How Can Teachers Use the Strategy of Acknowledging Positive Behaviors?
• Give positive responses to the desired behavior in that particular child, and to other children in the classroom who are behaving well, and avoid responding when that behavior is not occurring. This approach also requires that adults give positive responses to desired child behavior and do their best to avoid responding when that behavior is not occurring, unless safety issues arise. Positive responses involve communicating verbally and nonverbally with the child but can also include presenting favorite objects (toys or books), pictures, sounds, or other items. Kathy was worried that if she ignored inappropriate behavior the children might end up completely out of control. Hank listened to her concerns and told her about some of the problems that he ran into when he started acknowledging children’s positive behaviors in a classroom setting. Hank told Kathy that behavior gets worse before it gets better when you withdraw attention and reward (the response extinction pattern). However,
