General Education Teachers’ Natural Rates of Praise: A Preliminary Investigation

Abstract

Many teachers struggle with classroom management and report that it is not only one of the most difficult parts of their job but also an area in which they receive the least amount of training (Baker, 2005; Reinke, Stormont, Herman, Puri, & Goel, 2011). Student disruptive behavior and ineffective classroom management likely influence teacher attrition, in that many teachers who leave the field due to job dissatisfaction cite student discipline as a contributing factor (Ingersoll, 2001). Praising is an easy-to-implement, no-cost strategy that has been studied since the 1960s to assist teachers with classroom management (Hall, Lund, & Jackson, 1968; Thomas, Becker, & Armstrong, 1968). Praise is defined as a verbal statement or gesture signifying teacher approval of student behavior, which goes beyond verbal feedback for a correct academic response (Brophy, 1981; Reinke, Stormont, Herman, Wachsmuth, & Newcomer, 2015). There are two types of praise: general praise (GP), a broad statement of approval (e.g., good job, nice), and behavior-specific praise (BSP), which explicitly describes the student's behavior and approval of that behavior (e.g., good job completing all your math questions; Moffat, 2011). BSP is purportedly more effective than GP because children learn which behavior earned approval (Brophy, 1981). There is a large body of evidence to support that praise can help prevent and ameliorate the effects of emotional and behavioral disorders (EBDs; e.

An analysis of general education teachers’ use of diverse praise

“…Teachers of early grades had higher TDP (5.3 kindergarten and 4.3 first) than teachers who taught later grades (2.0 fourth and 1.8 fifth). Previous research (Floress et al, 2017c;Jenkins et al, 2015;White, 1975) reported a downward trend in praise rates as grade level increases, which was observed with DP in this study (except for third grade, which had the second highest average number of TDP categories per observation; 4.8). Again, it is possible that teachers who use more BSP are also more likely to use DP.…”

“…On average, teachers used more GDP categories than BSDP categories, and this difference was statistically significant. This was not surprising, considering previous research Floress, Berlinghof, Rader, & Riedesel, 2017a;Floress et al, 2017c;Reinke et al, 2013) has demonstrated that teachers use more GP compared to BSP. If BSP is used less frequently in the classroom, then it stands to reason that there were fewer opportunities to code BSP verbatim data for diversity.…”

“…More recently, Floress, Jenkins, Reinke, and McKown (2017c) found a relation between teachers' natural use of BSP and class-wide, off-task behavior, but did not find a relation between teachers' natural use of GP and classwide, off-task behavior. These findings suggest that teachers who naturally use more BSP (class-wide) may have fewer students who are off-task and that higher natural rates of BSP may serve as a preventative classroom management strategy.…”

“…Unfortunately, few studies have examined teachers' natural use of praise . Based on existing studies Floress et al, 2017c;White, 1975), general education teachers' use of praise is infrequent and early elementary teachers praise more often than later elementary teachers (Floress et al, 2017c;White, 1975). Knowing how often teachers use BSP in the absence of intervention has the potential to inform professional development; however, there may be additional praise characteristics (i.e., DP) that also provide insight into how praise can be used to prevent behavior problems.…”

Preschool Teachers’ Use of Praise in General, at-Risk, and Special Education Classrooms

“…Average rates of praise were highest among first and second grade teachers (43.7 per hour) and lowest among high school teachers (8.4 per hour; Jenkins et al., ). Floress, Jenkins, Reinke, and Baji (under review) reported similar findings among GE teachers’ (kindergarten through fifth grade) natural use of praise. The downward trend was most obvious for BSP (10.25 per hour in kindergarten classrooms and 1.10 per hour in fifth grade classrooms), but was also apparent for total praise (45.1 per hour in kindergarten classrooms and 30.0 per hour in fifth grade classrooms) and GP (34.9 in kindergarten classrooms and 29.7 in fifth grade classrooms).…”