Staff Development

1
Staff Development

• ED 571 School and Home-Based Programs for
  Children with Autism

2
School-Based Program
3
Players

• Instructional aides
• Teachers
• Staff Trainer
• Related service providers
• Director Supervisor
• Supervisors
• Consultant
• Administrators
• Secretarial
• Medical
• Financial/Business
• Others?

4
Credentials

• What are the qualifications of the
• aides
• teachers
• staff trainers
• consultant

5
Hiring

• What is the interview process?
• Who should the candidate interview with?
• Administrative AND clinical

6
Hiring (cont)

• Interview
• Face to face
• where did they hear about the position
• Interest in position
• long short term goals
• Describe program AND requirements
• Minimally ONE year commitment
• Have candidate work with child
• Model, have candidate imitate, provide feedback,
  have candidate implement feedback

7
Staff Training

• Workshops/lecture
• Hands-on

8
Staff training Workshops/Lectures

• Monthly Workshop
• Various topics of ABA
• Teaching procedures (activity schedules, discrete
  trial, incidental) reinforcement, prompting,
  generalization
• Pre-service
• 3-4 days prior to beginning of school year
• autism, basic principles of ABA professionalism
  
• Staff development days
• 3-4 days per year (no students)

9
Staff Training Hands-on Training

• Observation
• Paired with staff trainer
• Model, have staff imitate, provide feedback, have
  staff implement feedback
• Alternate independence with training
• Use of video?

10
Other training opportunities

• Provide training to a new staff member
• Attend conferences
• Present at conferences
• other?

11
Program Make-up

• Allocation of staff across school program
• Allocation of individualized programs across
  instructors

12
Allocation of Staff Across School Program

• How do you allocate your teachers across program?
• Skills
• Career
• Move around program so can gain experience with
  multiple skill and age levels
• How do you allocate your instructors across
  program?
• Skills
• Career
• Move around program so can gain experience with
  multiple skill and age levels

13
Allocation of Individualized Programs Across
Instructors

• Teachers teach all foundational learning skills
• Contingency management
• On-task behavior
• Reinforcement system
• Easier programs for newer staff members
• E.g., gross/fine motor, matching
• Same programs across students
• Other?

14
Supervision

• What is the hierarchy?
• E.g., Director ?Consultant ? Teacher ? Instructor
• Related service providers?

15
Supervision (cont)

• Director Consultant
• Be sure the role of Director and role of
  Consultant is well delineated
• Teachers
• In terms of teachers supervising instructional
  staff, check union rules for a public school
• Consultant director should always empower the
  teachers with the instructional staff and parents
• How else can you increase accountability?

16
Communication among the Staff

• Classroom communication
• Ongoing hands-on training
• Effective for teacher to spend whole day with
  one child and train all staff members -this
  ensure consistency
• Brief after-school meeting about that student
• Weekly classroom meetings
• Systems in place to
• alert teacher when student is not making
  progress and observation/training is needed
• alert teacher when student needs new sets

17
Communication among the Staff

• Teacher collaboration
• Grade level teachers should collaborate minimally
  weekly
• Biggest asset in a program are your
  colleagues!!!!!

18
Communication among the Staff

• Program communication
• Weekly grade-level meetings with director
• Problem solving
• Ensure consistency across program
• Why is consistency important????
• Weekly management meetings
• Consultant, trainers, director

19
Documentation

• For all meetings, notes should be taken and
  stored for future reference
• E.g., when consultant provides recommendations to
  a teacher, an e-mail is sent to all other
  consultants, teacher, and director

20
Evaluating Staff

• Who evaluates teachers, instructional aides,
  consultant?

21
Evaluating Staff (cont)

• Annual evaluations of all staff members
• contract contingent on successful evaluation
• Ongoing brief evaluations of all staff
• Ongoing data notebook evaluations
• External programmatic review

22
Ongoing brief staff evaluation

• In one session, collect data on
• On-task
• Opportunities to respond
• Contingency management
• Incidental teaching

23
Annual staff evaluation

• Professionalism
• On-Task
• Opportunities to respond
• Behavior-descriptive praise
• Teaching new skills
• Incidental teaching
• Programming generalization
• Teaching social competence
• Relationship building
• Decreasing problem behavior
• Understanding intervention technology
• Maintaining the physical environment
• Assessing personal appearance

24
Ongoing data notebook evaluation

• Sufficient data collection
• Progress
• Generalization probes
• IOA
• Explanatory statements
• Consent
• Accurate graphing techniques
• Neat and professional
• Can administrator do this?

