Preschoolers' compliance with simple instructions: a descriptive and experimental evaluation.

The team worked with preschoolers in a daycare classroom. They wanted to see how many antecedent tricks it takes to get kids to follow simple instructions.

First they tried one antecedent at a time: stand close, get eye contact, use a calm voice, and so on. Then they stacked all six together with three-step prompting.

Half the kids started complying after just a few antecedents were added. The rest needed the full six-variable package plus prompts to reach high compliance.

Once the full package was running, compliance stayed high until adult accuracy dropped below 20%. Then it fell apart fast.

Speights Roberts et al. (2008) showed the same antecedent-plus-praise recipe in a clinic. M et al. moved it into a noisy classroom and still got the same jump past 80% compliance.

Fullana et al. (2007) looks like a contradiction: their antecedent-only package failed for two of three preschoolers. The difference is M et al. kept adding pieces until they worked, while A et al. stopped after one tactic.

Rojahn et al. (2012) flipped the idea: instead of adding adult moves, they taught kids to stop, look, and say "yes." Both paths lift compliance, so you can pick teacher-focused or student-focused first.

If a child is still non-compliant after you stand close and speak calmly, don’t quit—layer in the rest of the package. Keep your own accuracy above 20% or the whole thing unravels. Use the checklist at every transition: proximity, eye contact, brief instruction, wait, prompt if needed. It’s a quick classroom-wide routine that saves time spent on re-direction later.