So much literature about employing functional behavior analysis (FBA) has focused on applications with young children, that secondary educators rightfully may feel skeptical about employing this highly valuable technology. Well, three special educators associated with Clemson University have an article that should be helpful to educators concerned with students at the secondary level.

In “Implementing Functional Assessment–Based Interventions in Secondary Settings,” Catherine A. Griffith, Shanna E. Hirsch, and Tracy Burns provide sensible and readily applicable guidance about using FBAs and functional assessment–based intervention (FABIs). The article (link in the resources section) provides fabulous suggestions and sensible procedures in plain-easy-to-read language. This is not some way-technical report that requires one to have extensive background knowledge to undertand.

So, if you’re an educator who wonders why some of your secondary students have behavior issues, here you’ll find recommendations that you can put into practice starting tomorrow.

[Disclosure: Cathy and Shanna worked with me during their doctoral studies. Maybe I’m biased, but I think they’re pretty great! That their paper was published by TEC makes me think my evaluation of them has been validated.]

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Sources

Griffith, C. A., Hirsch, S. E., & Burns, T. (in press). Implementing functional assessment–based interventions in secondary settings. Teaching Exceptional Children, https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/00400599211029675