25
Annual Notebook evaluation

• Number of programs reviewed
• Number of individualized programs
• Percentage of individualized programs
• Number of programs rated effective
• Percentage of programs rated effective
• Number of programs rated appropriate
• Percentage of programs rated appropriate
• Percentage of programs with current consent
• Percentage of programs with some/any
  interobserver agreement

26
External Programmatic Evaluation

• Objective professional evaluates program by
  evaluating data notebooks
• Who does this evaluate?

27
Retention

• How do you keep morale high and retain your
  staff?
• Preps/lunch
• Daily hours
• Teacher support
• Appropriate resources
• Professionalism
• Open communication

28
Home-Based Program
29
Players

• Instructional aides
• Teachers
• Staff Trainer
• Consultant
• Financial/Business
• Others?

30
Recruitment

• Where do you get the instructors from?
• How about the teachers?

31
Credentials

• What are the qualifications of the
• aides
• teachers
• staff trainers
• consultant

32
Hiring

• What is the interview process?
• Who should the candidate interview with?
• Parent consultant

33
Hiring

• Interview
• Face to face
• where did they hear about the position
• Interest in position
• long short term goals
• Describe program AND requirements
• Minimally ONE year commitment
• 10 hours per week with child
• 2 hrs per day 5 days per week
• No more than 4 staff members with child
• Have candidate work with child
• Model, have candidate imitate, provide feedback,
  have candidate implement feedback

34
Staff Training

• Workshops/lecture
• Hands-on

35
Staff training Workshops/Lectures

• Monthly Workshop
• Various topics of ABA
• Teaching procedures (activity schedules, discrete
  trial, incidental) reinforcement, prompting,
  generalization

36
Staff TrainingHands-on Training

• Observation of skilled staff member
• Paired with staff trainer
• Model, have staff imitate, provide feedback, have
  staff implement feedback
• Alternate independence with training
• Consultant/trainer needs to train with each staff
  member minimally weekly
• Use of video?

37
Other training opportunities

• Provide training to a new staff member
• Attend conferences
• Present at conferences
• other?

38
Program Make-up

• Allocation of staff across home program
• Allocation of individualized programs across
  instructors

39
Allocation of Staff Across Program

• How do you allocate your instructors across home
  program?
• Skills
• Career

40
Allocation of Individualized Programs Across
Instructors

• Consultant/trainer teaches all foundational
  learning skills
• Contingency management
• On-task behavior
• Reinforcement system
• Easier programs for newer staff members
• Other?

41
Supervision

• What is the hierarchy?
• E.g., Consultant ? Trainer ? Instructor
• Parents?
• Related service providers?

42
Communication among the Staff

• Home program communication
• Ongoing hands-on training
• Effective for trainer to see all staff members
  minimally weekly to ensure consistency

43
Communication among the Staff

• Frequently
• Overlap sessions to allow for collaboration
• Necessity of team meetings???

44
Documentation

• For all training, notes should be taken and
  stored for future reference
• E.g., when consultant provides recommendations to
  a staff member, an e-mail is sent to staff member
  and consultant
• Communication book among staff members?

45
Evaluating Staff

• Who evaluates instructional staff?
• consultant?

46
Evaluating Staff (cont)

• Annual staff evaluation
• Ongoing brief evaluations of all staff
• Ongoing data notebook evaluation
• External programmatic review??

47
Ongoing brief staff evaluation

• In one session, collect data on
• On-task
• Opportunities to respond
• Contingency management
• Incidental teaching

48
Annual staff evaluation

• Professionalism
• On-Task
• Opportunities to respond
• Behavior-descriptive praise
• Teaching new skills
• Incidental teaching
• Programming generalization
• Teaching social competence
• Relationship building
• Decreasing problem behavior
• Understanding intervention technology
• Maintaining the physical environment
• Assessing personal appearance

49
Ongoing data notebook evaluation

• Sufficient data collection
• Progress
• Generalization probes
• IOA
• Explanatory statements
• Consent
• Accurate graphing techniques
• Neat and professional
• Can parent do this?

50
Annual Notebook evaluation

• Number of programs reviewed
• Number of individualized programs
• Percentage of individualized programs
• Number of programs rated effective
• Percentage of programs rated effective
• Number of programs rated appropriate
• Percentage of programs rated appropriate
• Percentage of programs with current consent
• Percentage of programs with some/any
  interobserver agreement

51
External Programmatic Evaluation

• Objective professional evaluates program by
  evaluating data notebooks
• Many times, home programs wind up in due process
  there will be an expert witness, as well as a
  judge evaluating the data notebook

52
Retention

• How do you keep morale high and retain your
  staff?
• Different in home program because staff member
  works alone
• Overlap sessions
• trainer support
• Appropriate resources
• Professionalism
• Open communication