The first step in the process of developing an effective behavior intervention plan is to systematically observe behavior. Behavior observation provides a thorough overview of a student's behavior in all educational environments. Valid and reliable classroom observation requires that the observer understands the purpose for the observation, has an operational definition of the behavior to be observed, has training in observation practice, observes behavior at established time intervals and records objective data about these observations.
An antecedent is an event, person(s) or thing that happens immediately preceding a challenging behavior. Knowing the antecedent to behaviors provides the behavior intervention team information about what triggers or initiates the targeted behavior. Antecedents may show that specific behaviors are related to the time of day when the behavior occurs, the activity that was going on right before the behavior or the person the student was interacting with immediately prior to exhibiting the behavior.
A behavior selected for modification in a behavior intervention plan must be specific, detailed and precise. Defining a behavior as simply, "The student has tantrums," is not specific enough. If tantrums are the problem behavior, an example of an appropriate description would be, "The student yells obscenities at teacher and peers, hits and kicks peers in close proximity, and hits self in the face." This description identifies specific behaviors that can now be modified.
Students learn that some behaviors have positive consequences and others have negative consequences. Functional behavior analysis suggests that students exhibit a behavior primarily to obtain something (e.g., attention from adults or peers), or to avoid something (e.g., a situation or expectation). The consequence section of a behavior assessment identifies what happened immediately after the targeted behavior occurred. Teachers and peers both provide consequences to a child for behavior. Teachers may send the student to time out, yell, reprimand or ignore. Peers may laugh, fight back, cry or tattle.
Effective behavior intervention plans use the data collected during the observation of antecedents, behaviors and consequences to determine what strategies to use in changing the behavior. Strategies are developed that directly correlate with the observation data. In addition to the planned intervention, ongoing assessment is included in the plan and defines how the teacher and team will track behavior to determine the effectiveness of the plan.
To determine if a behavior plan is effective, the same method of data collection needs to be repeated within a timeline set by the team. Repeated observations yield data that show whether or not the desired behavior increases and the undesirable behavior decreases, indicating that the behavior intervention was effective. The process of charting antecedents and consequences is repeated if the data show the plan was ineffective, and these new data are used to make changes to the plan.