Improving On-Task Behavior in Middle School Students With Disabilities Using Activity Schedules
A plain paper activity schedule quickly lifted on-task behavior for every middle-school student with disabilities in math and language-arts class.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Four middle-school students in a resource room got a simple paper schedule.
The schedule showed the order of math and language-arts tasks.
Teachers used a multiple-baseline design to see if the tool raised on-task and on-schedule behavior.
What they found
Every student’s on-task behavior rose once the schedule arrived.
Teachers and kids both said the tool was helpful and easy.
How this fits with other research
Pilgrim et al. (2000) ran a similar study with younger kids. They also saw big gains, so the new study repeats the win at the middle-school level.
Koyama et al. (2011) looked at 23 studies and found schedules work across ages and settings. Mattson et al. (2020) now adds one more clear case to that pile.
Sances et al. (2019) and Lora et al. (2020) moved the same tool to adult beekeeping and high-school job tasks. The pattern shows one cheap aid scales from classroom to paycheck work.
Why it matters
You can print a schedule tonight and hand it to your learner tomorrow. No tokens, no apps, no extra staff. The tool cut problem off-task moments and kept kids in sync with the class pace. Try it in any small-group table or resource room to win back teaching time.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Middle school students receiving special education services for specific learning disabilities and other health impairments often struggle to remain on task and meet independent work demands. Although a variety of strategies have been documented as effective in improving on-task behavior in students with disabilities, most are not contextually appropriate for public schools. Activity schedules may provide an efficient, minimally intrusive, and low-effort intervention for middle school classrooms. In this study, a concurrent multiple-baseline design across participants with an embedded reversal was used to examine the effects of activity schedules on the on-task and on-schedule behavior of four middle school students with disabilities in a resource classroom. Results demonstrate increased on-task and on-schedule behavior for all participants in math and language arts settings, and students and teachers indicated both that they enjoyed the activity schedule and that it improved on-task behavior and work completion. Implications for practice and future research are discussed.
Behavior Analysis in Practice, 2020 · doi:10.1007/s40617-019-00373-2