Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Introduction

Hi, and thanks for your interest in "The Inventory of Good Learner Repertoires". This blog has just been opened....minutes ago, and I want to introduce myself and orient you to the purpose of this blog. My name is Steve Ward, and I've worked with a variety of educational approaches. I became interested in creating the current inventory when I noticed that most educational teams emphasize skill acquisition MUCH more than the quality of learner responding. I've also noticed that many educational teams believe there is a "right way" to do everything. For example, therapists may say "I thought we were always supposed to use errorless teaching." Or, "I thought it was bad to use edibles as reinforcement." One of the messages I'm trying to share with "The Inventory of Good Learner Repertoires" is that there is more than one way to do things. The first priority should be on establishing quality of responding, regardless of the types of behavioral adaptations in place. Later, all adaptations that differ from the natural environment or inclusive educational settings should be systematically removed. Shaping the quality of learner responding is a PROCESS. Believing in a single "right way" to do things creates STATIC programming, and is therefore frequently wrong vis-a-vis the needs of a particular learner.

I'm aware that the inventory can be confusing, especially to those relatively new to the field of behavior analysis. Therefore, this blog is intended to serve 2 purposes:
-assisting consumers with understanding the rationales behind "The Inventory of Good Learner Repertoires"
-assisting consumers with scoring questions

I do want to make one quick point on scoring....please don't "sweat it" too hard. Theoretically, hard data could be taken on every one of the 137 items contained in the inventory. Most programs will already be gathering hard data on SOME of the items. But consideration of MOST of the items will be new to most educational teams. Early feedback on interobserver agreement is positive. I think it is more important for scores to be REPRESENTATIVE than to necessarily be precise. So, if you can't decide whether to score something as "almost always" or "sometimes", just ask yourself whether your learner might benefit from further growth on that item. If so, score it "sometimes".

I suppose that's enough for an introduction.

Thanks, and I look forward to hearing from you.
Steve

2 comments:

lindsay said...

Terri & Steve

Yeah, celebration! I just bought your book and can't wait to share it with my coworkers. I have one little girl in particular that I am working with that has many "splinter skills" and I know this assessment will help us know where to fill in the gaps to enable her to be a better learner. Thank you, thank you for all the hard work and dedication it took to make this fabulous assessment. As a therapist I believe it to be an invaluable tool for every program.

Lindsay Sherry, BCABA

Unknown said...

Hi, I just wanted to let everyone know that the follow-up book, "Teaching Good Learner Repertoires" is in the works. I've been pleased with the responsiveness to workshops on the IGLR, and have heard the cry for recommendations about how to translate IGLR profiles into lesson plans. THANKS!

I will also be posting some recommendations, especially related to calming, on our website, www.wholechildconsulting.com, very soon.

Steve