An evaluation of the teach‐back method for training new skills
Ask staff to explain the procedure back to you, add 30 seconds of spoken feedback, and you hit a large share integrity in under five minutes.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Sleiman et al. (2023) tested a two-step staff-training trick. Step one: teach-back. After you show a new skill, ask the worker to explain it back to you. Step two: if needed, give 30 seconds of spoken feedback.
No slides, no packets, no rehearsal. The team ran a single-case experiment with adults who had to learn a six-step autism intervention. Integrity scores were tracked minute-by-minute.
What they found
Teach-back alone pushed every worker to a large share correct steps. Adding the quick chat lifted all of them to a large share. Gains showed up right away and stayed high.
The whole package took less than five minutes per person.
How this fits with other research
Slane et al. (2021) reviewed 20 earlier BST studies and found most needed longer packages. Sleiman cuts the time to minutes while still hitting high marks.
Neely et al. (2022) also reached a large share fidelity, but used full BST over four Zoom sessions. Teach-back gives the same end point in one brief face-to-face turn.
Gladstone et al. (1975) proved you can train high-school helpers with just a video and practice. Sleiman updates that low-resource spirit: now only a short conversation is required.
Why it matters
You can run teach-back on the clinic floor, in the classroom, or during home visits. No prep, no handouts. Ask the staff member to teach the steps back, give a sentence or two of praise or correction, and move on. It is the fastest known path to near-perfect treatment integrity.
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After you demo a skill, pause and say, 'Now you tell me the steps.' Fix any error out loud, then start the session.
02At a glance
03Original abstract
There are several effective training packages (e.g., behavioral skills training, video modeling, and self-instruction packages) available to train staff. Despite their efficacy, these training procedures require substantial time or preplanning and resources to create materials. Teach-back, an empirically validated method used in the healthcare setting to enhance communication between clinicians and patients, does not require any preplanning or materials. However, this method has yet to be investigated in the context of training and supervision. The purpose of this experiment was to evaluate the efficacy of teach-back in training participants to implement preference assessments and a token economy. The teach-back method improved procedural integrity to at least 88%, and the addition of vocal-verbal feedback resulted in all participants achieving 100% integrity in all skills. We discuss the implications of these findings.
Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 2023 · doi:10.1002/jaba.966