BEST in CLASS

School of Education

About the Implementation

BEST in CLASS is implemented through three interactive components:

  1. BEST in CLASS Teacher Workshop (or online modules)
  2. BEST in CLASS Teacher Manual
  3. BEST in CLASS Practice-based Coaching (in-vivo or web-based)

Additionally, effective strategies for enhancing Home-School Communication (HSC) are embedded throughout all components of the intervention, with an expanded HSC component included in the BEST in CLASS-Elementary project (referred to as Home-School Partnerships).

BEST in CLASS Teacher Workshop

The in-person BEST in CLASS intervention begins with a six-hour workshop that provides introductory information about the BEST in CLASS as well as detailed information on how to implement the practices with focal children. Participants in BEST in CLASS-Web are given access to web-based learning modules that provides the same information (e.g., including definitions of the practices, exemplar videos, and interactive knowledge checks).

BEST in CLASS Teacher Manual

The BEST in CLASS Teacher Manual helps extend teachers’ knowledge about the BEST in CLASS practices and is used as a resource. Included within the BEST in CLASS Teacher Manual is an overview of each of the practices, guidelines for how to implement each practice with focal children in classrooms settings, strategies for how to communicate to children’s caregivers about these practices for use at home, and the role of the BEST in CLASS coach. BEST in CLASS- PK practices include:

Module 1: Rules

  • Describes the effective use of classroom rules to support children’s compliance and appropriate behavior. Young children with challenging behavior can benefit from teachers having a few, short and simply worded classroom rules.

Module 2: Precorrection

  • Describes the effective use of precorrection to prevent children’s challenging behaviors. Precorrection happens before transitioning to a new activity and lets the focal child know what to expect in upcoming activity and what specific behavior expectations exist for that activity.

Module 3: Opportunities to Respond (OTR)

  • Describes the effective use of opportunities to respond and enhanced instructional pacing to increase children’s engagement, while decreasing their challenging behaviors. Focal children who are actively participating have less time to engage in challenging behaviors and teachers can focus on their instruction.

Module 4: Behavior Specific Praise (BSP)

  • Describes the effective use of behavior specific praise to increase children’s appropriate behaviors. When teachers use BSP with a focal child, that child knows that they behaved in a way their teacher appreciates and they can identify a behavior that they can engage in to earn positive attention in the future.

Module 5: Corrective Feedback (CF)

  • Describes the effective us of corrective feedback to support children’s learning and increase their correct responses and appropriate behaviors. Focal children can benefit from knowing when their behavior doesn’t meet classroom expectations, or their answers aren’t correct, so they can improve their response to the next opportunity to respond.

Module 6: Instructive Feedback (IF)

  • Describes the effective use of instructive feedback to expand high-risk children’s learning of academic and behavioral concepts. For young children with challenging behavior, instructive feedback provides positive feedback for their positive behavior or correct response to a question and increases their opportunity to learn new information.

Module 7: Linking and Mastery (LM)

  • Provides an overview of linking and mastering BEST in CLASS practices to ensure effective and continued use. Young children with challenging behavior can benefit from teachers linking the BEST in CLASS practices together to increase engagement and reduce problem behavior.  When a teacher gives a rules reminder to a focal child, “Remember our rule is…”, she can follow it with an opportunity to respond, “Can you show me how you…”, and then deliver BSP as soon as the child demonstrates the requested behavior, “I like the way you showed me…”.

 

BEST in CLASS-Elementary practices include:

Module 1: Supportive Relationships

  • Describes how to develop supportive relationships with young students with unwanted problem behavior. This module also helps teachers support the emotion regulation of their focal students.

Module 2: Rules

  • Describes the effective use of classroom rules to support student’s compliance and appropriate behavior. Young students with unwanted problem behavior can benefit from teachers having a few, short and simply worded classroom rules.

Module 3: Precorrection

  • Describes the effective use of precorrection to prevent student’s challenging behaviors. Precorrection happens before transitioning to a new activity and lets the focal student know what to expect in upcoming activity and what specific behavior expectations exist for that activity.

Module 4: Opportunities to Respond (OTR)

  • Describes the effective use of opportunities to respond and enhanced instructional pacing to increase student’s engagement, while decreasing their challenging behaviors. Focal students who are actively participating have less time to engage in challenging behaviors and teachers can focus on their instruction.

Module 5: Praise

  • Describes the effective use of praise to increase student’s appropriate behaviors. When teachers use praise with a focal student, that student knows that they behaved in a way their teacher appreciates and they can identify a behavior that they can engage in to earn positive attention in the future.

Module 6: Home-School Partnership

  • Helps teachers build effective, trusting partnerships with caregivers in a

culturally responsive manner.

Module 7: Linking and Mastery (LM)

  • Provides an overview of linking and mastering BEST in CLASS practices to ensure effective and continued use.

 

BEST in CLASS Practice-Based Coaching

Along with the BEST in CLASS Teacher Workshop and the BEST in CLASS Teacher Manual, teachers receive 14 weeks of practice-based coaching (including performance feedback). Each teacher works collaboratively with a trained BEST in CLASS coach. The role of the coach is to provide technical assistance and support to the teachers in helping them enhance their use of the BEST in CLASS practices with identified focal children (i.e., children who have been identified as being “high risk” for developing emotional/behavioral disorders and who are participating in BEST in CLASS). Teachers participating in In BEST in CLASS can receive online coaching via ZoomTM (video conferencing) and the TORSHTM  online platform or coaching in person.

Teachers and coaches meet weekly to develop an action plan for increasing and enhancing their use of the BEST in CLASS practices in their classroom. Following a focused observation, the coach and the teacher meet to review the teacher practice data, reflect on teacher practice, share performance feedback, discuss support strategies and to plan next steps. The coach also helps the teacher plan strategies for communicating with the focal children’s caregivers about using of these strategies in their home.