The natural rates of teacher verbal approval and disapproval in ten grade-seven classrooms were determined and compared with those described by White (1975). Although there were differences in the observation techniques used and the behavioral, cultural, and ethnic groups sampled, the results were similar. The majority of the teachers displayed individual rates of disapproval that were higher than their individual approval rates. The correlations between levels of on-task behavior and approval and disapproval rates were low. The issues raised by these findings are discussed in terms of directions for further research.DESCRIPTORS: child behavior, classroom reinforcement, teacher approval, disapproval, natural rates of verbal reinforcement, on-task behavior, children White (1975) asked how rates of teacher verbal reinforcement operate to maintain or increase the school behavior of pupils. She

Expanding the capacity of systems engineering to include evaluating and designing social systems is a desired goal as stated in the INCOSE SE Vision 2025. Systems engineering applications in sociotechnical contexts, from management and organizational to learning and education studies is already documented. There is room for adaptability in systems engineering methodology to accommodate a further reach into the social domain. The growing interest in this expansion is leading to the establishment of the term: social systems engineering. Social systems engineering is a reciprocal relationship between systems engineering and the social sciences. More specifically this means: 1) adapting/applying systems engineering methods/tools in a range of social policy areas in industry, government and academia; and 2) developing/applying social science theory and methods for the integration of teams and communities that are engineering systems. In this paper, we provide an overview of the history of social systems engineering and develop the concept to provide systems engineers with a conceptual foundation for using social systems in their systems engineering practice.

The late 1970’s have, in Queensland, seen an increasing number of exceptional children being integrated into regular school settings. In some cases attempts at integration have failed miserably. The present survey was conducted in the first half of 1979. It is an attempt to collect information in order to improve the integration of physically handicapped children into alternative school placements, in particular regular classroom settings. The information collected through the survey forms a basis of a sequence of integration procedures for physically handicapped children. The strategies contained in the sequence, while focusing on the physically handicapped, could be appropriate for other children with special needs.

A program aimed at improving the quality and quantity of oral exchanges between teacher and pupils during oral language sessions was examined. The particular program devised and implemented focused on reducing pupil call-outs by means of a group contingency procedure where time spent on listening to a story being read was contingent on keeping below a particular call-out rate. The study involves the use of Grade Seven pupils as data gatherers and suggests that beneficial social ‘spin-offs’ resulted between the Grade Seven and Grade One pupils. The reduction in the rate of call-outs during both treatment phases was statistically significant. Reinforcement (i.e., story reading), either partial or maximum, was obtained 80% of the time.

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