THE EFFECTS OF ACCESS TO A PLAYROOM ON THE RATE AND QUALITY OF PRINTING AND WRITING OF FIRST AND SECOND‐GRADE STUDENTS 1

A common assumption in special education is that temporal limits for a task should be expanded so that ample time is provided for completing the work. This study describes the opposite strategy of restricting temporal limits to augment academic performance. Three educable retarded children received token reinforcement contingent on the number of correct math problems answered during daily sessions. A reversal design was used to assess the effects of an abrupt reduction in time limits (20-5-20 min) and a graduated sequence of reductions (20-15-10-5-20 min). The graduated sequence resulted in rate increases of correct responding ranging from 125% to 266% and these gains endured when temporal limits were again expanded. In contrast, the abrupt shift produced interfering emotional behaviors and rate decreases in academic performance of 25% to 80%. The findings indicate that systematically restricting temporal limits for an academic task can further enhance the performance of slow learners already maintained by a token system.

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 87%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

REDUCING TIME LIMITS: A MEANS TO INCREASE BEHAVIOR OF RETARDATES¹

Ayllon

Garber

Pisor

1976

“…Similar to other studies (Evans and Oswalt, 1968;Hopkins, Schutte, and Garton, 1971;Lovitt, Guppy, and Blattner, 1969), the present results indicate the use of free time to be a powerful consequence for the control of a variety of academic behaviors. Leaving school early at the end of the school day and leaving the classroom early for lunch were effective consequences for increasing the number of students completing the homework assignment and for increasing the accuracy with which students performed the homework assignment.…”

Section: Resultssupporting

confidence: 90%

Homework Assignments, Consequences, and Classroom Performance in Social Studies and Mathematics1

Harris

Sherman

1974

Elementary school students who frequently answered questions incorrectly in class were given daily homework assignments in social studies and math, but they rarely completed the assignments accurately and their classroom performance in social studies and math was only slightly better than when they did not have homework assignments. However, consequences provided for accurate completion of homework assignments increased the number of students completing homework and the accuracy with which homework assignments were completed. Further, assignments of homework with consequences for accuracy were associated with more accurate classroom performance.Students are often assigned homework on the apparent assumption that it will improve their academic performance and foster development of independent study skills. A number of articles have described the presumed advantages or disadvantages of homework assignments on the attitudes of students, teachers, and parents about homework assignments (e.g., Check, 1966;Langdon and Stout, 1957;Maertens, 1968;Schiller, 1954). Although several authors have reviewed the experimental literature on the assignment of homework (e.g., Goldstein, 1960;Otto, 1950;Swenson, Cost, and Taylor, 1955), there seems to be little agreement as to whether the assignment of homework is useful. Abramowitz (1937), Anderson (1946), Foran and Weber (1939), Hines (1957), Schain (1954), andSteiner (1934) The purposes of the two present experiments, in social studies and math were: (1) to evaluate the effects of assigning homework on students' subsequent classroom performance, (2) to develop methods of increasing the number of students who completed homework assignments at a reasonable level of accuracy, and (3) to evaluate the effects of assigning homework on students' subsequent classroom (WINTER 1974)

“…Early studies found that teacher attention could be altered to provide an immediate and natural system for changing on-task rates (Chadwick and Day, 1971;Hall et al, 1968;Hasazi and Hasazi, 1972;Ward and Baker, 1968). However, attention was not always effective as a reinforcer, 5Brigham, Finfrock, Breunig, and Bushell, 1972;Chadwick and Day, 1971;Hall and Broden, 1967;Harris and Sherman, 1973;Hasazi and Hasazi, 1972;Hopkins, Schutte, and Garton, 1971;Jacobson, Bushell, and Risley, 1969;Knapczyk and Livingston, 1973;Lahey, McNees, and Brown, 1973;Martin, England, Kaprowy, Kilgour, and Pilek, 1968;Miller and Schneider, 1970;Salzberg, Wheeler, Devar, and Hopkins, 1971; Wolk, Giles, and and token systems with more potent backups became popular alternatives (O'Leary and Becker, 1967, p. 637;Quay, Werry, McQueen, and Sprague, 1966). Studies that dealt with token systems typically dropped the analysis of adult attention and emphasized instead the effect of nonsocial consequences on appropriate classroom behavior.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Promptly, however, some researchers began examining the effect of another class of more-natural reinforcers-play activities and materials, and free time. These "natural" reinforcers were found in the home (Nordquist and Wahler, 1973;Phillips, 1968), in psychiatric institutions (Ayllon and Azrin, 1968;Mitchell and Stoffelmayr, 1973), and in educational settings for children and adolescents.6 It has been argued that natural reinforcers should be used whenever 6Betancourt and Zeiler, 1971;Brigham et al, 1972;Harris and Sherman, 1973;Hopkins et al, 1971;Jacobson et al, 1969;Knapczyk and Livingston, 1973;Miller and Schneider, 1970;Osborne, 1969;Reynolds and Risley, 1968;Salzberg et al, 1971;Wolf et al, 1968. possible because they should facilitate generalization of behavior change (Axelrod, 1971;Lovaas, Koegel, Simmons, and Long, 1973).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Interactions Between Teacher Guidance and Contingent Access to Play in Developing Preacademic Skills of Deviant Preschool Children1

Rowbury

Baer

1976

Token-mediated access to play and snacks was made contingent on completion of academic tasks in the Baseline Experiment. This contingency produced stable completion rates that were subsequently doubled, and then tripled, for four deviant children in a special preschool. A reversal design demonstrated that the contingency was functional in maintaining the children's rates of task completion. The Guidance Experiment examined the role of a social event, teacher guidance, in the acquisition of task-completion skills, in a multiple-baseline-across-tasks design (with reversals). The analysis demonstrated that teacher guidance was an important supplement to the token-mediated contingency in establishing significant increases in task completions for a second group of three deviant children in the special class. The importance of teacher guidance was related to the difficulty level of the children's tasks.