Association for Behavior Analysis International

Paraphrasing is a skill that which is fundamental in academic training, especially at a university level. This ability is considered as a study strategy. Starting from the fact that paraphrasing is a skill that can be trained, the objective of the present study is to evaluate a program to reinforce this skill. The program was developed through the Moodle platform, consisting of the phases of: Welcome, Instructions, Pretest, Intervention and Posttest and Acknowledgment. Both in the pretest and the posttest, an instrument was presented to evaluate with closed response options. In the Intervention phase, a phrase was shown to the participant and they had to press a key to continue, later the same phrase and three response options were shown, which alluded to different types of paraphrasing. The phrases could be from methodology, biology or psychology. Once the student selected the phrase, he could earn 1 or 5 points depending on the type of paraphrase. The program recorded both the selection and the latency in the responses. A non-probabilistic sample was used, made up of 90 students belonging to the online Psychology career. The design was Pretest-Posttest. The results were analyzed descriptively, the main measure was the selection by the participants of the type of paraphrase and the correct answers. The main finding is correct execution in training. A change was also observed in the selection of paraphrases, from basic to complex. It is concluded that the educational platform is a good tool for learning the skill of paraphrasing.

Teacher training and performance are closely linked in the fulfillment of the curricular objectives set out in the proposed curriculum, so it is necessary to consider their influence during its implementation, however, there is almost no research in this regard. Objective: to evaluate the opinion of the students regarding the teaching practice in the two curricula (1976 and 2015), of the psychology career of a public university at the time when both plans were in force. Method: The COPDE (Student Opinion Questionnaire on Teaching Practice ) was applied in its digital version in three different academic periods. In total, 2651 were collected questionnaires. Results: Almost 50% of the teaching staff were evaluated. A factorial analysis of variance measuring the individual and joint effect of curricula (1976 and 2015) and application periods (2018-1, 2018-2 and 2019-2), on the dependent variable was performed. The data indicate significant interaction effects between the plan and the application of 2018-1 and 2018-2 (Sig. = 0.004) and between the plan and the application of 2018-1 and 2019 (Sig. = 0.001). Discussion: The performance evaluation allowed us to assess the impact of the process transition between both plans.

In this contribution, we aim to talk about Positive Behavior Support (PBS) in the context of Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA). We will introduce the workshop and its content, show examples of activities, and used tools for an assessment, and we will discuss the evaluation of the workshop. The evaluation will focus on the competencies of our participants, particularly problem definition, and functional behavioral assessment. Next, we will talk about the need for continual education in teachers and non-teaching employees in the field of PBS. We will start a discussion on possible next steps, focus on our future education and upcoming research.

The present study explored mainstream primary teachers, teaching in the Republic of Ireland, causal perspectives of disruptive behaviour in the classroom. It also explored teacher stress, self-efficacy, and years of experience and how these variables relate to causal perspectives of disruptive behaviour. A total of 109 mainstream primary teachers rated the likelihood of four causes (1. parental, family, home factors, 2. access to something in the immediate environment, 3. student difficulty, 4. developmental phase) to be the cause of nine disruptive classroom behaviours. The results found that teachers in the Irish primary education system believed that student difficulty such as “student disability, student personality, health issues or emotional issues” was the most likely cause of disruptive behaviour and developmental phase was the least likely cause of the disruptive behaviour. There were no significant differences on stress, self-efficacy and years of experience between teachers when they were grouped by primary causal perspective. There were however significant relationships between causal perspectives and self-efficacy and causal perspectives and years’ experience. These relationships, implications for practice and future research will be discussed.

Ludic activities can promote learning in different contexts and ages. To evaluate the impact of ludic activities on content learning in a psychology course in high school, a didactic planning centered in ludic activities was implemented. One hundred and fifty-three students (83 women and 70 men) between 15 and 17 years of age from a public high school in the north of the State of Jalisco in Mexico participated. This area is characterized by the presence of an important population of indigenous inhabitants. A quasi-experiment was carried out with 2 experimental groups and 2 control groups. Content learning was evaluated through a traditional exam administered at the beginning and at the end of the course. Results showed high performances in the experimental groups and in a control group. Only the control group where there were more students of indigenous origin did not show high performances in all the test items. It is suggested to evaluate in a subsequent experiment the effect of a didactics focused on ludic activities in school contexts with a high degree of cultural diversity.

Teaching with acoustical guidance (TAG) is a behavioural intervention that involved the delivery of an audible stimulus contingent on the performance of the desired response (Stokes et al., 2010), and may also be used in intervention packages, such as TAGteach (TAGteach International, 2004). TAG, TAGteach, or both, have been evaluated in a variety of domains including sports (e.g., Ennett et al., 2020; Harrison & Pyles, 2013; Quinn et al., 2015), gait rehabilitation (Baram & Miller; 2007; Cassamassima et al., 2014), and daily living skills (Wertalik et al., 2018); however, the terms TAG and TAGteach have been used somewhat inconsistently in the literature. The purpose of this poster is to discuss the findings of our scoping review on TAG and TAGteach interventions, and to explicitly differentiate these two interventions. This scoping review followed the systematic methodology guidelines outlined in PRISMA-SR. In doing so, we searched MEDLINE, PsychINFO, and ERIC to locate peer reviewed articles written in English that incorporated an audible stimulus to provide feedback during skill acquisition. Two independent reviewers screened the articles and extracted and synthesized the data. The results will be discussed within the context of practical implications and suggestions for future research.

The educational outcomes and quality of life of students with moderate-to-severe disabilities (MSD) are often dependent on the implementation of evidence-based practices (EBPs), such as systematic instruction (SI). However, paraeducators are often tasked with serving students with MSD despite prior knowledge or training in instructional strategies. Furthermore, special education teachers are often unprepared to train paraeducators’ to deliver instructional practices with a high degree of fidelity. ParaImpact, a coaching intervention package, seeks to address this need by training teachers to implement practice-based coaching (PBC), a model grounded in adult learning, to provide on-the-job training for paraeducators. Two multiple-baseline designs across skills were conducted with two teacher-paraeducator dyads to determine if there is a functional relation between implementation of ParaImpact and increases in fidelity of implementation of the components of SI for paraeducators. The four SI components included: environmental arrangement, prompting, error correction, and reinforcement. Results of both studies including social validity will be reviewed. Additionally, implications for future research and practice will be discussed.