive behavior of Sudanese elementary school students.
   Saigh, P. A. & Umar, A. M. (1983). The effects of a good behavior game on the disruptive behavior of Sudanese elementary school students.Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,. 16, 339-344. An endemic version of the Good Behavior Game was applied in a rural Sudanese second-grade classroom. Official letters of commendation, extra time for recess, victory tags, and a winner’s chart were used as backup reinforcers. The class w
3. Effect of the good behavior game on disruptive library behavior.
   Fishbein, J. E. & Wasik, B. H. (1981). Effect of the good behavior game on disruptive library behavior.. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,. 14, 89-93. A modification of the good behavior game was used to reduce disruptive behaviors during a weekly library period of children in a fourth-grade class. Modifications included student input in designing rules, attempts to state rules in positive terms, observation of class behavior in the exp
4. The good productivity game: Increasing work performance in a rehabilitation setting.
   Lutzker, J. R. & White-Blackburn, G. (1979). The good productivity game: Increasing work performance in a rehabilitation setting.. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,. 12, 488. Simple reinforcement systems have been used to improve performance in a broad range of settings. For example, in classrooms, the Good Behavior Game bas been shown to be very effective (Barrish, Saunders, and Wolf, Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 1969, 2, 119-1
5. Relative effectiveness of teacher attention and the good behavior game in modifying disruptive classroom behavior.
   Warner, S. P. Miller, F. D. & Cohen, M. W. (1977). Relative effectiveness of teacher attention and the good behavior game in modifying disruptive classroom behavior.Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,. 10, 737. A variety of behavioral procedures have been employed in recent years to modify disruptive classroom behavior. Such methods have been developed with the belief that curtailing disruptive behavior would strengthen pos
6. Use and analysis of the good behavior game to reduce disruptive classroom behavior.
   Harris, V. W. & Sherman, J. A. (1973). Use and analysis of the good behavior game to reduce disruptive classroom behavior.. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,. 6, 405-417. A recent study reported procedures (the good behavior game) for reducing disruptive classroom behavior. Replication of the procedures of the good behavior game in two classrooms showed it to be an effective technique for reducing disruptive talking and out-of-sea
7. Good-behavior game: A replication and systematic analysis.
   Medland, M. B. & Stachnik, T. J. (1972). Good-behavior game: A replication and systematic analysis.. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,. 5, 45-51. A good-behavior game was implemented in a fifth-grade reading class consisting of two groups of 14 students each. After the presentation of the game, reversal and component analysis phases were instituted. Game components included rules, lights (response feedback) and group consequences of
8. Good behavior game: Effects of individual contingencies for group consequences on disruptive behavior in a classroom.
   Barrish, H. H. Saunders, M. & Wolf, M. M. (1969). Good behavior game: Effects of individual contingencies for group consequences on disruptive behavior in a classroom.Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis,. 2, 119-124. Out-of-seat and talking-out behaviors were studied in a regular fourth-grade class that included several problem children. After baseline rates of the inappropriate behaviors were obtained, the class was divided i