Where is the student now? Where do you want him to be? Given the sub-skill you selected within your task analysis (your starting point for instruction), how can you shape this behavior into a practical skill for the future?
By the time you get to the point of setting up practice, the student has at least a limited set of strategies for organizing space, for self-monitoring, and for managing deadlines. You have targeted an additional strategy of using a script or set of visual instructions for a cooperative plan. After orienting the student to the plan, you may have to initially set up practice in the use of the plan in cooperative activities that can be completed within a class period so that you can help the student use all the steps in one relatively short interval. Repeated trials with short-interval tasks build motor memory and fluency in the use of the steps. Setting up group activities that are readily divided into nearly equal parts is also a key in early teaching of the negotiation process.
Over time, you may increase the complexity of the plan by increasing the time necessary to complete a task. You can add a step at a time to the task complexity itself so that the student gets increased success in dealing with more complex tasks with a peer. You might add complexity in the dividing of responsibilities. Over time, you can add another peer to a comparable task so that the three students have to negotiate and problem solve together.
What visual supports (scripts, instructions, reminder cues, etc.) will you use to help the student rehearse the expected behavior or skill?
It is likely that the student has a calendar or agenda, a notebook organizational system, and some other visual supports (reminder cards, visual instructions, etc.) to address quality of performance and timelines. Hopefully, he has agreed to use a script or set of instructions for a collaborative plan.
What type of prompting might you need to provide in the initial learning phase?
The use of a script or collaborative plan, after orientation, will probably be self-implemented by the student as a result of verbal prompting and social praise by the instructor. In other words, the student will use the system himself from the beginning. Modeling of the entire process by an instructor is not necessarily appropriate. Verbal modeling prompts of specific steps (“Say it like this – ‘I would like to do this part….’) can support the student in using the process.
However, a potentially high degree of monitoring by a primary instructor will be necessary at first to not only support the student in using the plan but to identify ‘trouble spots’ or places where the script or plan requires adjustment to support successful planning and independent use of the plan in the future.
Using a collaborative plan requires repeated practice with monitoring support both to encourage the student to use the plan and to adjust the plan so that the student is comfortable using it. Again, always look to reducing personal prompts, to hesitating and to reinforcing initiation in the use of the list.
What is your plan for systematically and quickly fading out your prompting? How do you time and fade the prompt to support the student in initiating the target behavior?
As you verbally prompt once, be prepared to hesitate (time delay), provide gestures to existing visual cues and socially praise initiation by the student in using the system. Keep in mind the need to reduce your personal cues by delaying prompts and socially reinforcing any consistent increases in initiation of performance by the student. *If you find you are prompting a great deal, this is probably a sign that the plan or visual instructions are not sufficiently clear. Adjust them so that you can fade prompts.
Can the student discriminate between the more versus less appropriate response in a given role-play scenario? Are you arranging opportunities for the student to make such discriminations and to label when the instructor or someone else performs the behavior incorrectly?
The use of role-plays may not always be beneficial here. In some cases, breaking out specific skills like negotiation or dividing responsibilities and providing repeated role-plays to support communication confidence may be helpful.
Actual problems, actual assignments, actual tasks lend themselves to success in using this process. The lead instructor may need to set up assignments that require the use of the visual supports and the collaborative plan that are initially short and simple. With practice, does the student begin to recognize when he does not use the system well? Can he label this in himself as a result of practice? Obviously, it is more beneficial for him to label when he follows steps of the plan well or when he uses his agenda as expected.
Are you arranging frequent practice opportunities to build fluency through repetition?
As noted, the repeated presentation of simple and short tasks that require cooperation can lead to fluency and independent use of supports. Your incremental additions of length and complexity of tasks can sustain fluency with success.
What steps do you need to take to ensure that everyone targeting that skill applies the same level of prompting and fades it out at the same rate to support initiation by the student?
Avoid failure in the use of the system. If the project before a student is clearly beyond his ability, how will you redesign or restructure the project so that the student can succeed? What steps will you remove from the student’s responsibilities? Which steps are carried out by someone else?