Is PBIS making a difference in your school climate? How do you know? It’s not enough to simply implement a PBIS framework and cross your fingers that it works. Progress monitoring is the regular assessment and adjustment of your PBIS initiative, and it is critical if you want to know how effective your PBIS initiative is.
Why Progress Monitoring
PBIS is not a one-size-fits-all approach. You must consider variables such as differences in student personalities, individual challenges, and staff performance. Adjusting your initiative for maximum effectiveness is reliant on solid data from progress monitoring the PBIS initiative in your school.
Progress monitoring takes emotion and guesswork out of the equation and allows you to:
- Make targeted adjustments based on data
- See where changes are needed
- Identify which strategies are working
- Monitor progress in social skills
- Adjust interventions for specific students
- Keep staff and administrators focused
- Win over reluctant staff
- Use resources more wisely
- Identify which students can move away from interventions
- Determine which components can be phased out
- And much more!
Progress monitoring builds accountability into the system. Tracking and evaluating behaviors and interventions provides solid data. Solid data means that you can improve what you are able to measure.
What to Monitor in Your PBIS Initiative
In order to get a clear picture of how effective your PBIS framework is performing, you must examine three key areas:
1) Monitoring at the Student Level
Tracking interventions student-by-student and comparing the number of corrections over a certain period can provide useful data for targeted improvements. Look at the behaviors being targeted and determine if they are specific and measurable.
2) Monitoring at the PBIS Initiative Level
Data collection for the overall initiative can take significant time and effort, but it is important for all staff members to have access to this information. An overview of all data allows staff to see the larger picture, particularly when it comes to identifying behavior patterns. It also allows you to determine if your staff is using the initiative with fidelity.
3) Including Parents
Parents want to see their child succeed. Students who require interventions benefit greatly from parental involvement. Involving parents via behavioral charts, weekly reports, phone calls, and face-to-face discussions can often provide insight into behaviors you will learn no other way. These conversations can also help to assure consistency in addressing behaviors both at school and at home. Remember to focus on the positive.
Improving Your PBIS Initiative Monitoring
Tracking and analyzing all of the data from a PBIS initiative can be a Herculean task. Many schools rely on labor-intensive methods like spreadsheets or online forms like Google Docs. The challenge here is to update information in real time and make sure it is accurate.
Automating your PBIS initiative can help monitor both your initiative and individual students while providing solid data for decision-making. PBIS Rewards can be the digital token economy that your PBIS initiative needs to be its most successful. The PBIS software tracks useful information such as daily point goals, trends, and referrals. Reports generated through PBIS Rewards give administrators the whole picture and provide staff with the data they need to make necessary changes in their PBIS initiative.
A positive, successful school climate depends on accurate progress monitoring. How do you measure student progress in your PBIS initiative?